"Maybe would it be helpful for someone to distill what the two camps seem to be fighting over? I mean this is harder to figure out than who was right about the Trojan War! where do DM and WM/TEP disagree and why?"
MikeM:
I do hear you----it probably is hard to figure out what all the arguing and fighting is over. But you read "The Missing Faces of Merion" so you should just start by asking yourself what premises he's making and what conclusion he comes to that doesn't seem to be part of Merion's architectural history. Now, granted, I admit you may not know what Merion's architectural history is but we certainly do.
I think the difference of opinion that we (Wayne Morrison and I) have with that essay is that it infers that C.B. Macdonald (Whigam) essentially routed Merion East in 1910 and in 1911 Wilson and his committee basically just built the golf course to that Macdonald routing (this is the essence of the essay's premises that Wilson was too much of a novice to route and design it and also the premise of what the terms "lay out" and "Construction Committee" means. The Francis story also figures prominently in his essay as to its timing in 1910.
We don't think it happened that way at all for a lot of reasons, some of which we believe are:
1. There was no routing in 1910 for a number of reasons.
2. That Francis idea (#15 & #16) took place in 1911 not 1910 as the essay says it did.
3. The roll in the entire move to Ardmore of Horatio Gates Lloyd, the details of which were not well known to us or seemingly to the Merion G.C. history writers.
As far as we're concerned if Macdonald really did provide Merion with the routing the course was originally built to he very much deserves almost co-equal design credit with Wilson and his committee and if that turns out to be proved we would suggest to Merion that he get almost co-equal design credit.
Macdonald/Whigam definitely advised Merion on their move to Ardmore and the way they went about creating the course (with a committee and perhaps a professinal engineer) and the club has always given them credit for that including from Hugh Wilson and his brother Alan who was there to see it every step of the way.
There most certainly is an on-going enigma here, though, and it's that story that Wilson went abroad in 1910 and returned with reams of drawings and sketches and surveyors maps and such. That story very well may've been a total non-event and it may not have even come within five decades of the creation of Merion. We can't find any mention of it within that timeframe of the creation of Merion or within decades of it other than some may've misconstrued what Alan Wilson said in his report about the creation of Merion about fifteen years after the fact----eg "the land was FOUND in 1910 and as a first step, Mr. Wilson was sent abroad to study the more famous links in Scotland and England." Remember, Alan Wilson wrote that fifteen years after the fact and to him 'a first step' may not have been 1910, particularly seeing as when Alan Wilson wrote that report in 1926 the course was still not really finished.
The point here is, however, even if Wilson did not go abroad in 1910 it does not mean that he and his committee did not route, design and build that course in 1911. But they always said Macdonald advised them in certain ways and made some suggestions. Alan Wilson's report says that Hugh and his committee designed and built the East and West course and that; "On his return the plan was gradually evolved and while largely helped by many excellent suggestions and much good advice from the other members of the committee, they have each told me that he is the person in the main responsible for the architecture of this and the West courses."
We have no reason to doubt that Alan Wilson report, at this point. Some on here call that report a glorified eulogy, and inaccurate on Alan Wilson and the other members of Hugh Wilson's committee's part---- but we don't. Our opinion is it's the truth, and we believe these recently rediscovered MCC board meeting minutes confirm its accuracy!