Flynn & Peters II

[Thomas MacWood]

Since the other thread has been hijacked.

On a previous post it was mentioned that Peters attended college at Amherst. That would be the Massachusetts Agricultural College, which is also the school that Hatch (Ross's associate) and Burbeck attended, and where I speculated Robert White studied agronomy. I believe the USGA Green Section had some ties to that school as well. Peters may have had some indirect connection to the USGA, although the more likely scenerio is a connection to Johnson Contractors.

What courses in Eastern Pa and environs were built by Johnson Contractors?

[Thomas MacWood]

But back to the thread . . .

Wayne, I am confused about a few things. 

1. Early in the thread you stated that Peters was not involved in any design work with Flynn.  Later you state that Peters was involved with Flynn in some unknown capacity.   Could you clarify?   
 -  Are you saying he was not involved with design work, but was involved in some other capacity? 
 -  Or are you now saying that you do not know whether Peters was involved in the design work? 
-   If you are still denying that Peters was involved in design work, what is your basis for doing so?   

2.  You wrote, "That 1979 letter mentioned a course her father built for Wm Plunkett in Heartwellville, VT."    Is this the basis for you concluding that Flynn designed this course?   
-  Why would you equate building a course with designing it? 
-  Is there any other evidence that Flynn actually designed the course?  Or is there only the mention that he built it?

[wsmorrison]

 


You and your protege should worry about your own foolish and error filled essays and posts.  You have three courses open to you--you can continue to make an ass of yourself, especially if you remain allied with your protege; you can move on once and for all and give up your attempts to discredit for you only discredit yourself; or you can be silent.

Which three courses did you open in 2008?

[Thomas MacWood]

Wayne
No one is forcing you to answer the questions; if you are uncomfortable answering the questions or discussing a subject you've spent the last eight years studying and researching so be it.

IMO it would be better to delve into the areas where your information is lacking or your story a little sketchy today (like Hartwellville, Peters and Toomey), rather than to wait until the book is already in print.

[TEPaul]

"Wayne
No one is forcing you to answer the questions; if you are uncomfortable answering the questions or discussing a subject you've spent the last eight years studying and researching so be it.

IMO it would be better to delve into the areas where your information is lacking or your story a little sketchy today (like Hartwellville, Peters and Toomey), rather than to wait until the book is already in print."


Mr. MacWood:

If delving into the areas where, in your opinion, Wayne Morrison's information is lacking or his story is a little sketchy is your real interest here, which it must be when one considers what you just said above, perhaps what you need to do is what he's done and spend about eight years researching this entire subject on your own or with the help of that self-possessed essayist on whose faces are missing at Merion.

If that is something you are really interested in, as before, it would be my suggestion that this time you actually visit Philadelphia and its golf courses as Wayne and I and the rest over here have done for so many years now.

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
No need to get defensive. I think one of the primary reasons many of us are involved with this website is to learn and to discover the truth. If you have problem with that intent, no one is forcing you to participate.

[TEPaul]

Mr. MacWood:

Again, despite your constant refrain that most anything said to you by anyone from this end is just being defensive, I guarantee you it is not being defensive.

If your interest on here is to constantly pick apart trivial details in and around the years of research by Wayne Morrison (apparently generated by information contained in a long obsolete draft of the Flynn book he sent you years ago) then it is our suggestion you do your own research or just wait for the book to come out. It really isn't worth our time and effort to waste weeks and months answering all your constant questions on here because you do not have the ability or the methodology to have done it or do it on your own.

Just wait for the book to come out or do your own research instead of always depending on us to do it for you so you can seemingly endlessly deny it and argue with us over it.

There's no question at all you and your protege do this and have done it for quite some time now to try to make yourself out to be 'expert, independent researchers' superior to Morrison or me or anyone else. This isn't speculation or defensiveness on our part, as anyone can see you two constantly remind everyone on here of it.

Therefore, if you feel as you do it makes perfect sense that you do your own research and familiarize yourselves with these subjects as we have certainly done without your help and some need to ask you a zillion questions. 

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
If you think that trying to discover who Peter and Toomey were or what really happened at Hartwellville is trivial no one is forcing you to participate. Personally I believe getting the facts straight at Heartwellville, Flynn's first excursion into golf arch or golf constrution, is important, nor do I think getting a better picture of the two partners he had during his design career is trivial either.

You obviously have nothing to add to this subject, please refrain from hijacking this one too.

[wsmorrison]

IMO it would be better to delve into the areas where your information is lacking or your story a little sketchy today (like Hartwellville, Peters and Toomey), rather than to wait until the book is already in print.

It is Heartwellville, Mr. MacWood, not Hartwellville.

We do not know what if anything Frederick Peters did in golf design with or without Flynn.  Maybe you do.  Since we do not, just what are we supposed to convey to readers?  We mentioned his short partnership with Flynn and possible design collaboration.  As far as we know, there is nothing more to say.  We don't make guesses as you are prone to do and present as fact.

We don't have a picture of Toomey.  We have sources that indicate he did zero golf architecture work while partnered with Flynn in Toomey and Flynn, which was only a contracting engineering firm building courses to Flynn's plans.  Perhaps you think our archival sources and personal recollections are lying.  Why don't you call up David Gordon and Flynn's daughter and tell them you know more than they do.

Why don't you ignore Tom and I, and Philadelphia golf for that matter?  Move on to other legends and histories that you can rewrite.  Find new people to tell they are lying or mistaken.  You are trite and boring.

Why don't you stick to figuring out how many courses Flynn opened in 1927?  Why don't you publish your findings about Macdonald and Whigham routing and designing Merion East and being the driving forces behind course involved in the move from Haverford to Ardmore?  Never mind that you've never been here to see for yourself how ludicrous your flights of fantasy have been.  I invited you here to show you around, show you the archives and show you the proof of your mistakes.  Take me up on that and let's move past this.  

Stop with your tired accusations of defensiveness and other discrediting statements.  I've said it before and I'll say it again.  Leave us alone and we'll leave you alone.  You are the initiator.  You are the one that starts all these threads in a flawed attempt to go after Tom, Mike, myself and everyone else in the Philadelphia metropolitan area.  Shine your dim light elsewhere.

I spent 8 years researching and studying Flynn.  I don't need to discuss anything with you.  I wrote it all down.  You cannot force me to answer anything.  You have no control over me and your attempts to humiliate me backfires and humiliates you.  Your protege takes self-humiliation to here-to-fore unknown depths.  While you may think I've got something to hide or I want to protect legends, it is far simpler than that.  I don't like your attitude, your mission and your sidekick.  Oh, by the way, your conclusions are often wrong.

Now, Tom MacWood, how many courses did Flynn have open in 1927?  Three?  What were they?

[Thomas MacWood]

Wayne
You seem particularly bitter and sensative today. Any excercise that uncovers new information is a good excercise IMO. Because you don't know much about Peters, his activities and the nature of their partnership I would have thought you'd welcome a thread like this, but if you are uncomfortable no one his forcing you to participate.

I would disagree with you regarding my 'guesses". I try to be clear when making statements that are factual as opposed to educated speculation. For example I have recently said the facts point to Findlay designing Heartwellville, not Findlay designed Heartwellville. Unlike your statement, 'It was here [Heartwellville] at the age of nineteen that Flynn was asked to design his first golf course, the Kilkare Golf Club, for Mr. William Plunkett, the owner of the nearby Berkshire Cotton Mills.' Would you characterize that as a guess or something else?

Regarding Peters, what courses in Eastern Pa and environs were built by Johnson Contractors?

Did Peters study landscape architecture at Massachusetts Agriculture College?

[TEPaul]

"You obviously have nothing to add to this subject, please refrain from hijacking this one too."

Mr. MacWood:

No problem at all. I think most everyone can see attempting to have a conversation or discussion with you on here about anything is a virtual waste of time. You should just continue to ply your own odd and fanciful and exaggerated notions about architects and courses and their histories. It seems pretty clear, at this point, that most understand to take them for what they're worth.

By the way, Wayne is right again---eg before you do your independent and expert research on the course that Flynn apparently first worked on in his career it might be a good idea for you to learn how to spell the name of the place correctly first!   

[Thomas MacWood]

Wayne/TE
Another good reason for a thread like this, you 2 seem to have a tendency to minimize or ignore persons you don't have much info on - for example long time partner Toomey is just a contractor and the mysterious Peters couldn't have had any involvement Flynn's design business and ignoring poor HH Barker's early routing.

[DMoriarty]

IMO it would be better to delve into the areas where your information is lacking or your story a little sketchy today (like Hartwellville, Peters and Toomey), rather than to wait until the book is already in print.

It is Heartwellville, Mr. MacWood, not Hartwellville.

We do not know what if anything Frederick Peters did in golf design with or without Flynn.  Maybe you do.  Since we do not, just what are we supposed to convey to readers?  We mentioned his short partnership with Flynn and possible design collaboration.  As far as we know, there is nothing more to say.  We don't make guesses as you are prone to do and present as fact.

We don't have a picture of Toomey.  We have sources that indicate he did zero golf architecture work while partnered with Flynn in Toomey and Flynn, which was only a contracting engineering firm building courses to Flynn's plans.  Perhaps you think our archival sources and personal recollections are lying.  Why don't you call up David Gordon and Flynn's daughter and tell them you know more than they do.

Why don't you ignore Tom and I, and Philadelphia golf for that matter?  Move on to other legends and histories that you can rewrite.  Find new people to tell they are lying or mistaken.  You are trite and boring.

Why don't you stick to figuring out how many courses Flynn opened in 1927?  Why don't you publish your findings about Macdonald and Whigham routing and designing Merion East and being the driving forces behind course involved in the move from Haverford to Ardmore?  Never mind that you've never been here to see for yourself how ludicrous your flights of fantasy have been.  I invited you here to show you around, show you the archives and show you the proof of your mistakes.  Take me up on that and let's move past this. 

Stop with your tired accusations of defensiveness and other discrediting statements.  I've said it before and I'll say it again.  Leave us alone and we'll leave you alone.  You are the initiator.  You are the one that starts all these threads in a flawed attempt to go after Tom, Mike, myself and everyone else in the Philadelphia metropolitan area.  Shine your dim light elsewhere.

I spent 8 years researching and studying Flynn.  I don't need to discuss anything with you.  I wrote it all down.  You cannot force me to answer anything.  You have no control over me and your attempts to humiliate me backfires and humiliates you.  Your protege takes self-humiliation to here-to-fore unknown depths.  While you may think I've got something to hide or I want to protect legends, it is far simpler than that.  I don't like your attitude, your mission and your sidekick.  Oh, by the way, your conclusions are often wrong.

Now, Tom MacWood, how many courses did Flynn have open in 1927?  Three?  What were they?

Wayne,

Your posts seem to have again digressed into nothing but pointless and immature insults.  You, Tom Paul, and Mike Cirba are NOT "Philadelphia Golf."   You need not be part of this conversation if you don't have anything at all to offer.  Please control yourself.

As to Flynn's "three courses," Tom MacWood considered your interpretation and accepted and acknowledged that it was the correct interpretation.   What purpose does it serve for you to continue to rub his nose in this?   There is no shame misinterpreting something then reconsidering when a better interpretation is offered.   

______________________________________________

Tom MacWood,

I haven't been able to determine exactly what Peters studied at Mass Agricultural College (now UMass.)    I do know that in 1910 he considered himself an entomologist and a landscape forester.    I also know that the same year he had a business relationship with a fellow named Byrne from Boston (Northern Ireland originally) and that he claimed to have business interests not just in Ardmore but also in Lenox.   I haven't been able to link him specifically to any projects in either places, but it is possible that they could have worked together in either local.

Wayne Morrison,

Not sure if you are productively participating in this thread or not.   If you are, could you please elaborate on your basis for claiming that he designed Kilkare?   Did Flynn's daughter claim in designed it, or that he built it? 

[Thomas MacWood]

David
Do you know Byrne's first name? There was a Byrne who played out of Wollaston and a Byrne who was caretaker and gardner at Tufts College.

[Jed Peters]

If that is something you are really interested in, as before, it would be my suggestion that this time you actually visit Philadelphia and its golf courses as Wayne and I and the rest over here have done for so many years now.

Funny. This pre-supposes any of you would give him access.

Me thinks that after some of the posts on here, the more "historical" philly courses may be a tough "get"?

And also, Peters is me. I'm really old. Ask away.

[Thomas MacWood]

I found a few more details on Peters. Apparently his parents were both British, they came over in the 1870s. Perhaps there is a Pickering connection. And his father was a decorator. I'm not sure if a decorator in 1900 is the same thing as an interior decorator in 2008 or not. Either way I expect this will make good fodder for TE and his homosexual comedy.

[DMoriarty]

Byrne was Edward Joseph Byrne, born around 1882, apparently in Ireland.   Said he was a "tree expert" and forester in 1910. 

I think there may have been a couple of "Fred Peters" who lived in Lenox.   

[TEPaul]

"Either way I expect this will make good fodder for TE and his homosexual comedy."


Mr. MacWood:

Wasn't it you who decided to air Herbert Leeds living arrangements on here and what you seem to imply that meant? In my opinion, that sort of ancillary, trivial horseshit would be far better on here in the context of humor. You even speculated that it's important to know because Leeds' lover, James Parker the green chairman, may've put Leeds in the position he took on because they were lovers.

SO WHAT? My God, will you please spare us that kind of highly speculative triviality and preposterousness? 

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
I did, the fact that Leeds was living with Parker, the green chairman, when HL was given carte blanche at MH is important when telling the complete history of Myopia. Of course you immediately called them homosexuals and began joking about exploring keyholes.

[TEPaul]

"the fact that Leeds was living with Parker, the green chairman, when HL was given carte blanche at MH is important when telling the complete history of Myopia."


Yes, right, I'm quite sure Myopia and the rest of the world of golf architecture is just dying to hear that from some revisionist they've never even heard of. I'm sure they would also be tickled to death to have someone they've never heard of tell them they should just throw out their entire architectural record and collected history and start from scratch too! At the moment, I'm just trying to imagine if it is possible for you to say anything more ludicrous than you already have about Myopia Hunt Club.

[DMoriarty]

Tom Paul,

An honest question... Why are your tangents important but this not?

[TEPaul]

an honest answer....my tangents are intended to be jokes and are hopefully taken as comedy. This guy's tangents he thinks should be taken as a fact that should be important to a club's architectural history.

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
Obviously you are uncomfortable with Leeds and Parker's living arrangments. That is your problem not mine. The fact is their relationship is important to the architectural history of Myopia, due to the fact Leeds was not part of the original hierarchy of Myopia, he came from The Country Club. Parker was part of the original hierarchy at Myopia and as chairman of the greens was in position to give Leeds the ability to make changes to the course, which ultimately is why the course is famous.

It sounds like you would have preferred a simplified version of the story, kind of like the histories you find in the kids section of the library - short, simple, highly santitized, with lots of pictures. Most readers of history are adults and can take the truth.

Now can we get back to Flynn & Peters?

[DMoriarty]

Those are not the tangents I mean .  For example why is your description of the  lineage of The Myopia Gardner's relevant but not this?

[TEPaul]

Mr. MacWood:

Why do you assume I'm uncomfortable with Leeds' living arrangement? I just think it's another one of your ridiculous stretches to assume that just because Leeds and Parker lived together that was the reason Leeds took over the architecture of Myopia and made it famous and himself famous. Did it ever occur to you he had the respect of all golfers and golf clubs in that area which were not many because he was certainly one of the very best golfers in Boston? He also won the first two tournaments played on the original Myopia nine in 1894 about a month after it opened. Maybe you don't think that's what got their attention and that's precisely why you totally lack any deductive ability, logic or commonsense in these things.

Leeds was not part of the hierarchy of Myopia and Parker was? Again, you have zero idea what you're talking about because you have zero idea of what Boston was back then that way and still is today. Maybe you just assume it was the same as Columbus Ohio or Ivory Tower Ohio or wherever you live and relate to but I guarantee you it wasn't. All those kinds of people between Myopia Hunt Club and TCC and a few of the other clubs like them knew each other, went to school and college with one another and married into the same families. It's the same today but was so much more so back then for completely obvious reasons.

Have you ever heard of Myopia's Boardman family, Mr. MacWood? Of course you haven't. Do you know their relationship with Leeds? Of course you don't. Do you know who the Merrills were, the Bacons, The Hunnewells, A.P Gardner and particularly R. M. Appleton? Of course you don't and that's why you'll never be able to understand some of these clubs by JUST sticking your nose in a book, a magazine or the computer somewhere in Ohio and never getting out to see and know and understand these places, these clubs, their members and their friends.

You made the remarkable statement on here that the master of the Fox Hounds of Myopia Hunt Club, R.M. Appleton could never have laid out a golf course with Merrill and Gardner. Why do you assume that, Mr. MacWood? What in the world gives you that ridiculous idea? Perhaps you can't chew gum and walk at the same time but I assure you R.M. Appleton had the ability to be one of Boston's best fox hunters and also have the knowledge and werewithall to lay out a golf course, and particularly since he had a golf course on his own estate before Myopia even considered having a golf course. You don't think that's relevent and important, Mr. MacWood? And if not, why not?

Don't try to dismiss this Mr. MacWood? Don't try to ignore it. This is what it was all about back then and you have zero sense of it. You don't understand that time, you don't understand that place, and you definitely do not understand those people and it shows in spades!

I dare say if you found out on your Google website that Herbert Leeds had an ugly Port Wine Stain on the side of his face and a complex about it and you figured you'd first discovered that information you would try to rationalize and exaggerate the importance of it into why he became the architect he did.