[Thomas MacWood]

What role did the seed merchants play in the development of golf architecture?

[Ally Mcintosh]

What role did the seed merchants play in the development of golf architecture?

I believe Tony Muldoon is working on this topic (or similar) at the moment...

[Thomas MacWood]

Ally
Tony and I have been sharing information on this subject, mostly related to British golf.

[TEPaul]

"What role did the seed merchants play in the development of golf architecture?"


To really understand some of the answers to that question, one could just not do better than to read the entire perhaps 1500 letter files of the correspondence between Hugh Wilson and Piper and Oakley.

Those seed merchants and a number of others were always mentioned and their products were constantly analyzed in the Arlington test center of the US Dept. of Agriculture. Matter of fact, Piper and Oakley even got Wilson to buy for the test center a few times so as not to make the seed merchants aware of what they were doing with their products.

Wilson seemed to have one seed merchant he believed in and relied on most and it wasn't either Carters or Sutton. I'll try to find the name in the files.

Essentially those three but also including Flynn and Toomey and the likes of Harban were the developers of what might be termed (at that time) modern bent grass for golf.

There was also an interesting letter in those files from Colt around 1920 asking Wilson if he would kindly mail him a copy of their experimental findings.

Apparently the basic modus operandi of the earlier seed merchants (perhaps in the first decade of the 20th century) was to just throw anything and everything into those grass seed bags under the theory that something should probably grow! Unfortunately, that approach created something of a "grow-in" mess on a few early courses apparently including NGLA.

[Tony_Muldoon]

This is a big subject.  These were huge firms selling all kinds of seeds, for agriculture, for gardening and from the start of the last century for Golf. Ironically the types of grass seed they were originally interested in were to produce thick lush grass for cattle to graze and grow fat on.  Not ideal for golf. By 1852 Suttons had 54 separate mixtures on Sale.

Apparently it started with Carters at Walton Heath. Suttons were the bigger firm but slow to realise how big Golf was becoming.

Apparently the basic modus operandi of the earlier seed merchants (perhaps in the first decade of the 20th century) was to just throw anything and everything into those grass seed bags under the theory that something should probably grow! Unfortunately, that approach created something of a "grow-in" mess on a few early courses apparently including NGLA.

This was a real problem on all the seeds the firms were selling.  Suttons sold on purity of stock, meaning you needed to use less, and Carters on how quickly they could establish a playing surface. The adulteration (bulking up) of all types of seed was so common that various Acts of Parliament tried to regulate quality.  Old, dead and even similar looking seeds would be added.

Both firms were active in the wholesale slaughter of Worms!

Influence is hard to know.  However they were powerful firms and each offered practical support if you bought their seeds.  Both firms targeted Greenkeepers. Carters produced an annual hardback, “The Practical Greenkeeper” which had an essay from Simpson in the English edition and Tillinghurst in the American one.  Suttons responded with an essay competition for Greenkeepers and later their own pamphlets.

Carter’s used to employ the contractors and add 10% offering the client a one stop solution, and the list of Architects in their camp was most impressive.  Braid, Fowler, Simpson (who appears to have crossed the floor in the late 20’s) and (dare I assume) Tillinghurst.   The also used Peter Lees in their advertising.

Suttons entered the field properly with Colt in 1909.


There’s a lot to find out.

[Neil_Crafter]

An important and interesting subject for research - keep up the good work Tony and Tom Mac.

TE - you say we could do no better than look at the 1500 Wilson letters - can you say how we can do that? Where are these letters held?

[Alfonso Erhardt]

Tony,

Include Arana as a user of Suttons in the 40s-60s. The first two things he mentions to all people who thought of hiring him was the need for enough water to irrigate (a problem in Spain) and the (very strong) recommendation to use Suttons.

Regards,

[Neil_Crafter]

And H L "Cargie" Rymill here in Adelaide, Australia, who was also an agent for Suttons out here I believe.
Neil

[Thomas MacWood]

Neil
The Green Section letters are at the USGA museum; they have been very helpful to me over the years.

TE
To truly understand those letters I think you need to know what was going on in the industry a decade or more before those letters were written. And although there is some good architectural information in the Piper & Oakley letters, they were clearly oriented toward agronomy. My question on this thread relates to the role the seed merchants played in golf course design and construction. They were a very important promoter of golf architecture. For example I do not believe Colt would have ever toured the US in the 1910s without the seed merchants. They were instrumental in the development of many golf architects including Ross, Flynn, Macomber, Thompson, Park, and Colt.

[TEPaul]

"TE
To truly understand those letters I think you need to know what was going on in the industry a decade or more before those letters were written. And although there is some good architectural information in the Piper & Oakley letters, they were clearly oriented toward agronomy. My question on this thread relates to the role the seed merchants played in golf course design and construction. They were a very important promoter of golf architecture. For example I do not believe Colt would have ever toured the US in the 1910s without the seed merchants. They were instrumental in the development of many golf architects including Ross, Flynn, Thompson, Park, and Colt. "


Mr. MacWood:


From what I can glean from the seed merchant industry in America in the first decade of the 20th century it was pretty hit-and-miss agronomically. If it hadn't been that way at that time obviously a man like Macdonald wouldn't have turned to Piper and Oakley of the US Dept of Agriculture, and then recommended to MCC in 1910 that they do the very same thing!

As for how the seed merchants were involved in architecture or promoting architecture at that time I surely can't say. Apparently they were trying to drum up business wherever they could find it and golf grass and golf agronomy surely was a very new area at that time. Therefore, I doubt what they were doing architecturally or agronomically for golf was particularly impressive at that time (the first decade of the 20th century in America).

Much of what Piper and Oakley and Hugh Wilson were doing and discussing at that time (particularly the early "agronomy letters") was to try to figure out what types of grasses were in those bags those seed merchants were trying to sell them!

[Bradley Anderson]

Mr. MacWood,

I wonder if the seed merchants provided the most vital component of what the pioneer architects needed to really unleash their creative powers.

The architects had great land to work with ussually. And they had plenty of manpower, materials, and whatever equipment they needed. But they couldn't very well shape the land without good reliable turf to stabilize it. Irrigation was obviously a big part too, but even water isn't much use without good grass species.

[Ian Andrew]

Stanley Thompson listed himself as an agent for Sutton in all the advertisements that I have.

[TEPaul]

"Mr. MacWood,

I wonder if the seed merchants provided the most vital component of what the pioneer architects needed to really unleash their creative powers."


Bradley:

What an appropriate and fantastic question! My first thought is how in the hell could they? What did those seed merchants know at that time about architecture that some of those latent highly creative minds didn't?

In my opinion, this is precisely why a questioner like Mr. MacWood just doesn't have enough of a foundation in the details of this history and those people to understand these distinctions at that time! 

The primary thing to keep in mind, in my opinion, is that back then was just so different from today! Those guys were living and working and dealing in a "Model T" world----not that the "Model T" wasn't a remarkable breakthrough for its time!

[Thomas MacWood]

Mr. MacWood,

I wonder if the seed merchants provided the most vital component of what the pioneer architects needed to really unleash their creative powers.

The architects had great land to work with ussually. And they had plenty of manpower, materials, and whatever equipment they needed. But they couldn't very well shape the land without good reliable turf to stabilize it. Irrigation was obviously a big part too, but even water isn't much use without good grass species.

I think you are right. One of the dilemmas these early architects faced was finding the manpower to construct their courses, particularly for those architects who came over from Britain, like Colt, Park and Fowler. Carters was particularly strong in this area. And those constuction gangs created by the seed merchants produced their own budding architects over the years.

If the seed merchant has strong relationship with a prominant architect, and their own construction crew, and the grass seed and maintenance equipment, they became more or less a one stop shop, and in the process they were creating a long term customer for their products. The seed merchants were very important to the course building boom in the 10s and 20s.

[TEPaul]

Mr. MacWood:

Are you saying the seed merchants had or could produce architectural construction crews???

If so, let any of us see you try to provide a scintilla of documentation and proof of that, particularly in the first or second (or even third) decade of the 20th century! 

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
I'm surprised you were not aware of this dynamic. If you spend any time reading the old golf magazines it becomes patently obvious.

Who better than seed merchants to provide the manpower. They had strong relationships with greenkeepers and could recruit them to help form these construction crews. I suspect the money was better for some of these men in golf course construction. Leonard Macomber of Carters oversaw the construction of CC of Detroit for Colt. The seed merchants were also involved in providing and recommending greenkeepers for these newly built courses, which was obviously in their best interest as well.

[Tony_Muldoon]

Mr. MacWood,

I wonder if the seed merchants provided the most vital component of what the pioneer architects needed to really unleash their creative powers.

The architects had great land to work with ussually. And they had plenty of manpower, materials, and whatever equipment they needed. But they couldn't very well shape the land without good reliable turf to stabilize it. Irrigation was obviously a big part too, but even water isn't much use without good grass species.

Suttons were happy to do this and felt their purity and quality allowed them to position themselves at the top of the market.  Their bone of contention was that others did not.

[Tony_Muldoon]

Mr. MacWood:

Are you saying the seed merchants had or could produce architectural construction crews???

If so, let any of us see you try to provide a scintilla of documentation and proof of that, particularly in the first or second (or even third) decade of the 20th century! 

please read my first post.

[Tony_Muldoon]

TE - you say we could do no better than look at the 1500 Wilson letters - can you say how we can do that? Where are these letters held?

Tom Paul, just in case you missed this. It provides you with an opportunity to demonstrate how you co-operate on here.


Thanks for all the extra leads guys.

[TEPaul]

Tony Muldoon:

I believe the USGA may've recently digitized the so-called "agronomy letter" files between the Wilsons of Merion and Piper and Oakley. There're probably close to 2,000 letters over about fifteen years (1911-1926). If they aren't on their Green Section part of their website, I'd email them and ask if they'd make some discs available to you.

I hope you like reading about experiments in grass strains, bugs, worms, fishmeal, bicarbonate of this and that etc. The files do contain some pretty interesting discussion and material on some of the seed merchants of that time though. If the seed merchants were heavily into golf architecture, golf architecture construction, crews etc in the first or second decade of the 20th century in America it does not appear that Macdonald, the Wilsons or Piper and Oakley were very aware of it which seems pretty strange considering how involved they were with the products of the seed merchants. But perhaps the likes of Macdonald, The Wilsons etc were more interested in doing some of those things their own way at that time. 

[TEPaul]

"TE
I'm surprised you were not aware of this dynamic. If you spend any time reading the old golf magazines it becomes patently obvious.

Who better than seed merchants to provide the manpower. They had strong relationships with greenkeepers and could recruit them to help form these construction crews. I suspect the money was better for some of these men in golf course construction. Leonard Macomber of Carters oversaw the construction of CC of Detroit for Colt. The seed merchants were also involved in providing and recommending greenkeepers for these newly built courses, which was obviously in their best interest as well."


Mr. MacWood:

I have seen those ads in the old magazines and some of them are pretty early. Some of those ads are impressive and quite elaborate.

On the other hand, I have not seen much evidence from the clubs I've been involved with that those kinds of crews were used on those courses. 

I have seen an ad from one of the major seed merchants explaining that Pine Valley used their product (I think it was Sutton or Carters)---if I'm not mistaken that interesting photo of the infamous "pimple" on the 18th green at Pine Valley was from a seed merchant ad.

With Merion, they had a crew of their own and they also had Flynn who was developing a pretty fine reputation of his own for agronomics.

If you read the early "agronomy letters" you can see that a lot of the experimentation between the Wilsons and Piper and Oakley was analyzing exactly what kinds of grasses were in those seed merchant bags and if they were actually what they advertized.

As far as crews go, I can certainly see a guy like Colt or Alison hooking up with other crews, since they apparently didn't have their own over here. Alison tried to go into partnership with Flynn (probably to hook up with his crew) but Wilson basically recommened against that saying that he didn't think Flynn needed a partnership like that. That info is in those "agronomy letters."

It's also interesting that Colt wrote Wilson asking him if he'd send him a bulletin on the experiments Wilson, Harban and Piper and Oakley were doing. At that point it seemed to be concentrating on bent. Wilson wrote Piper and Oakley something to the effect of; "How about that, now Colt is coming to us for advice on grasses?"

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
It would probably be a good idea to familarize yourself with the individuals who were involved with Carters and the other outfits, and then go through those letters again and check your club records again. I think you will be surprised what you find.

Wilson, Piper, Oakley and Macdonald were all intimately familar with the grass merchants and their construction arm. That is what I was getting at in my previous post, I strongly believe if you don't know what was transpiring in the previous years and you're not familiar with all the names its only natural you are going to miss things.

[TEPaul]

"Suttons were happy to do this and felt their purity and quality allowed them to position themselves at the top of the market.  Their bone of contention was that others did not."

Tony Muldoon:

The only real information I have on this kind of thing comes from a few clubs like Pine Valley, NGLA and particularly Merion. Analyzing seed types was something they were all most certainly into but obviously particular soil analysis was something they were very much into as well. Wilson for instance regularly send grass and seed and soil packages down to DC on the train. This seems to be why the likes of Macdonald, Crump and the Wilsons and Harban turned to the US Dept of Agriculture (Piper and Oakley) at that time. The US Dept of Agriculture had one helluva impressive agronomic experimentation station in Arlington Virginia at that time.

Eventually around 1920 both Piper and Oakley left the US Dept of Agriculture and moved over to the USGA to run their green section. Just before that they felt they almost had the president of the US (Woodrow Wilson I believe) convinced on getting the US government (the US Dept. of Agriculture) involved in developing golf course agronomy as they thought it was such an immense developing business in the nation. But it seems eventually they just turned it over to the USGA to get involved in.

Alan Wilson, Hugh's brother, was the first chairman of the USGA's Green Committee at this time. When Hugh died, Alan resigned that position and as one can see in the "agronomy letters" Piper and Oakley felt that left them all sort of in the lerch for the time being until someone as competent as Alan could be found to replace him in this rapidly burgeoning area. At first Alan Wilson recommended Merion's W.E. Griscom to replace him explaining that he was a remarkably resourceful man but then Alan concluded that Griscom probably did not have the sufficient background and expertise in that area. I think they found a man from New York to replace Alan (I'll look through the letter to try to find out who it was). One of the reasons to pick a guy from New York is that is where they all generally met.

[Thomas MacWood]

TE
Wasn't the experimental station at Arlington modeled after Suttons'?

[TEPaul]

Mr. MacWood:

And I strongly recommend that you read those "agronomy letters" if you want to familiarize yourself with that world in that business at that time.

Frankly, I'm pretty well past being sick of listening to you tell me and others on here what you know, what you've found, and what the rest of us don't have or don't know. It seems to me whenever you get interested in learning about some subject or area, some architect or golf course you just automatically assume noone else but you knows anything about it. I realize how much you want to make a name for yourself as what you've referred to yourself as an "expert researcher" ----but come on, use your head would you please---eg some of the rest of us weren't exactly born yesterday on understanding most of these areas and I don't think any of us have just been sitting around in the wings waiting for you to come along and discover these things and inform us on them! 

This I believe both was and is your fundamental problem in failing to understanding the details of the design history of Merion (and probably Myopia too)----eg you found some article or two on Macdonald advising the club and you thought you'd made some theretofore UNKNOWN discovery. The fact that Merion had those articles probably since the day they were published in those newspapers apparently never even occured to you!   

Really, come on, you need to just stop being so damn competitive all the time with some of the rest of us (particularly here in Philadelphia) and learn to start collaborating better. I think you'd be very surprised how and how much we can help you understand some of these things as you begin to develop an interest in some of these subjects.

In that vein, how is that silly "PLEDGE" of yours coming along? 

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