Mike, Steve & Patrick,
A few clarifications for you regarding design features used by Tilly.
Steve wrote, "The "Hells Half Acre" area is what Mike Cirba has identified just beyond the tee shot landing zone on the 9th hole. In reality, it is far more like a Sahara complex and uses "chocolate drops" (mounds) interspersed..."
Mike followed this up by saying, "He used them extensively at the original Shawnee. He also referred to them as "Alpinization", and/or "Mid-Surrey Mounding"..."
"Chocolate Drops" and "mounds" are not interchangeable references for the same feature, they are quite different things and Tilly STOPPED using "Chocolate Drop" type of mounds within a year or so after he built Shawnee. We know this because Tilly himself specifically wrote this.
In his advertising brochure published in 1915/1916 Tilly specified two of the types of "modern mound-building" used by good architects. These, including his own hand-drawn illustrations, he referred to as "a natural-looking sand trap and mound" and an "up-to-date variation of solid mound work."
Opposite them is another illustration of "Types of closely cropped and glaringly artificial mounds; now generally referred to as 'Chocolate Drops' IN RIDICULE." [CAPITALS mine].
The mounding that he used at Somerset Hills, which might be an example of "Mid-Surrey mounding" style, is then not of the "Chocolate Drop" type. Tilly was very specific in both how he designed hole features and how he referred to them, and this is a good example.
Today many have a habit of refering to similar features as all being a certain thing and an example is the "chocolate drops" mentioned above. Since the creator of them not only chose not to but himself gave specific definitions of what they are in his writings, we should endeavor to view them in the same way.
Another example is the how the term's "Hell's Half Acre" & "Sahara" are synonomous and the same for some; they aren't. Tilly viewed each one of these as specific and quite different from the other.
Tilly used the term "Great Hazard" to define a large area to be avoided during the course of a hole's play. Within this feature type, specific features are included, but not limited to, those known as "Hell's Half Acre" & "Sahara."
Tilly defines "Sahara" as a singular bunker. It is very large and impacts either into a fairway or across it entirely. It is not a waste bunker, although there may be small areas of scrub within it's confines. He created these in various sizes and shapes and amount of impact on holes. Not all large bunkers in his designs though are "Sahara" types.
His definition of a "Hell's Half Acre" type of "Great Hazard" is also quite specific. This is an area which has a combination of much sand and both areas of rough and scrub grass contained within its boundaries.
There are actually two types of these. One is where the overall structure is defined by the sand portion of the feature. You might picture a large, predominately sandy area with 'oases' of grasses, rough and even small mounds within its bounds
This is the one that most picture when the phrase is used.
The second type is the exact opposite and is defined by the grass portions that shape it. It is primarily a massive area of rough interspersed with 'oases' of bunkers of various sizes and shapes within. A good example of this is the one at the Philadelphia Cricket Club. If you take a look at Gib Carpenter's In My Opinion piece titled "A Cry for the Golf Course" there is a portion of a 1938 aerial of holes 7, 4 & 5. Note the "Hell's Half Acre" hazard in the middle of the 4th fairway and how 75% or more of it is rough with pockets of sand bunkers throughout.
Each type is the polar opposite of the other yet both fit within the definition of WHY this name was given to these features by Tilly. "Hell's Half Acre" was a 6-square block area in Philadelphia at the turn of the 20th century. The area was so dangerous that the police refused to enter it at night and any good person who found themselves within its bounds were, quite literally, as good as dead.
Just as "Hell's Half Acre" was the last place that a person would want to be in Philadelphia, so too on a golf course.
Now even within these definitions there are variations of these types. Let me use three holes on Bethpage Black as an example. The "Glacier" bunker on the 4th hole. It is huge and massive and stretches completely across the entire fairway on the face of the hill separating one plateau from the other.
This is definitely a "Great Hazard" but because of its location (one would never purposefully play at or near to it, always short or well over) and its shape (just as it now has fingers and knobs it was shaped this way originally as well) it isn't an example of a "Sahara" bunker and simply falls into the generic category of a "Great Hazard."
The 5th hole has a clear variation of a "Sahara" bunker that stretches halfway into, across and down the right-hand side of the fairway. Despite having several small mounded areas of rough and tall grasses within its midst it is primarily sand (90% or more) and it impacts sideways into the fairway without completely crossing it.
The there is the 7th with the massive, seemingly never-ending bunker facing the player as he stands on the tee. This seems to be a clear-cut "Hell's Half Acre" but one must not necessarily jump to this conclusion.
Consider, one of the definition requirements of a "Hell's Half Acre" hazard is that it completely sections off the fairway from play. The fascinating thing about this feature on the 7th is that this occurs ONLY when one is playing it from the back championship tee (600-yard). There is no choice as to where one will attempt to hit their drive as regardless of line of flight one MUST carry the hazard to reach the fairway. So from the championship tee the player must carry a "Hell's Half Acre" to reach safe ground.
This isn't the case when the regular tee box is used for play. The player is faced with choices. He can try to carry a good portion of the hazard and thus greatly shorten his second shot into the green with the possibility of reaching it in two now greatly increased. Or, he can play the SAFE ROUTE to the left where the fairway is directly in front of him and make the hole play as a three-shotter and avoid the hazard in its entirety. So from this angle the hazard DOESN'T completely section off the entire fairway and so it ISN'T a "Hell's Half Acre" hazard for the regular player!
This example of subtlety to this design feature type sheds light onto why Tilly would specifically stop using "chocolate Drop" mounds while still using other similar types that today are confused as such...
Sorry for the length, but class dismissed!
