Oakmont -- Short Evolution Summary

[Rick Wolffe]

Hope everyone had a great New Year.  We continue along on our short summaries on the architectural evolution of the U.S. Open courses.  Thank you much again to everyoune for the constructive help with Merion, Olympic, and Cherry Hills.

We put the following together so far for Oakmont.  Again we are trying to make sure we are factualy correct -- or as Dragnet's Sgt Joe Friday would say, "Just the facts Ma'am."  So please feel free to correct or add to the facts.


Oakmont – originally designed by William Fownes circa 1903

The championships at Oakmont have been hosted over the same golfing grounds since their course opened in 1903.  To keep the course competitive, Oakmont has continually updated their golf course.

As noted in Oakmont’s 100 year history:

"The first significant changes at Oakmont came in the bunkering.  Like Thor hurling thunderbolts, W.C. [W.C. Fownes, Oakmont’s founder] hurled sand traps at every spot where an errant tee shot was not penalized.  Oakmont ended up with an astounding 300 or more bunkers during the first few decades of the 1900s.  That’s an average of nearly 17 per hole.  Then as clubs and balls improved, golfers were hitting past many of them.  As hazards they became expensive maintenance liabilities and were eliminated.  Oakmont ended up with about 180 bunkers by the late 1990s."

Over the storied history of Oakmont Country Club in Oakmont, Pa., three of its original holes have been substantially modified from the original Fownes design – the 8th, 15th and 16th holes. According to Oakmont’s History these changes were as follows:

"The golf course, too, has been altered from time to time.  Only the 16th hole has been changed in a major way, with a new tee and a new green, although the hole remains in the same general location.  The original tee for the hole is the present ladies tee, and the 16th green was new the present ladies tee, and the 16th green was near the present ladies tee, and the 16th green was near the present ladies’ tee for the 17th hole.  In 1926 the 16th green was moved to its present location, the length of the 15th hole was increased by 55 yards by moving the green, and a new men’s tee for the 16th was built behind the new 15th green….In 1951 the portion of the Pennsylvania Turnpike that runs through Bessemer & Lake Erie railroad cut was opened to traffic.  The cut had been widened somewhat to make room for the Turnpike, with the result that six feet was lost from the back end of 9 tee, and the eighth green and the No. 2 tee were moved a short distance to the east….From time to time sand traps and other hazards on the course have been added, removed or modified.  In 1961-62 alone, 40 sand traps were removed and 30 new ones built."  {Oakmont Country Club, The First Seventy Seven Years, by Edward B. Foote, Oakmont Country Club, 1980}

Over the past fifty years, many changes to fairways, greens and tees were designed by several notable golf architects, including Robert Trent Jones, Arnold Palmer in association with Ed Seay, Ferdinand Garbin, and Arthur Hills.  Most recently, in preparation for the 2000 Men’s Amateur and the 2007 Men’s US Open, Tom Fazio was brought in to add more length and new tees to the course.

Over the past decade the course underwent a significant restoration program, which was marked by the removal of most of the trees on the course and an extensive bunker restoration program.  The overall appearance of the course was restored to its early days – an inland windswept links land.  Some additional design modifications were made including an expansion of the second green, _____________ and additional length with new tees was put in place on holes __________.  Oakmont is scheduled to host the U.S. Women’s Open again in ______.
 

[TEPaul]

"Oakmont – originally designed by William Fownes circa 1903"

Rick:

A 1903 stick routing exists of the design of Oakmont presumably before the course went into construction. In my opinion, it is remarkably like the course still is today for a stick routing that old. The stick routing is unsigned but the club (the really good recent Oakmont history book by Pittsburgh sportswriter Marino Parascenzo) believes it is probably more the result of H.C. Fownes than W.C. Fownes at that point.

However, the club also feels that because H.C. and W.C. were only twenty years apart in age that they came to have more of a brother relationship with one another (apparently to H.C.s delight) than a father/son relationship.

But the point is H.C. totally controled that club and everything about it a whole lot longer than I realized (until into the 1930s). After that W.C. completely controlled the club until the late 1940s when he curiously tried to give up control (to the club's chagrin).

Some (and some on here ) might claim that the Fowneses could not have done the Oakmont course or design on their own but it appears that they largely did exactly that---ie designed that course themselves over an extended time. However, they did have 3-4 pretty significant (and perhaps construction or design participating) greenkeepers from the beginning on obviously ending up with long term greenkeeper/sometime designer, the marvelous Emile Loeffler. 

[Mike_Cirba]

It's probably somewhat germane to the story that the Fownes boys spent a lot of time in Pinehurst each winter, very early on. 

[Rick Wolffe]

Thank you Tom and Mike for the thoughts --  updates have been made in this latest version.


Oakmont – originally designed by William Fownes circa 1903

The championships at Oakmont have been hosted over the same golfing grounds since their course opened in 1903.  To keep the course competitive, Oakmont has continually updated its golf course.   In its first forty years, many of the improvements were designed by club founder and member William Fownes, who would be succeded in this role by his son H.C. Fownes.

As noted in Oakmont’s 100 year history:

"The first significant changes at Oakmont came in the bunkering.  Like Thor hurling thunderbolts, W.C. [W.C. Fownes, Oakmont’s founder] hurled sand traps at every spot where an errant tee shot was not penalized.  Oakmont ended up with an astounding 300 or more bunkers during the first few decades of the 1900s.  That’s an average of nearly 17 per hole.  Then as clubs and balls improved, golfers were hitting past many of them.  As hazards they became expensive maintenance liabilities and were eliminated.  Oakmont ended up with about 180 bunkers by the late 1990s."

Over the storied history of Oakmont Country Club in Oakmont, Pa., three of its original holes have been substantially modified from the original Fownes design – the 8th, 15th and 16th holes. According to Oakmont’s History these changes were as follows:

"The golf course, too, has been altered from time to time.  Only the 16th hole has been changed in a major way, with a new tee and a new green, although the hole remains in the same general location.  The original tee for the hole is the present ladies tee, and the 16th green was new the present ladies tee, and the 16th green was near the present ladies tee, and the 16th green was near the present ladies’ tee for the 17th hole.  In 1926 the 16th green was moved to its present location, the length of the 15th hole was increased by 55 yards by moving the green, and a new men’s tee for the 16th was built behind the new 15th green….In 1951 the portion of the Pennsylvania Turnpike that runs through Bessemer & Lake Erie railroad cut was opened to traffic.  The cut had been widened somewhat to make room for the Turnpike, with the result that six feet was lost from the back end of 9 tee, and the eighth green and the No. 2 tee were moved a short distance to the east….From time to time sand traps and other hazards on the course have been added, removed or modified.  In 1961-62 alone, 40 sand traps were removed and 30 new ones built."  {Oakmont Country Club, The First Seventy Seven Years, by Edward B. Foote, Oakmont Country Club, 1980}

Over the past fifty years, many changes to fairways, greens and tees were designed by several notable golf architects, including Robert Trent Jones, Arnold Palmer in association with Ed Seay, Ferdinand Garbin, and Arthur Hills. 

Most recently, in preparation for the 2000 Men’s Amateur and the 2007 Men’s US Open, Tom Fazio was brought in to add more length and new tees to the course.  The overall yardage of the course was increased by over 200 yards to over 7,200 yards with several new tees – a new tee on the 7th hole lengthened this hole to 480 yards and the 8th hole was extended to 290 yards making it the longest par 3 in U.S. Open history.  Several other holes were lengthened including the 4th, 15th and 18th.  In addition, over the past decade the course underwent a significant restoration program, which was marked by the removal of most of the trees on the course and an extensive bunker restoration program.  The overall appearance of the course was restored to its early days – an inland windswept links land. 

Oakmont is scheduled to host the U.S. Women’s Open again in 2010.

[TEPaul]

Rick:

My original point in my first post was I think anyone doing a design evolution on Oakmont should appreciate the roll of H.C. Fownes, not just W.C. Fownes.

[Forrest Richardson]

Rick — You should search the GCA site for Oakmont threads. Arthur Jack Snyder, grounds superintendent in the early 1950s was the GCA who re-built No. 8. I have posted several times about No. 8 green and the work Snyder completed. Lew Worsham (US Open Champion 1947) was the professional at the time. Snyder and Worsham created the modern day No. 8...with Fazio (Tom Marzolf's) touches of recent.

While Fazio is noted in your summary as "adding tees and length" I think you would be more accurate to say that he completely re-built all the bunkers — a far more substantial, and obvious, undertaking than the length and tees.