......who designed it and when was it first built?
To even have to ask this question on GOLFCLUBATLAS.com is horribly embarrassing and humbling for the august contingent of expert architectural researcher/analyst/writers of Philadelphia who know everything there ever was to know about the history of Philadelphia architecture and architects and who don't need to be told anything about our area by anyone and certainly including a couple of duffus researching interlopers from outside our region who think they know something about the history of some significant courses here but for some reason we have all had a temporary and simultaneous researching mental power failure. We can't figure out who designed the original Overbrook course or when it was built.
So come on all you Uber architectural researher moles, now is your opportunity to show us up once and for all. And that includes you, Moriarty and MacWood, now is your chance to finally tell us something about Philadelphia architecture we didn't already know.
By the way, C&W is all over the place on Overbrook. They mention that C.B. McGovern designed the present course in 1952 which of course we've always known but then they attribute an Overbrook course to Xenephon P Hassenplug for designing it in 1947 with McGovern assisting.
Super Philadelphia Research Mole Joe Bausch (by the way, have any of you ever seen a real Golf Architecture Research Mole? They are a pretty funny looking species, for sure) has apparently found an article from the 1920s that mentions that William Flynn did some kind of redesign work on the original Overbrook course and we never knew that.
Come on you expert researchers and Research Moles, please help us out.
Who designed the original Overbrook golf course and when was it built?
PS:
Regardless of who designed the original course (another location from the present course) the fact that Xenephon P. Hassenplug had something to do with the present course is something I sure hope the club knows and features. I would say if that information gets out there to the public it should be good for about a hundred new members in at least a month. I mean seriously who wouldn't want to brag that they have a golf course by Xenephon P. Hassenplug?
There will even be bonus points for the first person to tell us what Xenephon P. Hassenplug's friends called him.