Willie Campbell & Myopia

[DMoriarty]

Mike Cirba,

Again with the disingenuous broad brush generalizations to try and dismiss an article that, on its face, is a pretty remarkable find.  You wrote:

This case is a little different, however, Tom, and I think you'd have to acknowledge that.

The reporting of the nascent game in Boston meant that not only were the golfers of that city just learning the game, but the writers of what you have to concede were High Society gossip columns also were learning the game and what it meant.   We therefore have lots of very strange writing about things like "two links", and lot of errors.

You can't deny that.

What a joke.   If this case is a little different, it is because of the detail and accuracy and specificity in the key article.



You are a fraud on this one, Mike.  This article as about as best as we could ever ask for, and finally cleared up a lot about the early course - including the holes - that was previously unknown.    Your continued attempts to broad brush it with other articles you have misread or distorted is dishonest.   

As for Merion, you are so caught up that you  cannot even avoid distorting its history or my position on it here. A joke. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

David, Tom, and Mike,

Let's be honest here.  First, it is easy to pick out flaws in all our positions and all our methods.  Truthfully, all of us have made numerous mistakes and none proven any truth.   

We really aren't having a great historic discussion. More like a high school debate, but without an adult moderator to tell us its over and time to go home.

[Mike Cirba]

Jeff,

That's exactly my point.

I've only said it about six hundred times previously, but I DO believe Willie Campbell had something to do with the first course at Myopia.

I just also believe the members in question did as well, and these should not be irreconcilable differences or mutually exclusive truths unless someone is just so desperate to prove someone else wrong that they won't accept the reasonableness of the others evidence and position.

I THINK BOTH THINGS ARE TRUE.   Should I shout it from the rooftops and what the hell is so unreasonable about that??

Until we can understand and even examine the sources Weeks and May used to report their findings we are all SOL and definitive answers are not going to be forthcoming.

I guess that makes me a "Fraud" and a "Joke", and whatever block David's Insult-of-the-day meter ends up on when he spins it the next time.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mike,

Well stated as to our position.  

We disagree that those three articles are the only reliable source as DM insists.  We think insiders info trump newspaper reporters, with good reason.  In short, those newspaper articles are part of the story, not "as good as it gets" to anyone not trying to make a single point.

Those links, like Wiki, note that good historic method would be to seek out all the relevant documents that might affect the analysis, provide and test alternate hypothesis that fit with all known documents, and refrain from drawing conclusions before assembling all the facts.  That hasn't happened here.  It doesn't surprise me that DM tells me to substitute a link to "critical thinking" since he has been trying to downplay good historic method in favor of critical thinking - his only - to force his points down our throats.

All we have really said is that the story contains conflicting information and won't be told until we understand WHY Willie isn't in the club history.  Three newspaper articles are a good source that must be considered, but stopping there is really very shallow analysis.

[DMoriarty]

Mike,  Your duplicitousness with the way you deal with the source material is a joke, and exposes you as a fraud.  If you don't like the characterization, change your ways. 

Jeff Brauer,

If additional source material exists, then bring if forward.   But until then, quit pretending to be relying on additional source material.  You are not.   I have all the information you have, and more.   The only difference is, I choose to question it, while you accept it wholeheartedly despite the obvious flaws.

[Jeff_Brauer]

David,

You miss the point and that last statement exposes the flaw in your thinking.  None of us can get at that material right now.  The flaw is in your thinking that you can overcome that hurdle via the magnifgence of your "critical thinkng."

As to pretending to be relying on source material, right back at ya, bud.  As to choosing to question it, we only choose to question parts of it, all of us, thus revealing our biases.  I admit mine.  You don't.  Your biases keep you from being a good historian.

Cheers.

[DMoriarty]

I didn't miss the point at all.   You claim proper methodology as you hide behind sources that you don't have, sources that are at this point largely figments of your imagination and the imagination of your buddy.    In contrast, I deal with what we have and do the best I can with it, knowing there is always a possibility that more will be brought forward, that may change my viewpoint.

In this case there is quite a lot available, and the key secondary sourses are a pretty transparent window as to what else is out there, and it ain't much.  The big fictions and fantasies created by your buddy - the Leed's "Diary", the much vaunted Run Books, the records stating that they definitely "staked out the course"  - none of it has panned out.   Sure records may exist, as may a scrapbook, but none of it is nearly what your buddy has portrayed.  He was lying to us or lost in his own fantasyland.   Yet you cling onto his fantasies as if they were scripture.  

[Jeff_Brauer]

David,

I believe you are the only one who believes that you can tell us what documents say without seeing them.

Cheers.

[DMoriarty]

David,

I believe you are the only one who believes that you can tell us what documents say without seeing them.

Cheers.

Nonsense.  You rely on documents you haven't seen and may not exist all the time.  Just yesterday you were telling me about how Weeks was quoting someone when he wrote about the purchase of the Hopkiuns land, even though he was not.  And you still insist that the information must have come from somewhere accurate and reliable.  Same goes for your frequent references to the supposed Leeds Scrapbook and the supposed records.  You guys tell us repeatedly that these documents must have said exactly the same things as eventually appeared in the weeks book, even though you've never seen these records are know very little about them and nearly nothing about what they say.

All I have done is tell you guys to back up your claims.  You can't, so you try a BizarroLand switcheroo where you ridicule me for refusing to rely on documents none of us have seen and which may not even exist.   That and you repeatedly misrepresent what was contained in the Bush excerpt by pretending it told us who laid out the course.   This sort of thing is about as far from legitimate historical analysis as is possible.   It is one step away from just flat out lying and making up your own sources like your buddy does. 

If you have so much faith in Weeks, then why do you think he was incapable of bringing forward accurate information on the original course?   You seem to have this idea that Weeks' sources would tell us the whole story and so much more, yet Weeks' book contains very little accurate information about the original course. Hmmm, I wonder why? 

Why do you suppose it is that Weeks couldn't even get original holes correct, and he doesn't even know exactly where the course was located or whose land it was on?  Why do you suppose he was speculating even about whether they staked out the original course?   Weeks didn't know, and it is unreasonable for you to assume you would know more based upon the same information.

Yet you guys continue to pretend that there is some holy grail of information which will answer all your questions.  That is always the way it is in these cult things --the promise of salvation if you blindly believe and follow.   But you guys have been duped by a conman.  The same conman has duped you before in similar situations, so I have very little sympathy for you this time.   

[Jeff_Brauer]

David,

I could type out a long response like yours, but its the same arguments again. 

I believe one of the reasons you dismiss the existence or import of internal Myopia documents is that you know that by acting like a horses petute, you have reduced your chances of seeing/analyzing those important documents by about 99.99% so you would prefer to imagine that they don't or never existed.  However, I will wager that few consider that bias as good critical thinking or historic process. Even fewer would believe that this is TePaul's fault, and not your own. 

It is a shame that by the time you get in the gates of the great place that is Myopia, it, like hell itself, will have been frozen over.  (I understand that this may not be the perfect day to use that analogy)

[Mike Cirba]

David,

If Weeks was the only report citing Appleton, Merrill, and Gardner your point might have more merit.

However, the prior John P. May article citing the same three and also including information (course yardage) that Weeks never did makes it reasonable to assume there is a record of this somewhere internal to the club, especially since we know he cited internal club sources.  

I do hope we find out more some day.   Right now, it's a riddle, and your efforts to draw confident and final conclusions really aren't reasonable without all of the sources of information available to us.

[DMoriarty]

Jeff Brauer.  You know as well as I do that there was never a chance in hell that I was going to be allowed to review Myopia's records at Myopia, even if I wanted to.  They wouldn't even let you on the property, and you are an architect and former president of the esteemed ASGCA, or whatever you guys call yourselves.    

Besides, I have never written anything derogatory about the club or how it's operation.  To the contrary, Tom MacWood and I (but mostly Tom) have done more to clarify their history than anyone else around here, including a certain friend of yours who has done plenty to embarrass that club and about every other club with which he has ever claimed an association.  In fact, so far as I know, the only questionable thing the club has done is choose to deal with your lowlife buddy, but many clubs have made that error.  It must come with the territory.  But go on and keep pretending you know all about these magical mystery documents.  I am sure your buddy appreciates your efforts, as that kind of thing is right up his alley.  Maybe it will finally pay off with that access.

Remind me again, what is your purpose here, anyway?  You don't research, you don't understand research or analysis, how it works or its purpose, you have at best a superficial interest in the subject matter but are perfectly happy to chirp whatever Cornish, Whitten, or your buddy tells you to chirp.  So who are you to lecture me on my research or how it should be done?  It is not as if you are my peer here.  Not even close.  You've got no more basis telling me how to research an analyze as I do telling you how to place drains on fairways.  Less probably.  So who the hell are you to question my motives and methodology?   Who are you to compare what you do around here to what I do?  You and your buddy couldn't research your way into or out of a library if you had a map and a guide dog.  As soon as you contribute something original and/or relevant, get back to me.  Otherwise, when are you going to make good on your promise you keep making to walk away?  
__________________________________________

Mike Cirba,

You keep on as if May's project was some big well-researched club history created separate and apart from anything Weeks was doing.  That is unrealistic, at best.

According to Weeks, he had long been working on his project by the time May would have gotten around to his article.  Given May's connections to the guy within the club, do you really think that May was dealing with some separate batch of information?  That's rather strange logic, don't you think?   And if May had all this great stuff that Weeks didn't, how come it never made its way to Weeks, whose book came out not that many years later?

Look again at May's acknowledgements.  Most of his information is coming from the clubs or inside the clubs.   With Myopia it looks like he went a bit further, but surely that was because the Club didn't really know, or because Weeks was in the process of trying to figure it out.  Either way, given that May's information likely came from his buddy at Myopia, their conclusions can hardly be considered corroborating.    For example, if you and your mentor make the same claim based on the same information, that makes it no more likely for it to be true than if only one of you had made the claim.

As for the May quote of the course distance have you really thought of how incredible May's claimed was.  Comparing his version to Weeks, the course would grown just short of 900 yards - 878 yards to be exact - in two years.  That is a 43% increase in growth, the equivalent of a 7000 yard course being lengthened to over 10,000 yards!  

Never mind the percentage change.  In real terms, 878 more yard in two years is a huge increase, especially on a course of only nine holes. In yardage terms, it amounts to an additional hole of 400 yards, a 300 yard hole, and a 178 yard hole.

Think of it this way.  On average, the distances would have had to increase almost 100 yards per hole (97.7 to be exact.)   Yet many of the holes couldn't have increased much at all, so the increase would have had to have been much greater than 100 yards per hole on some of the holes!    

And yet, according to Weeks, the first six holes of the supposed "long nine" were also part of the original nine!  And remember that except for the first hole, in these days they generally played from green to green.   So while some of the original holes may have been somewhat shorter,  were they couldn't have been shorter by much, or the golfers would have been walking 90 yards between each green and tee!  

According to Weeks, the total distance for the first six holes on the long nine (1912 yards) was only 138 yards shorter than the supposed distancie of the entire original course from only two years earlier (2050 yards.)  Yet the original course supposedly contained all six of those holes, plus three more?   Unlikely.      

Look at the layout.  A number of these holes couldn't have been much shorter than they already were.  Weeks said the first was 80 yards shorter.  This could be --the first tee wasn't necessarily tied to the location of the previous green.  Weeks said the second was shorter but was still "three wood shots,"  and to get to the get from the supposed location of the old first green to the tee box of the third hole (locked in place by the pond) was around 475 yards, so the hole couldn't have reasonably been too much shorter than the 427 yards Weeks claims without necessitating a long hike. The third was locked in place by the swampy bullrushes  and was only 100-130 yards on the long version, so it couldn't reasonably have been shorter.  The next and was only 250-275 yards even on its lengthened version and the "alps" didn't move, so it is doubtful it was much shorter.  The valley hole had to get the golfer all the way back to the pond hole tee so while it could have been somewhat shorter, it couldn't have been too much shorter.   And the last was only 250-285 yards after the course was supposedly lengthened. Given it played over a pond to a ridge on the other side, how much shorter could it have been?  

Seriously.  Where can one find the much shorter versions of these holes?  Were the missing three holes less than 100 yards each in length?    Even if so, the math still doesn't work.  The holes could not reasonably have changed enough to make sense of both Weeks' and May's descriptions.   Maybe May read 2950 as 2050. Otherwise, his claim makes no sense.

Think of it as a race course and the greens as checkpoints.    We know some of these checkpoints were locked in place by natural features, and we know where others were supposedly located by the description.   There just isn't that much room to shorten or lengthen without rearranging the entire thing.  

And Mike, rather than railing at me in response, let's try to be productive.   Please explain to me where all this distance could have been made up, given Week's description of six of the holes?   I could buy a few hundred yards difference. But almost 900 yards?   I don't see it.   Do you?  

Thanks.  

[Jeff_Brauer]

David,

My purpose? Its an open discussion group, so I discuss, with all that entails. 

I admit you are an expert arguer, and I believe all of us who participate in this endless charade probably like the debate aspects more than we really care about history.

I will also admit you spend more of your free time digging up old documents, but do remind you that just the other day, I did do some research on this thread, pulling up old USGS maps and making my own critical analysis of the potential early routing, a subject which fasinates me more than giving credit to either Willie or the club.  As it happened, my work there led me to agree with you, which I was happy to acknowledge.

When I disagree with you, I point it out.  As you tell all of us, if it offends you when I make a point, then I guess that is your problem.

Here is another area where I disagree with you - you shouldn't flatter yourself about how you use documents.  I recall that as to Merion, you maintain that CBM routed the course over a period of time between June and November 1910.  As it happens, there are no documents that have ever come forward proving that, but you still maintain your position.

So, for you to tell anyone else that our positions rely on documents we never seen, its just hypocritical. 

In essence, you believe what you believe and twist the documents (or to be charitable, interpret) them one way based on your biases, and all of us do the same, while drawing different conclusions.

Again, not meaning to offend, but really, just another example of why this thread should end until someone sees the club documents - whatever they turn out to say - to further historical discussion.  I would think this group would be all pissed out by now........

But, I do agree with your last sentence to Mike.  We should all try to be productive.  It was fun to try to piece together a routing, even while admitting that its probably wrong, even if we both agree.  Trading insults based on your supposed historical superiority, well, not so much.  So, lets try to be productive, shall we?

[Mike Cirba]

David,

I was surprised at that total yardage at 2050 yards for eighteen holes too, so I passed it by Tom MacWood who assured me that many of Willie Campbell's earliest courses were indeed in that abbreviated range.

I'm not sure how accurate Weeks was in his admitted speculation about the original course but it does seem from the hole names very likely that we've nailed (as did Weeks) the first, and 6 thru 9, agreed?

That leaves us to figure out four holes, and the combination of John May's yardage and TMac's concurrence, my routing is meant to indicate a course of that total yardage, and also based on the hole names as mentioned in my assumptions on the post where I included a possible routing.

I may be wrong, but I'm trying to work with the very incomplete evidence at our disposal.

Hope that helps!

[Mike Cirba]

Oops...I meant nine holes, not eighteen, but can't edit from my Blackberry.

Sorry for the confusion.

[DMoriarty]

Mike Cirba,

It is impossible for me to do it exactly, but when I measure your routing, I come up with something quite a bit longer than 2050 yards. More importantly, I don't think some of your hole estimates are realistic. To keep the yardage down you left fairly substantial walks between tees and greens, sometimes 40-50 yards, and you know as well as I do that this would have been pretty incredible for a course at this time to have such walks.  

If you measure your course point-to-point (a more accurate portrayal of how golf was played back then,) using your green sites as the points, it measures at about 2530 yards.

_____________________

Even you admit that Weeks was likely wrong about his speculation regarding the first nine.   So explain to me how May could have gotten it correct while Weeks had it wrong?  Did Myopia lose more records during the few years between the May article and the Weeks book? Did May refuse to reveal his sources and take his secrets to the grave?  Was there a plot to keep the accurate information from Weeks?

It doesn't make sense that May would have had better information that Weeks.  If anything, May would have been working with more limited information that Weeks, since May apparently went to Weeks' club for his information! I will be very surprised if May's 2050 number is ever confirmed.  By reliable sources, I mean.

[Mike Cirba]

David,

I'll give a shot at yardage measurements of my hypothetical original nine hole course tomorrow....I did Google Earth them all, but as Joe Bausch mentioned, my translation between measuring and "Paint-ing" leaves something to be seriously desired.

[Jeff_Brauer]

David,

Once again, we totally agree. It’s like we were separated at birth!

No, just messing with ya again.

For what its worth, I measured the routing that you and I more or less agree on as 2639, assuming the shorter first hole, etc.  Obviously that could vary.

I actually tried several routings, and with the concentration of tees and greens near current 2G, 13T, 12G, 8T, 7G, all of which could have been in the orignial nine, its possible the missing three holes could be where existing 3 and 4 are now, and assuming a cross over at that location with the routing, 8 could be the original 2, but not with the seemingly logical hole names, unless there was some renumbering shortly after opening day.

I even tried a few routings with crossing fw which wouldn't be out of the question either.

Mike,

I am leaving early tomorrow so I won't have a chance to measure yours.  But, for either Davids routing on page 13 or yours, I believe that if it was 2050 yards, the holes would have to be far more compact than any of us show.

[Mike Cirba]

Jeff,

Understood and agreed.

I was definitely concerned that my yardage would be over the 2050 limit, and considered that in the rest of the routing.

I'll re-measure tomorrow, but imagine that the holes on Dr. Hopkins land are pretty short, and also that the rest of the course is much more abbreviated (while using some of the same hole corridors) as today's course.

I did get some confidence that I wasn't too far from the mark when recently viewing schematics of the original 1894 9 hole courses, as well as the original 1899 5.200 yard course at Brookline, both also very probably laid out by Willie Campbell, where many of the par fours are very short...many under 300 yards, and the par threes are mere pitch shots by today's standards.

[Jeff_Brauer]

I seem to recall TePaul mentioning that he saw something where there was only one par 3 on the original course, at least according to something he had seen.  I have slept since that conversation, and maybe either or both of us got that wrong.

As to the length of the Alps hole, at least one old rendering shows that with two centerlines, meaning it might be 260 the long way, and shorter the direct way.

Random thoughts - It may mean nothing, but I did take note of that statement that the first nine was on "the fringes" of the Hopkins Estate. No one has said how big it was.  If small, the  holes may not have extended up to Miles River Road.

Counter to that is the hole name "track" and school", plus the odd fact that the first five holes were named for external features, and the last four for landforms, possibly suggesting exterior and interior holes, such as David's routing would provide.

[DMoriarty]

Mike,  I don't think much purpose will be served of you shrinking down your routing.  There is far too much wiggle room between the holes already, and you still to go through those five same holes.     I think looking at it point-to-point gives a better idea of the approximate length of the course.

Here is the point-to-point measure of your course google path measure for your course.   The distance as 2530.    To make this significantly smaller everything would have to squeeze in, but you cannot move the first tee, the bullrushes, the alps, the pond, etc. so it just doesn't work.



And Weeks suggestions work even less at 2050.   

( I just noticed I have my first point on the wrong side of the bunker on one, but it is pretty much the distance to the second that matters.)

 

[Mike Cirba]

David,

You're probably right about my course being too long, but theoretically, that second hole could go anywhere out towards the river and still be called "Miles River"...even towards today's 4th tee...




...which could then really make those three holes occpy the land seen in this vintage photo of the 4th hole.

Please excuse the very large size of the second blowup but I think the detail is worth it.  Just use the scroll bar to scan to the right.

I noted two thiings immediately...1) The school on the hill in the background and 2) The fact that the entire ridge is devoid of trees.

Jeff earlier brought up an issue about playing blindly over the ridge, yet that is almost precisely what today's 7th hole does, so I'm pretty sure these guys weren't averse to blindness and such.

Still, it's a great picture and i'm hopeful it can stimulate useful, if speculative discussion.

[Mike Cirba]

It could be as simple as this....I replaced holes 2, 3, and 4 with new ones indicated in Blue.

2 would go towards Miles River

3 would come out of a covey...Shooting Box

4 would be from atop the ridge...School in the background.

I would think the total yardage should be around 2050 or thereabouts...

[DMoriarty]

Mike Cirba,

The photo above is great, but it sure would help if you cited your source when you post that sort of thing. I have a guess based on what I see, but it'd be just that.  Looks like a nice hole, I can see why it was so praised.  Thanks.   

Are you speculating about the "school" in the background on the hill, or do you know it was a school? If you know, how do you know? As I said, there was a school on that hill but I am not exactly sure when it was built.

As for your latest attempted routing . . .
 - Given that Weeks apparently knew very little about the routing of the first course, why do you include the current 8th hole?   Weren't you speculating that the golfers would have needed to stay out of the way, and away from the horsemen?  Your routing looks like a bit of a maze for them, doesn't it? And with the 8th right across the middle that section of the property.
 - I've never been there, but from the indications I have seen I suspect you have placed your second green and third tee in a swamp.   Take a look at your photo.  The tee in the photo appears to be back a bit from where you have yours and notice the lowland a bit in front of the tee.  Notice that they have placed what looks like a plank path through the area, and if so that would be a pretty good indication that the area was swampy.  I've seen other indications that this general area was swampy as well. 
- A point to point routing, with every hole measured from green to green (and no doglegs considered) comes in at about 2350, a full 300 yards longer than your routing, so you are fudging your tee to green distances by quit a lot.  (It may sound like a strange method, but I think one of the better ones for getting a true idea of distance on these courses.  They just didn't hike to tees, if they had them at all after the first!  For example the "long nine, using your green for the 5th and a substantially shorter green for 8th comes up with an approximate distance of about 2850, which is pretty close.)
- I am not sure your routing makes the most sense when we think of the expansion of the long nine which happened very soon thereafter (and may have been in the works from the beginning.) They would have been relocating the tees and/or greens on 4 or 5 holes.  Are there remnants of greens where you put greens?  Were those spots even suitable for greens?       
- I am not sure how the names make sense where you have the middle holes, track and school in particular.  Maybe we just don't know what the references were for these holes, but I have trouble connecting the current 8th to that (maybe) school house.  [I am not sure I wrote this already, but "school" is (and I assume was) sometimes used to describe the area where they trained the young horses, but that area of the 8th hole seems awfully big and open to me for that sort of thing.]

[Mike Cirba]

I'm not sure if it helps at all, but this was Campbell's routing for TCC in 1894.




Does anyone have the total yardage for this course?   If not, I'm pretty sure we could derive a close estimate from a modern aerial.