Ron Whitten's Game Changers: Most Important Courses by Decade

[Terry Lavin]

If you're like me and you love lists, despite all their inherent infirmities, you'll just love this list from Ron Whitten.

http://www.golfdigest.com/golf-courses/2010-11/most-important-golf-courses

From Oakhurst in West Va. in the 1880's to Chambers Bay in 2007, this very well-researched list is a bit of a roadmap to American golf course architecture.  There isn't a tremendous amount of accompanying copy, but just enough to encapsulate the development of the trade and the various trends that developed.  A must read, IMHO.

[Matthew Sander]

Terry,

Thanks for the heads up. This list will be very interesting to look over. In many ways, this list is much more interesting (to me anyway) than any of the current Top 100 lists. It should also provide plenty of material for questions on GCA .

[Michael Huber]

I'm intrigued by the choice of the works as one of the game changes.  Is this the first "piece of crap that no one wanted turned golf course" in the country? 

Also, I'd opine that Shadow Creek might be the most influential course of the 1980's

[Garland Bayley]

I'm intrigued by the choice of the works as one of the game changes.  Is this the first "piece of crap that no one wanted turned golf course" in the country? 

Also, I'd opine that Shadow Creek might be the most influential course of the 1980's

No, it is the beginning of a new US Am category choice. This years US Am was competed on a dynamite manufacturing site (before the Washington Golf Assn bought it, it was know as the DuPont Dynamite Works Golf Course) that had to have environmental mitigation, and on a sand and gravel mine site.

[Mike Nuzzo]

2000s
Old School advocates bring the game back down to earth, with more playing options and firm, fast conditions.

I would say that more than half of the following did not have down to earth budgets.
More like the previous can you top this decade.

2001: Kinloch G.C., VA
2001: Pacific Dunes, OR
2002: Friar's Head G.C., NY
2002: Old Collier G.C., FL
2003: The Quarry at Giants Ridge, MN
2006: Ballyneal G. & Hunt C., CO
2006: Erin Hills, WI
2006: Sebonack G.C., NY
2007: Chambers Bay, WA
2008: Pete Dye Cse. at French Lick, IN

[Richard Choi]

Mike, I think Ron is referring to earth as in ground game (which is certainly more back in vogue) and not down to earth in construction cost.

[Matthew Sander]

Mike,

I kind of got the same impression of the 2000's list. Not only the construction budgets, but all of the courses (with the mild exception of The Quarry at Giants Ridge which is still upwards of $80 in summer) are ultra exclusive or extremely high end. That is not a criticism of the venues on the list, just an observation. Personally, my list would include a course such as Wild Horse as an example of high quality golf still being available at a more reasonable price. To each his own though, right...

[JLahrman]

There isn't a tremendous amount of accompanying copy, but just enough to encapsulate the development of the trade and the various trends that developed.

Interesting read, but I have to agree most with the comment above.  I would have preferred fewer courses and more insights about why they were so important.  One sentence summarizing the decade with ten courses that (I would assume) embody the summary isn't very deep.  I would have preferred 20 courses instead of a list of over 100 courses.

[Tim Bert]

2000s
Old School advocates bring the game back down to earth, with more playing options and firm, fast conditions.

I would say that more than half of the following did not have down to earth budgets.
More like the previous can you top this decade.

2001: Kinloch G.C., VA
2001: Pacific Dunes, OR
2002: Friar's Head G.C., NY
2002: Old Collier G.C., FL
2003: The Quarry at Giants Ridge, MN
2006: Ballyneal G. & Hunt C., CO
2006: Erin Hills, WI
2006: Sebonack G.C., NY
2007: Chambers Bay, WA
2008: Pete Dye Cse. at French Lick, IN

Mike - It depends.  Are you talking about the first time they designed and built Erin Hill?  Or the second?  Or the third?  Or all of them combined? 

[Greg Ohlendorf]

As far as lists go, I think that this one is pretty cool. Most people don't know or remember when many of these courses were built and too see them grouped by decade for those he deemed important is a neat way to look at the evolution of course design.

Greg

[Brad Klein]

Interesting choices, always debatable. I like the 1920's choice of Whitfield -- that one comes out of nowhere. The era of 1950s-1970s is revealingly fallow, with the exception of the 1960's Dye courses.

[Mac Plumart]

Did anyone read his "Critics Rant"?

If I read it correctly, I am in almost total disagreement with him.  He criticizes architects for not bringing anything new to the table design-wise.  But I believe that nothing new is needed as golf is best when it embraces time tested principles. 

What is the quote in Scotlands Gift?  Time doesn't bring forth new truths, rather it reveals timeless truths (or at least something like that).  I tihnk that is the ticket with golf.

[john_stiles]

Interesting courses, but year by year, I don't see how many of those are 'game changers' each and every year.

Geez.  I guess it will sell a few more mags at the airport.

[Matt Kardash]

Interesting courses, but year by year, I don't see how many of those are 'game changers' each and every year.

Geez.  I guess it will sell a few more mags at the airport.

Not every year has a course. Look carefully. It's just listed numerically by year in ascending order.

[Mac Plumart]

The list is neat, but how about a blurb about why each course is a game changer?

I don't even know why the courses from the 2000's are considered game changers...let alone courses from 1900.

[JNC Lyon]

One name that stuck out on the list was from the 1930s: Pocantico Hills in Tarrytown, NY.  I'd never heard of this course, but I figured out it was the Rockefeller Estate course. I did a Google Maps search, and it looks like there is still a nine-hole layout on the estate, and it appears to be reversible.  Is this the same course Whitten was talking about?

[Tom_Doak]

Did anyone read his "Critics Rant"?

If I read it correctly, I am in almost total disagreement with him.  He criticizes architects for not bringing anything new to the table design-wise.  But I believe that nothing new is needed as golf is best when it embraces time tested principles. 

What is the quote in Scotlands Gift?  Time doesn't bring forth new truths, rather it reveals timeless truths (or at least something like that).  I tihnk that is the ticket with golf.

Mac,

Well, it was a rant, but to a point I agreed with Ron.  I do think there have been some innovative designs and some unique holes built in the last decade, though, and I think Ron is wrong to not focus on it at that level.  But changing the big picture is hard to do.  He should have said that the primary reason for conservatism is that courses are so expensive to develop that clients are averse to taking chances.

[john_stiles]

So why is it that some of these are innovative ? 

But year after year, almost 10 to a decade are listed, without any discussion for the vast majority.  Granted some years are skipped, some years have two or three listed,  but it isn't clear why so many of similar ilk are listed.

One article discusses a lack of innovation in 43 years, one article lists about 10 courses for every decade that were game changers with little or no discussion.

[PThomas]

Kemper Lakes??

[john_stiles]

Without any discussion or elaboration to go by,  my guess is Kemper Lakes is the first early 1960s style Florida course with water in play built in the late 1970s in Illinois.

Have played Kemper Lakes, perfectly fine course & one I would play again,   but why Kemper Lakes in 1979 ?    The strategy ?  Probably not.  Use of water along the finishing hole ?  Nope.  What ?    Public course for the longest period and about to be private ??

[Mike_Young]

Where Ron hits the nail is when he says architects are a middle man that can be eliminated....we are now at the point of being sort of like a cabinet maker that just draws the cabinets and has no tools or a potter that draws the pot but can't turn the wheel...the contractors are perfectly capable of building the majority of golf courses built much like the homebuilders....so if you are an architect you better get you some bulldozers and trackhoes....

[Matt Kardash]

I've long had the same rant as Ron. Golf by nature is a very conservative sport. As much as I think designers today are doing an admirable job, I always have this weird feeling that i"ve seen it all before. I see guys like Tom Doak and C&C as Quentin Tarantinto's of golf. There is nothing wrong with that... I really like tarantino movies. But it's the David Lynch's of this world who are truly original.

[Adam Clayman]

I've seen more than one envelope pusher get shouted down here because their work is too radical. The word unfair usually is the subtext of these criticism, which, is a pity.

[Mike_Young]

I've long had the same rant as Ron. Golf by nature is a very conservative sport. As much as I think designers today are doing an admirable job, I always have this weird feeling that i"ve seen it all before. I see guys like Tom Doak and C&C as Quentin Tarantinto's of golf. There is nothing wrong with that... I really like tarantino movies. But it's the David Lynch's of this world who are truly original.

And Quinton gets by with things none of the others could...example..Dennis Hopper interrogation in True Romance.... a southern movie maker would be shot for that scene....

[Wayne Wiggins, Jr.]

Wonder why Hazeltine National, another big RTJ course (a la Bellerive, etc.) got the nod in '62 over Desert Forest GC?  Isn't considered the first desert-style course ever built?