I have read the summary of HJW career, too.
This is probably some attempt at a cut, but I have no idea what you are talking about.
Is there a reasonable scenario where Merion would fail to mention additional CBM contributions so many times while trying to accurately report their record to the members and board?
Yes.
Would they mention his June 1910 letter in their Nov meeting, but not other meetings and routings?
I didn't claim there were meetings, and I'll answer the routings question below.
As for other communications, the November correspondence was about purchasing the land, but the decisions and recommendations had been made in early July, when the committee recommended the purchase the land based in "large part" on CBM's opinions and letter. It was read into the record in July, and that is the only reason it came out in November. The Committee had used the letter to sell the Board on the purchase in July, and the Board used the letter to sell the members in November.
In short, it is unreasonable for you to expect all of CBM's communications with the Site Committee to make it into the minutes or the board's report to the memberships. Why would any other CBM letter have been read into the boards record during this period? Do you think the board was monitoring CBM's communications with any or all members on the Site Committee? Why would they?
And why don't you have the same expectation for
Lloyd's negotiations with Haverford Development Company? That was about the purchase, and apparently, if we are to believe the Merionettes, there are no records of what went on in those negotiations in the minutes or anywhere else. Are we to assume that there were no negotiations?
Would they present a blank drawing in Nov 1910 if they had his routing?
The routing was rough, and they had to change it to make it fit, and CBM had seen the changes and not yet "approved" the changes. And it included land that they did not yet own or control. You think they are going to go public with a routing when they haven't yet secured all the land they needed?
Somewhere there is a Barker routing of the course, and it probably has CBM's and HJW's lines and changes right over the top of it. And on top of that, or more likely on a separate sheet, Francis had made his changes. But they hadn't finalized anything, and wouldn't until CBM got a contour map and until he went over it with them and
until he returned to Merion, went over it all again, and chose and approved the plan. That is when they had their final routing. When CBM/HJW approved it. And in November CBM and HJW hadn't yet approved it.
Would they not mention the routing in December if it was integral to their land purchase?
See above.
Would they not mention other meetings or continued correspondance with CBM in any of their reports, correspondances, or recollections, which were quite consistent in the number of times they met with him, and what happened when they did?
I have not claimed more face to face meetings. Why do you keep acting as if I have? But as for other communications, the answer is No. That wasn't board business.
Why would each of the committee that Alan Wilson interview for his piece (and they were there) not take the time to correct a faulty record. How could they all keep their stories straight?
Because the Chair of the Committee, the one with whom he most likely would have been communicating and thus be most aware of these communications, was dead.
Because they weren't appointed until late January, and it is unclear that anyone except Wilson did anything initially. Are you certain all of them were even at NGLA? I am not. I am not even sure it was that committee. But assuming it was that committee, did all five of them show up at CBM's door with sleeping bags for a slumber party? Why would all five of them have gone? One of them was in Europe that spring, although I am not yet sure when he sailed for distant shores. Another of them didn't seem to have much of an interest in the nuances of strategic design.
But they weren't telling a story. I wish you would stop accusing me of accusing them of lying. They said that CBM was extremely helpful planning the course, and after that it was Hugh Wilson's show. This was true. Do you really expect they are going to make sure Alan Wilson included a phone log of calls to CBM in his letter about his brother? Were they to have gone through their own correspondence for letters from CBM?
Why didn't CBM take credit in Scotlands Gift?
Because he didn't build the course. Because only discussed the projects with which is was most involved.
The answer is simple - all of their perceptions back then were that the committee designed the golf course, and CBM offered valuble advice that helped them immensely.
Why didn't Wilson take credit in his Chapter or in one of the thousands of letters he wrote about the golf courses?
Why in his only discussion of the planning does he profusely praise and thank CBM for all his help and for showing him what to do with the land at Merion?
Why did his friends in D.C. write that his greatest accomplishment in architecture was the redo of the course in the 1920's? He designed Merion, yet isn't worth mentioning in his remembrance? It made the cut in CBM's remembrance, but it didn't quite make the grade in Wilson's remembrance written by his own close friends?
Not a single contemporaneous sourse said that Wilson designed the course, but you keep acting as if every source did. Why is that? And don't point me toward the Lesley report because you have acknowledge that you cannot separate what went on a NGLA from what went on upon their return.
CBM is discussed again and again in Merion's Board Minutes. Every time the course comes up, they are discussing CBM's help and involvement. Yet that is not enough for you.
Can you list for me all of the mentions in Merion's Minutes of Hugh Wilson's involvement in the design process? Thanks.
One more thing about Alan Wilson since you seem to like to run with gossip. He was no fan of CBM's. In fact what TEPaul and Wayne tried to blow into some fantasy about CBM abandoning the game sounded to me like Alan Wilson expressing his dislike for and disrespect of CBM.
Given your penchant for following the gossip, what do you make of this?
How do you suppose Alan would have felt about his brother sharing credit for Merion with CBM?