Is Alistair MacKenzie the MOST overrated architect of all time?

[JC Jones]

Could any man get more credit for design based more on his writings and philosophies than on his ACTUAL design work?

What did he contribute to the courses that carry his name in Australia?

How much did he do at ANGC and why was Maxwell called in a short time afterwards to fix many things?

Would Cypress be so great if Raynor hadn't routed it and Marion Hollins hadn't insisted the 16th be a par 3?

Would Crystal Downs be such a great course if Maxwell didn't spend 3 years on site building the course after MacKenzie spent only a few days there?

What courses did he actually spend time at during construction?  What courses did he actually put quantifiable work into?  Pasatiempo?

[George Pazin]

Would Cypress be so great if Raynor hadn't routed it...?

Has this been definitively established?

[Jim Nugent]

George, you may want to rethink that quote of yours JC always seems to put at the bottom of his posts. 

[Ben Sims]

JC,

Being outlandish for the sake of argument is so 2010 GCA.com.  You need more snark and inside knowledge to grab attention in 2011.  Learn from Jaka in this regard. 

[John Shimp]

NO. Tom Fazio is. 

[JC Jones]

JC,

Being outlandish for the sake of argument is so 2010 GCA.com.  You need more snark and inside knowledge to grab attention in 2011.  Learn from Jaka in this regard.  

Subscribing to group think is so GCA.com of all time.  Perhaps we should consider facts and not mythologies.

This has been discussed before it made its way to the board.  If I wanted to be outlandish for the sake of argument I would tell Tom Doak I know more about soils after taking an internet class than he does after spending 30 years in the dirt.

[JC Jones]

George, you may want to rethink that quote of yours JC always seems to put at the bottom of his posts. 

1.  I don't "always seem to put it at the bottom of my posts," it is part of my signature line so it IS always at the bottom of my posts.

2.  Perhaps you should follow George's advice.

[Terry Lavin]

Arthur Hills is offended by this post.  He's had this designation nailed down for a long, long time.

[Tom_Doak]

Could any man get more credit for design based more on his writings and philosophies than on his ACTUAL design work?
  -  Well, George Thomas, for one.

What did he contribute to the courses that carry his name in Australia?
  -  He did the routing for 27 holes at Royal Melbourne, turning it from ordinary to top 10 in the world.  He came up with the new 15th at Kingston Heath and the bunkering scheme for it.  He re-routed Royal Adelaide significantly.  And he laid out the original routing of New South Wales, though it has evolved since then.  Those are the four best courses in Australia, apart from anything built in the last ten years.

How much did he do at ANGC and why was Maxwell called in a short time afterwards to fix many things?
  -  Routing and greens plans, and discussions with Bobby Jones about how to incorporate his ideas.  Maxwell was called in because Augusta is never satisfied and because MacKenzie had already passed away.  No reason to think they wouldn't have called him; after all they already called his partner.

Would Cypress be so great if Raynor hadn't routed it and Marion Hollins hadn't insisted the 16th be a par 3?
  -  There's no good answer for this because no one knows Raynor's routing, and you can't say that any architect [other than Raynor, according to legend] would have passed up building a hole on the site of today's 16th.

Would Crystal Downs be such a great course if Maxwell didn't spend 3 years on site building the course after MacKenzie spent only a few days there?
  -  No.  But you could write a similar question for almost any of the top 20 courses in the world.

What courses did he actually spend time at during construction?
  -  Alwoodley, Moortown, Royal Melbourne (early days), Cypress Point, Pasatiempo. 

What courses did he actually put quantifiable work into?  Pasatiempo?
  -  What is "quantifiable work"?  There are copies of his routings for at least 50 of his courses, and copies of his green plans for many of the most famous ones.  That's not quantifiable?


P.S.  I had one semester of agronomy at Cornell.

[John Shimony]

JC,

Being outlandish for the sake of argument is so 2010 GCA.com.

Hilarious.

[JC Jones]

Tom Doak,

Thank you.  That is exactly the type of post that I was hoping for.

Is there a repository for the routings and green plans you speak of?  I think those would be very cool to see.

Is George Thomas overrated?

[Mike Hendren]

In response to your first theory, like Tom Doak I immediately thought of Geo. C. Thomas, Jr. and Golf Architecture in America.  The Captain's writing, sketches and theories are fascinating though occasionally eccentric.

I'd be hard pressed to call him overrated however as most pundits wouldn't likely mention him in the same breath as Ross, Mackenzie, Tillinghast, Flynn, Colt and Macdonald/Raynor just to name a few.  While his body of work is not extensive and his California career lasted less than ten years, there appeared to be greatness in LACC North, Ojai, Bel-Air, Riviera and La Cumbre.  I say appears because I have not had the pleasure of playing his work and it seems precious little of his genius survived in tact.

Perhaps passion for his rose garden kept him from widespread reknown:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HmZm0OLCAE

Mike

[BCrosby]

Note that MacK visited ANGC three times, once to tour the grounds and twice during construction. His last visit was the spring of 1932.

Bob

[JC Jones]

Very interesting, Bob.

Bogey, you're the man.

[Mac Plumart]

We had this conversation Tuesday night over beers and hot fudge sundays (and no I'm not kidding).

It wasn't meant to be over-the-top outlandish, is was meant to be a sincere question.  The flip side of it was Maxwell the most under-appreciated architect of all-time.

I am not the expert on either one of these guys, but between sips of beer and bites of sundays interesting points that I need to research were:

Is Mackenzie the best router of a golf course?

What are the key differences in Mackenzie greens and Maxwell greens?  Which ones are the gems at Crystal Downs?

What are the key architectural features of Prairie Dunes?

What are the great features of Augusta?  Or maybe, "were" is better than "are" in that question.

Cypress is tough with the Raynor routing deal, but once these other things are pieced together I can get a better feel of what are Mackenzie's key inputs on the course.

Anyway, it was a fun conversation and worthy of dicussion on GCA in my opinion.

[JC Jones]

Lots of people sit down for dinner and order a hot fudge sundae and a beer.

Sometimes the filet is too obvious

[DMoriarty]

In response to your first theory, like Tom Doak I immediately thought of Geo. C. Thomas, Jr. and Golf Architecture in America.  The Captain's writing, sketches and theories are fascinating though occasionally eccentric.

I think those were Billy Bell's sketches. 

[Ben Sims]

JC,

Being outlandish for the sake of argument is so 2010 GCA.com.  You need more snark and inside knowledge to grab attention in 2011.  Learn from Jaka in this regard.  

Subscribing to group think is so GCA.com of all time.  Perhaps we should consider facts and not mythologies.

This has been discussed before it made its way to the board.  If I wanted to be outlandish for the sake of argument I would tell Tom Doak I know more about soils after taking an internet class than he does after spending 30 years in the dirt.

JC,

When you shoot from the hip you're more accurate than when you actually aim. 

[Peter Pallotta]

I'm sorry I'm late to this party (i.e. late, as in after Tom D arrived).  But a worthy question, and Tom D's answers are in themselves food for thought:

"No.  But you could write a similar question for almost any of the top 20 courses in the world."  Except that none of Tom's own courses are the product of years of work (by others), absent of Tom himself on site.

"What is "quantifiable work"?  There are copies of his routings for at least 50 of his courses, and copies of his green plans for many of the most famous ones.  That's not quantifiable?"  And yet how we often slag certain architects -- some of whom have designed over 200 courses -- because we don't think they spend enough time on site, and despite the fact that we could have, if we wanted them, copies of hundreds of their routings.

Almost 4,000 posts but I'm still a newbie -- so, I'm just saying...

Peter

[Stewart Naugler]

Cypress is Dr. MacKenzie... The way the course blends into the natural terrain, the camouflage bunkering, and the great green complexes. Yes Hunter, Hollins, and a few others had a major impact on the final product but Cypress is truly Dr. MacKenzie's masterpiece. I've seen several different routings of the Point and Dr. MacKenzie would have done it very similar to the way Raynor drew it up. The changes Dr. MacKenzie made resulted in some of the most brilliant holes on the golf course.

I love Raynor but Cypress with a bunch of template holes... just wouldn't be Cypress.

Hopefully someday I can post more information to prove my point further.

And I completely agree about Arthur Hills!

[Sean_A]

JC

You are on a tough sell program even if you do raise interesting questions.  Much of your query can be answered by how much you believe assistants/associates deserve credit for design work.  There is no question Dr Mac did a bang up job picking his associates, but they had to have something to work with.  A guy can also be a good designer for recognizing he has capable associates and by letting them carry on.  Finally, it is often the case that good projects follow good reputations and those projects beget a better reputation.  But, a guy has to do something right, especially one as reputedly abrasive as Dr Mac.  

I don't talk about Dr Mac designs mainly because I don't know his work well.  I know his California period bunker work by and large turns me off.  Its just too much.  That said, a wee course like Cavendish, blew me away in how good it is in the simplicity of the design.  Bottom line, Dr Mac is hard guy to pigeon hole because he was willing to try different stuff at different times in his career.  That in itself is a sign of quality so far as I am concerned.  

Ciao      

[Mac Plumart]

Sean...

You bring up great points.  And, in fact, you touch on some of the items Mr. Jones was discussing Tuesday night.  Take his Australia courses for instances.  He spent a few days and routed them, correct?  But it is my understanding he left after that and before the courses were actually built.  Wouldn't this imply that the construction crew, supervisors, and greenskeep/super led the show after that and put all the details in place...perhaps even a lot of touches on the greens?

And to Crystal Downs, didn't Maxwell, essentially, live up there for a good bit of time while the course was being built? 

As I mentioned previously, I don't know these details are fact...rather points that I need to research and confirm.  But if true, they are, at the very least, interesting to fully consider.

[Marty Bonnar]

No, he isn't.
There is no-one else in a million years could have visited such an unprepossessing site such as that at Pitreavie and have teased so much out of the available terrain as the Dr.
Never mind ANGC, CPC or CD. GET yourselves to Fife and witness the genius...

luv,
FBD.

[JMEvensky]

Shivas,you're in Paris and you want to sit at a computer and argue about over-rated golf course architects?

There's gotta be something better to do.

[JC Jones]

JC

You are on a tough sell program even if you do raise interesting questions.  Much of your query can be answered by how much you believe assistants/associates deserve credit for design work.  There is no question Dr Mac did a bang up job picking his associates, but they had to have something to work with.  A guy can also be a good designer for recognizing he has capable associates and by letting them carry on.  Finally, it is often the case that good projects follow good reputations and those projects beget a better reputation.  But, a guy has to do something right, especially one as reputedly abrasive as Dr Mac.  

I don't talk about Dr Mac designs mainly because I don't know his work well.  I know his California period bunker work by and large turns me off.  Its just too much.  That said, a wee course like Cavendish, blew me away in how good it is in the simplicity of the design.  Bottom line, Dr Mac is hard guy to pigeon hole because he was willing to try different stuff at different times in his career.  That in itself is a sign of quality so far as I am concerned.  

Ciao      

I'm not trying to sell anything though I will take Mr. Pallotta's assessment of my question as "worthy" as endorsement enough.  Perhaps what is a tough sell is asking people to challenge assumptions and think critically about the status quo (particularly the status quo of the group think). Sometimes the status quo stands and other times we learn something new.  What often comes from those who are capable are posts like the ones from Mr. Doak, Peter and yourself.  Unfortunately, what also comes are the posts from those willing to accept what is already out there as gospel and label anyone who wants to think critically as unreasonable.

To your point that my question my ultimately be how much design credit belongs to associates/assistants, I agree.  And once again, Peter has my point pegged.  Why do we tirelessly rip designers and their courses when they didn't spend any time on site and left the entire project to an associate and yet we are willing to deify Dr. Mac for basically doing the same thing?

At one time Tom Doak said that the real difference was the architects we rip today don't do the routings and Dr. Mac did.  Perhaps that is the line to be drawn.