Chris:
The point was to see if there was any validity to the claim that the architecture always was great.
From what I've read, Jack, influenced by his Sebonack experience, took on the construction of a type of course that he had not yet tackled. I believe his quote after the Sebonack experience was that they were making things too perfect. I think his vision for what could be at Dismal was not perfectly translated to the canvas of the land, most likely because his team had never designed for or constructed a course on the type of property they saw in the Sand Hills. They didn't miss the mark by much, but they did miss.
So what happens next is a series of tweaks, changes and alterations that individually do not seem grand in scale, but when looked at in their totality appear to have changed the nature of several holes fairly drastically (most likely for the better) from what was first built. The fact that they were irrigating the rough seems to have been a major misstep from the get go, one that may have been avoided with a bit of study of other courses built on similar land. Go back and read the thread discussing how Jack didn't visit Sand Hills before embarking at Dismal. I can understand his wanting to give Dismal his version of a NE Sand Hills course without being influenced by any thoughts he might have absorbed from its neighbor. But the least he and his team could have done for the first owners was to have asked the pertinent questions about practical features of the land, such as does watering the rough make any sense.
As the third owner, you've inherited a course that for most of its lifetime was a work in progress. From what you've said, that work is still taking place, whether in design changes or in the constant battle by your super to present the best possible conditions. From what Mac said, that work is noticeable to the member on a year by year basis.
All new courses go through tweaks. C&C does it, Doak does it and even Nicklaus does it. When those tweaks are focused on softening a contour here, supporting a bunker face there or adding a variant to the maintenance meld, you're looking at a design that hit its mark. The minor tweaks are the inevitable maintenance that is needed when working with the ever changing medium of land. When the tweaks are needed to right flaws in the initial design parameters, such as major regrading of fairways, softening greens that had slopes too severe for the designed contours or deciding to pull the pipes out of the rough, I'd say the initial design missed its mark.
The real case study is going to be when we look back on what Tom does on the second course. Of course he has the benefit of learning from all of Jack's missteps. But I'd bet even without those lessons he'd come a lot closer to the bullseye than Jack did on his first go.
Respectfully,
Sven
PS - JNC - let's not compare apples and oranges when we're talking about the changes made to ODG courses and modern courses. The changes in design and construction technology have made the process a lot easier today, thus negating the need for many of the tweaks made to some of the older courses in their infancy. Not to mention the back-of-the-napkin need-to-catch-my-next-train attitude of many early architects. We won't even get started on the way the evolution of golf equipment technology influenced course renovation back in the day.