Cypress Point was then raised as an example of Mackenzie, that great course routing genius, making the most of a fabulous site – a mix of pine forests, great eroded sand flashes, jutting cliffs into the sea, and not caring about back-to-back par 5’s and par 3’s, because that’s what the site yielded most naturally. Let’s be a little careful here, however, and give credit where it’s due: the essential routing for Cypress Point was undertaken by Seth Raynor in September and October 1924, nearly two years before Mackenzie was asked by Samuel Morse, (the real estate developer of much of the Peninsula), on Seth Raynor’s untimely death, to finalize the golf course design on the point. Raynor’s routing plan (dated X.’24) shows that Mackenzie changed little in his plan, although the famous Hole 16 was a risk-what-you-dare 320 yard par-4 playing from tees further back and hugging the inner coast, the drive more towards the 18th hole. And the 18th green seems to be about up towards where the clubhouse now is – a hole of some 390 yards instead of the Mackenzie – realized 345 yards par-4. (Did Mackenzie ’compromise’ Hole 18’s length on instruction from the fledgling club’s board about relocating Raynor’s original clubhouse site, nearer the sea, up to the crown of the hill?)