The other side of the Merion move to Ardmore (Merion East) story!

[TEPaul]

Sorry to start another Merion thread on here when so many seem to be thoroughly worn out with the subject.

However, I think this one is really interested and has never much been discussed on here and probably for a very good reason---eg fundamentally it does not just focus on golf course architecture.

I am speaking of course about what-all else was involved back then in that move to Ardmore that created the great Merion East golf course. Actually there was a whole lot more and without it Merion East as we know it probably never would have happend back then in 1910 and 1911.

And I am speaking of at least one person involved in it all who arguably could be labelled "the REAL Missing Face of Merion."

That would of course be Horatio Gates Lloyd!

When one looks at that MCC move to Ardmore story (MCC actually never left their original club), all-in Lloyd very well may have been the greatest "angel" any significant American golf club ever had!

Forget for a moment all the little details of the original design and construction of Merion East in 1911 and 1912 and who did what and when on that, because without Lloyd it's quite likely it never would have happened at all. When it came to finding the site, negotiating the deal for the site, organizing how the land and the course would be payed for, actually buying the land himself, underwriting a stock subscription for the development company who developed the residential community to the west, how the course was designed and built, how boundary problems could be resolved, and how it would operate financially, Horatio Gates Lloyd was everywhere, on all the committees, on the board, the president of the MCCGA Corporation etc, etc----you name it, he was there and right in the middle of it all.

And here is another item that may interest and amuse you-----had it not been for David Moriarty's 2008 IMO piece "The Missing Faces of Merion" that focused on the faces of Macdonald, Whigam and to some extent HH Barker, the story of Lloyd and Merion may never have resurfaced with Merion GC as well as with multiple members who live to the west of Merion East.* So if David Moriarty is looking for credit and attribution from me or us or Merion GC, this is probably what he ultimately will be credited with---and not his alternative architectural creation story involving Macdonald and Whigam which Merion GC has long included and featured to the extent their records back then show were appropriate.

Lloyd did a remarkable thing for MCC and Merion back then but for some reason his contribution and his story really was lost in the wash and apparently right from the beginning.

When one asks why, the real reason very likely might be because that is the way he wanted it to be!! And if it is true to say that was the way he wanted it to be the next logical question should be, WHY was that the way he wanted it to be?

Ultimately, the answer to that may be one of the most interesting stories ever told by Merion G.C.!


*Reading the 2008 IMO piece "The Missing Faces of Merion" one can see that the author was certainly aware of the roll of Horatio Gates Lloyd but for reasons that include a lack of additional information on him (that would be found later in the archives of MCC) at the time the IMO piece was presented he was apparently not aware of the details and certainly the extent and significance of it.

[Terry Lavin]

I hereby move for a Merion-atorium.

[TEPaul]

Terry:

I completely understand. This may not be of much interest to GOLFCLUBATLAS.com and I suppose that's understandable at this point.


However, it certainly is of great interest to Merion GC and it is a story that will be told by them----we have spoken about it and how best to tell it. Lloyd is definitely a man whose Merion story must be told as without him they may have never existed and the scores of members who live to the west contiguous to it may never have lived there either.

Another interesting item is that had it not been for Lloyd, Macdonald very well might not have come to Ardmore in 1910 in the first place. An adjunct to that might be a much more comprehensive revelation of just how and why Macdonald became involved in the golf architecture projects he did become involved in. That too is a fascinating story and there is actually some really interesting documentation out there that seems to reflect on it.

We cannot forget that Macdonald was considered by many to have been the Father of American golf architecture but that through a number of those years he did have a most interesting regular job and it definitely was not golf course architecture! Macdonald's business profession and activities in the first decade of the 20th century after moving from Chicago to New York are really interesting and I think say a whole lot about who he was and what he was all about even with golf course architecture projects of which arguably there were probably only about a dozen that required his significant participation!!

[JESII]

Tom,

In my opinion, the most important "fact" for you to find is just when Lloyd became engaged with HDC. The stock recapitalization plan is part of it, but not all of it, I see that as the end of the story as opposed to the beginning. Do you tink he was talking to Connell and HDC about this particular piece of land as early as 1909? Why or why not?

[Sam Morrow]

I hereby move for a Merion-atorium.

Your honor, please compare and contrast Dismal River and Ballyneal.

[TEPaul]

Jim:

Regarding Lloyd and HDC or Connell as early as 1909, I just can't say conclusively at this time. Years ago I thought he was and I said he was because of some incorporation papers or reincorporation papers of HDC in 1909 (which were REALLY hard to read because they are so degraded).

I certainly think it's possible he was for a number of reasons* but the fact is I have nothing solid document-wise to back it up. The first documentation appears to be MCC's Site or Search committee's and Lloyd's contact with HDC and Connell on or just before June 1910, but that certainly does not mean something was not going on between them before that.

One of the problems here is the penchant people like Lloyd and his business crowd had back then for just laying something or some project with complex corporation structures. I don't know why that was but I have a very good suspicion of why it was. For this I probably need a really good business historian and I've been looking for one for a few years.

We should remember and note that this very era when this was happening with MCC was a very seminal one in American governmental and business history. It was in fact right in the midst of a government restructuring that nominally was trying to deal with what was called "trust busting." In 1913 the US Government would institute the Federal Reserve (bank).

I have not seen it ever mentioned on this website but at this very time the US Government was making some serious noise about taxing recreation which probably would have included golf clubs. Therefore that might explain some of this complicated corporate or business layering that people like Lloyd and J.P Morgan and J.D. Rockefeller got into around this era.

Lloyd was a stock underwriter, that was his business. In 1910 he was a primary partner of Drexel & Co (interestingly George Thomas Jr's father was too) and in 1912 Lloyd would move over to J.P Morgan & Co and become one of its partners. Organizing and underwriting stock subscriptions is what he did-----that's what those financial partnership companies like those ones were all about. They had plied about a 77 year era when the US Government had nothing like the ability to raise money as they had before 1836 and would again after 1913. Those kinds of private financial partnerships essentially did it for them during that era!

We also need to know more about Joseph Connell. He was definitely not just some speculative real estate developer, he and his history with the development of the Main Line back then was pretty amazing. Therefore there could probably be no way that Lloyd and the rest of the MCC crowd could not have been aware of him and for years as well as perhaps being friends!

*I would be glad to provide later if you're intersted.