Why does Bill Diddel get no respect?

[Evil Lurker]

Regarding Kern's work at ECC -

[Evil Lurker]

Regarding Kern's work at ECC-

The use of timber walls was a decision made by the club - if I remember correctly Kern wanted to use low profile stone walls but was voted down - the superintendent felt that the lakes should be walled to minimize erosion.  There was quite a movement at the club to beautify it through the use of landscaping done by the superintendent and timber walls was just the ticket.

Diddel designed the second nine and _remodeled_ the first - to this day there are still many unsafe areas on the front nine as it is built on very little land.

The original budget for ECC was probably nil - the old, tiny greens are native material, nearly no drainage was originally installed and the amount land used was pretty small - considering in those days land was probably pretty cheap.  The original course was not a classic course in the Mid Pines, etc. sense at all, but a decent course on a difficult piece of land.

Before the Kern remodel, several greens had already been rebuilt in the 70's and the original eighth green had been relocated by a greens committee, I think.

The original budget and Master Plan was trimmed back by the club and did not make all the improvements originally proposed but  did manage to remodel the clubhouse shortly thereafter for a pretty penny, or two, maybe three.

Many of Kern's changes were pretty good - lengthening a nothing 250 yard par four into a 420 (15) yard challenging and difficult par four and changing a 460 yard par four into a 500 + par five ( were pretty good.  Some of the new green complexes add a some variety to the round as well.

ECC is a great club golf course - really fine for its members - it is always in great shape, too.

[JakaB]

Evil,

Thank you for the info...I have played ECC many times after the remodel but never before...I felt the course to be an excellent design with the exception of the angle of the gold tee on 12....Sturges also mentioned Diddel reworked Rolling Hills...if this is so what do you think of the work he did there?

[Tommy_Naccarato]

William H. Diddel
By Bradley S. Klein

1884-1985
born: Indianapolis, Indiana
residence: Carmel, Indiana; Naples, Florida

charter member: American Society of Golf Course Architects

    If a golfer shot his age or better more times than Bill Diddle, there's no record of the achievement. He is said to have recorded that feat over 1,200 times in his life, as well as having won the Indiana Amateur title five times. But his chief legacy to golf has been a series of strong if under-appreciated courses, most of therm in the Midwest.

    Like many architects of his generation, he arrived at his craft fortuitously, in his case undertaking construction of a Willie Park Jr. routing for the club, Highland G&CC in Indianapolis, where Diddel had been a member. Dozens of assignments followed, including Speedway 500 CC (1928), a layout inside the track of the famed Brickyard that has subsequently been bulldozed. His Woodland GC (1951) in Carmel proved doubly famous, for it sported not a single bunker and was also the first Midwest golf course planned and developed as part of a residential real estate development -
where Diddel himself lived in a log cabin behind the twelfth tee.

    His works were well-routed, with strong ground contours and firm, fast turf conditions. Diddel was worried about the advent of automatic irrigation systems in the 1950's. When an aspiring young would-be designer in town by the name of Pete Dye asked him for advice, Diddel told him to break with convention since the craft was in the throes of rapid change and old-fashioned, hand-built courses emphasizing the ground game were about to become obsolete.


William H. Diddel's best:

Highland, Indianapolis, IN (1928) - with Willie Park Jr.
Meridian Hills, Indianapolis, IN (1923)
Forest Lake, Bloomfield Hills, MI (1926)
CC of Indianapolis, Indianapolis, IN (1930) - major revisions
Hot Springs-Arlington, Hot Springs, AK (1932)
Purdue University-South, West Lafayette, IN (1934)
Wichita, Wichita, KS (1950)
Woodland, Carmel, IN (1951)
Hidden Valley, Gaylord, MI (1957)
CC of Naples, Naples, FL (1963)

[cardyin]

I use the term "fingerpainting" to mean obliterated.
I still recommend Meridian Hills C.C. as an example of Diddel's best work.  First, the routing hasn't changed.  Second, the greens haven't changed.  George Fazio did a bit of work there in the 1960s, and Pete and Alice Dye (along with course superintendent Steve Frazier) built new tees and re-placed
some bunkers about 12-13 years ago, but they were smart enough to leave the greens alone.  Unless I have missed it, Tom Fazio hasn't worked there unless it was to construct a hidden water hazard first short of and now around, the green on the 18th hole, a par 5.

[Tom_Egan]

To: Evil Lurker

I enjoyed your discussion about the ECC course(s).  I'd like to discuss this further.  Could you please email me at tegan52356@cs.com so we can exchange some information?  Thanks,

Tom

[JakaB]

Tom,

How come BarnyF and Dr. Katz play golf in the same town and have never met.

[Peter Pratt (Guest)]

David, my family had a membership at Forest Lake from 1970-1990, so I found your comments interesting. I agree with you about the greens, though I've played Crystal Downs, High Pointe, and Kingsley since then and think Forest Lake's are not of their caliber and variety. Still, when I was growing up, no one I knew disputed that OHCC and FLCC had the best greens in SE Michigan.

I do disagree with you about the 2nd hole--it's a great short par 5, 315 yards, with options to fly the trees on the right (and risk the OB) or stay left with a layup that leaves a scary 2nd. The 4th green has been flattened--sigh--I hear. 6 and 7 are excellent long par 4s, 9 a solid par 4 with a wild green, and 17 a great long par 3. I miss it!

TJ,

I can now comment on why he may get no respect with regards to his work in Michigan.  Forest Lake is an interesting course.  I think a compelling argument could be made that it has the best greens in Michigan (Even better than Oakland Hills).  That written, the routing is mediocre to poor and the fit of approach to green is bad.  Furthermore, the course starts out with several outright goofy holes wrapped around a poorly placed driving range, houses, and wetlands.  If this course was built in the 80's, you could blame the poor site plan, routing, and fit on environmental regulations and housing requirements but since most the houses are forty or more years newer than the course and environmental regs were not issues in the 1920's, the architect has to take the blame.

As for Shanty Creek and Hidden Valley, these are very mediocre resort courses.  Probably no more than a 3 or a very generous 4 on the Doak scale.

[Evil Lurker]

About Rolling Hills -

It is an original Diddel design and has many fine golf holes - the course is crtiticized for having too many redundant holes whose tee shots play downhill and the subsequent approach plays uphill to a blind or semi - blind putting surface and having greens that are severely sloped and somewhat one dimensional in playing character.  The original course was not built on a very big budget.  Some of Diddel's original design features were never constructed.

The original Master Plan the Kerns did was trimmed back to a bunker remodeling project and after the plan was sketched the club never was willing to pay to have the architects implement the plan so they handed it over to the superintendent, Larry Hantle, I think, to construct, along with input and "guidance" from the greens committee.  The bunkers that were constructed were steep faced, not Diddel - like at all, and did not blend into the surrounds very well - many were maintenance trouble.

Ron Kern was called back in to reevaluate the bunkering and provided a plan that revised the bunkering to a more subtle style and to provide some much needed playing variety to the redundant par fours.  Many trees were encroaching on the course so several were removed.  6 holes were revised with Kern's involvement and since then drainage and irrigation projects by the superintendent have apparently taken the available budget for construction.

Rolling Hills is a great study in routing especially on an attractive, yet difficult piece of land where virtually no earth was moved.  It will test your shotmaking abilities and definitely don't short side yourself!  The membership is very friendly and the price makes it a steal!!!!

[JakaB]

Evil,

You are hardly evil at all...your prose borders on prozacian...what opinions if any do you have of the other Evansville area courses...Victoria National, Quail Crossing, Oak Meadow, Cambridge Crossing or even my personal favorite Hamilton...home of the Barney 66.  

[Evil Lurker]

The most worn out piece of equipment at Hamilton's has got to be the cash register - I wonder how many they go thru per year!!!!

There are probably crazies out there today getting a lot of roll on the frozen tundra.

Good day and Good Golf

[John Nixon]

TS

'Wonder what courses BD did are still in tact?

Old thread, but I missed it first time around and just found it searching through the archives.

I live across the street from what is probably one of Mr. Diddel's last courses, Brookshire, in Carmel, IN. Designed as part of a subdivision developed in the early 70's, it's a very narrow, tree-lined design that Mr. Diddel fit into a flood plain along Cool Creek and some adjoining small bluffs. I would imagine the course is untouched by any subsequent designer, and in fact has been allowed to be overgrown with large deciduous trees to the extent that the course has lost a bit in playability over the years. I recently asked the new management at the course about plans for addressing the tree problem, but they currently are sinking a lot of money into improving the conditioning of the greens, fairways, cartpaths etc. The course was allowed to fall into a bit of disrepair by the previous owner (well, ok, MAJOR disrepair) and needs the upgrade. It's currently in much better shape. If I ever find the time I'd like to see if there's some original plans and/or photos in the clubhouse.

[Ron Kern]

Nixer:

I can tell you that the original plans will not be in the clubhouse.

I have the original plans and specs.

I walked the ground carrying stakes and a hammer for Bill and my dad before this ever was a golf course - at the ripe age of 10 years old.  It sure was something to see the course built.

The original developer hired my dad to design the subdivision and wanted him to design the golf course.  Not having any experience, he suggested that the developer hire Bill Diddel who lived over at Woodland.  That was done and Bill took my dad under his wing and my dad's career in golf architecture was born.  Today, how many people would have turned down that "chance."

I played A LOT of high school golf on the course and my teacher, Tommy Vaughn was pro there for years.

Here's the rub...I live exactly 2 1/2 minutes away from the clubhouse...

The new owners have hired some hotshot guy to run the course.  And, I found out that he was making changes.  I tried to make contact with this new guy, but could not get a return phone call.  I dropped off my literature to a very unimpressed golf professional - I told him that I did not even want to be paid for any work, I just wanted to help with any changes that they might be considering - again I asked for a return call - nothing.

Finally a friend in the irrigation business made contact with the new guy and asked him about me.  The new guy's reply was that he considered himself a golf course architect and did not need my help.  He said that he would have no use for my free service and that he had no plans on returning my calls.  He mentioned that he had worked on 19 golf courses all over the world so he was more than experienced!!

So I will be keeping the plans in my office.

And, they don't even have Bill's last name spelled correctly on their website - that's right they brag about Bill's design on their website.

He has rebunkered one hole so far, and there are more to come.  It looks like an overinflated ego is ruining another golf course.

I am deeply disappointed by all of this.

Ron Kern

PS:  It is not untouched - a former superintendent that considers himself a golf architect fiddled with some of the bunkers and added a couple because he claimed to know what Bill would have wanted.  Bill was on the site very often and the course was shaped as he saw fit.  It is a good example of how Bill liked to bunker a course - not overly penal and not an over abundance of bunkers.  As on most of Bill's course, the short side of the hole is trouble.

[John Nixon]

Ron,

Thanks for your informative, if somewhat disillusioning, reply. I think everyone is so delighted the new owners are actually fixing up the course they may be missing what the long term goals of the new guy may be... I wonder if a number of other people raise the subject with him it would make any difference?

Since I live only 15 seconds from the clubhouse, we're not that far apart, I'd love to take a look at those plans if the chance arises. If your schedule allows I'd love to arrange a meeting. My email is Drophoppy@msn.com, if you're so inclined.

One last question - were there nearly as many large trees on the course originally? How did Bill D. feel about those? The Brookshire subdivision itself was originally pretty devoid of trees, I've been led to believe, but the situation may have been different down on the flood plain.

Thanks.

John Nixon

[Ron Kern]

Another interesting story about Brookshire is that when the City of Carmel was going to widen 116th street, that runs adjacent to hole number 14, they were going to build a retaining wall all along the hole and traffic was going to be within 75' of the edge of the fairway.  Plus all of the trees between the road and the golf hole were to be removed.

The owner at that time contacted me to take a look at the situation.

Being a civil engineer by education and having been a road design and drainage engineer I was able to evaluate the situation and come up with a solution.

Working with the city's consultants, I was able to change the design cross section section of the roadway and slightly realign the proposed widening thereby not taking nearly as much of the property, saving the tree buffer and eliminating the retaining wall (which saved the city several hundred thousand dollars to boot.)

In the past, I have seen questions here how engineering can benefit golf course architecture - here's an example, I guess.

So it is kind of funny that I actually saved the integrity of the golf course in the past, but now can have no input into any proposed changes.

About the trees - Bill did not believe in removing a tree unless it was in the way.  On some of his courses you will find a tree in the fairway or you may have to play over a tree on a par three ala the South Course at Purdue University (at least they kept that Diddel course intact.)

There were always large trees on the course - there isn't a lot of room between holes, so Bill left as many as possible.  How about that second shot on #8?

Ron Kern

[John Nixon]

How about that second shot on #8?

Ron Kern

Hole #8 is one of the prime reasons I realized I needed to learn to hit a draw  

That's one of my favorite par 5 holes in the area.

[Ken_Cotner]

Brookshire...boy, does that bring up some memories!  I ran many a high school cross country meet there, on a section of the back nine backing up to 116th Street (I think).  The golfers were none too happy to have their course invaded on days of meets!

I always enjoyed my opportunities to play at Brookshire as a young enthusiast.  Nixer, the course seemed pretty tree-lined to me back then (mid-1970's).

Didn't realize it was a Diddel design, nor that Tommy Vaughn was the pro.  He was a great guy and seemed to love teaching kids.

Is the lake in the neighborhood still there?  I fondly remember trying to learn how to sail on a 2-person boat at about 1:00 AM one summer evening...

Ken

[Jeff_Brauer]

I just had the pleasure of working with Wichita CC, noted as one of Diddel's best designs, to try to restore the course.  We dug up some of his old plans and philosophies and he was, IMHO, remarkably sophisticated for the 1950's time period.  

On all but the shortest par 4's and par 5's, he would bunker only one side of the green, not both, to allow a bail out.  This philosphy was ressurected on many TPC layouts in the 90's.

His fairway bunkers varied in distance from 220-270 from the tee depending on the tailing wind.

His greens were softer versions of Maxwells Rolls, probably a combination of his love for them, and some Midwestern "practicality" of his less well heeled clients. He did a few courses with gingerbread style bunkers, but the courses I saw of his in Wichita were pretty simplified shapes, so that's what we used in restoring WCC.  While I tried to restore everything to original plan, there were a few questions about immediate field changes, based on old photos, and plaster mosaic in the clubhouse.  So, we had to make a few guesses, and in some cases, decided to move bunkers farther out, or leave ones added by various greeens committees which members had become attached to, etc.  So, we didn't get all the bunkers back in original configuration, but we got most, and removed a few trees to get play corridors back, and the course seems better for it.

Like many courses, his greens have grown in over the years, but we didn't touch those in phase one, doing just the fairways and bunkers.  After the clubhouse gets its share of TLC, we will come back and restore the greens to original dimensions.  Luckily, only a few have been rebuilt over the years, and the original contours are mostly intact.