TOC- Periods of Change

[Scott Macpherson]

Hi All,

Looking at it, there have been four periods of significant change since TOC assumed its modern routing in 1870.

1) 1866-1870 – When Old Tom built the 1st and 18th Greens
2) 1904-1905 – Added 200 yards, 13 bunkers, returfed or relaid 7 Greens
3) 1924-1936 – Expanded the 2nd green to the right, raised the hollow in front of the 6th green, removed 2 bunkers, added 7 new tees
4) 2012-2014 – 3 bunkers removed,  3 bunkers moved, 2 bunkers added, 1 bunker adjusted, part of 11th green adjusted, some 'broken ground' created by 3 greens.

Old Tom was on-hand for the first works, no-one in particular associated with the works in the second and third phases (but Harry Colt was on the R&A Greens Committee from 1924-1928), and Martin Hawtree for the current phase.

Looking at the works, the first phase was the most significant as it gave us the routing we now have. The second most significant phase took place in 1904-1905, and then maybe the current phase is the third most significant – but it is pretty even with the 1924-1936 period.

Other works have taken place in between these periods, such as the addition of new tees, or the removal or addition of some bunkers, but the majority of works do seem to be in concentrated periods.

Hope this helps give some historical context for the current period.

regards,

Scott

[Carl Rogers]

Is some of the vitriol expressed here about TOC alterations due to:
1. an an excessively emotional if not irrational affinity for nostolgia?
2. dislike of the individuals involved, thus nothing they do can be any good?
3. dislike of the governing bodies in general, (ditto above)?

in my copy of the Confidential Guide, TD states a position that states the qualities of TOC that go far beyond the merely historical.

[Paul_Turner]

Carl

A lot of water under the bridge at St Andrews since the 1930s:  the best Open championships, explosion in popularity of the game, just more history to get attached to.   

Scott

You forgot the 7th hollow.

[Ally Mcintosh]

Carl

A lot of water under the bridge at St Andrews since the 1930s:  the best Open championships, explosion in popularity of the game, just more history to get attached to.   

Scott

You forgot the 7th hollow.

And the spur on the 4th being changed... And two more greens with broken ground being created (5 in total)... and alterations to the 17th green to assist the bunker... And gorse removed on the 7th...

[Tony_Muldoon]

Scott you might also relate these periods to the length added. Again from your excellent book.



In any 'normal’ distribution curve you would expect the big % spikes to have happened when the course was shorter, but look they are getting bigger!

Could you also entitle your 4 periods of most intense changes as

!) Response to gutta percha
2) Response to bounding billies/Haskell
3) Response to steel shafts
4) Response to ProV1

[Scott Macpherson]

Hi Tony,

Yes, I considered including a comment on length, but thought that the heart of the current angst is to do with bunkers and greens primarily, as no tees are being added this year. Glad you are still enjoying the book though.


General Comment:

There have been some comments that Mackenzie and Harry Colt was dead against any changes to The Old Course. Mackenzie may have been, but my impression was that Colt considered changes. I found an old photocopy from my Book's notes. It is a notice in a prominent golf magazine suggesting Colt had ideas to change the Course in 1914. Later, (and I can find the notes at the moment) but he may have also been involved in the expansion of the 2nd green down to the right. Indeed, this may have happened while Harry Colt was on the R&A Greens Committee.

My point is that the course has always changed, that some prominent people have often suggested changes, and we can have a more pragmatic and objective debate if we consider the historical facts.

Scott

[Scott Macpherson]

Hey – I just had an idea. Maybe Peter Dawson and the research staff at the R&A uncovered Harry Colts design change proposals of 1914 and are implementing them 100 years later as a tribute to the great man. Wouldn't that be an interesting twist!

Scott

[Paul_Turner]

Scott

Colt's classed his courses/work in 5 ways: 

A: New Courses designed
AA: New courses designed and supervised
B: Courses remodeled
BB: Courses remodeled and supervised
C: Clubs advised regarding upkeep or minor changes

For the "St Andrews Eden" he has AA

For "Royal and Ancient GC" he has C.  I assume this means the Old Course.

Neil Crafter I believe has a quote on Colt stating he wouldn't change The Old Course.  I can't recall where this is.

[Sean Walsh]

Scott,

Your highlighted press clipping had me wondering whether it was published 3 days before they got out the horse and dray to perform the work. 

[Tony_Muldoon]

Hey – I just had an idea. Maybe Peter Dawson and the research staff at the R&A uncovered Harry Colts design change proposals of 1914 and are implementing them 100 years later as a tribute to the great man. Wouldn't that be an interesting twist!

Scott

Yes indeed it would Scott


Could your highlighted part of the photocopy be referring to alterations at the Eden?  I don't think its conclusive that it's referring to the Old Course.

[Frank Pont]

If they were implementing Colt recommendations I am sure the PR advisors to the R&A would have made sure it would have been front and center in any communications. Since that was not the case, and given his own classification of his work at TOC as C,  I judge the hypothesis highly unlikely

[Geoff_Shackelford]

Just curious...is there any possibility that, we, occupants of the planet in 2012, have the benefit of wisdom of time and experience to decide when periods of change are no longer progress and just change?

[Kyle Henderson]

Is some of the vitriol expressed here about TOC alterations due to:
1. an an excessively emotional if not irrational affinity for nostolgia?
2. dislike of the individuals involved, thus nothing they do can be any good?
3. dislike of the governing bodies in general, (ditto above)?

in my copy of the Confidential Guide, TD states a position that states the qualities of TOC that go far beyond the merely historical.

Certainly those are all influences. My own personal distaste for the current changes to TOC stem from:
1) the near impossibility of ever restoring these features as they were
2) what seems to be an impetus for demanding more precise execution of the professional/aerial style of golf at the expense of the more strategic, low-running amateur game that comprises 90+% of play on the course.


Golf, to me, is immeasurably more fun when played over firm, naturally tumbling ground. I have spent more time and money than rationality can defend in pursuit of logging experiences on such playgrounds, as far too few golf courses possess these features.

To have the original, and perhaps the best example of what many golfers consider to be ideal playing grounds irreversibly harmed is a tough pill to swallow. Surely there are more important things in life than golf, but the needless and misguided nature of the modifications to the Old Course gnaws at my inner sportsman in a most displeasing fashion.

[Sean Walsh]

Kyle,

Extremely well said.

[Scott Macpherson]

Hi Tony,


Yes in 2006 I could not cross verify exactly what, if anything, Colt did to the Old Course so hence you won't read about it in my book. My sense is that he may have had some input though.

Paul,

Thanks for putting up that list. You have perhaps the most info in Colt of anyone here. Did Colt give himself a 'C'? Can you remind me where that is? Do you have any evidence of Colt being involved in changes to TOC when he was on the R&A Greens Committee? When he was on the Committee in 1924 they added a lot of new tees.


Geoff.

Yes. There is always a question of 'change' vs 'progress' but the answer is often subjective. Or to say it another way, everything done to the course is a 'change' but only an individual can decide if it is 'progress'. I was just trying to say with the facts (loose as they may be).

regards,

Scott

[BCrosby]

Scott

Neil Crafter I believe has a quote on Colt stating he wouldn't change The Old Course.  I can't recall where this is.

From about 1924 to '27 Joshua Crane wrote a series of commentaries on architecture for Field magazine. At the heart of Crane's commentaries was a theory of assessing the quality of a course based on 'objective' criteria. TOC came out last in Crane's rankings using his criteria. The dust-up that followed was remarkable, drawing in virtually every big name from the Golden Age. (Crane had, in effect, challenged many ideas that went to the heart of the theory of strategic golf architecture. Architects were upset. There were tears.)

Among the responses to Crane's ideas (there were many from different people in several different journals) was a series of interviews that Charles Ambrose conducted with MacK, Abercromby and Colt for Field magazine. The question Ambrose posed to each was whether the TOC should be changed in light of the criticisms it was then receiving.

Colt's and Aber's responses were both, basically, that they would not touch TOC because of its historical significance.

MacK's response was more interesting. While saying that he would not change TOC, also for historical reasons, he did send to the Field offices (from the boat then taking him to Australia) a sketch showing proposed changes to the 1st and 18th at TOC. MacK noted that his sketch was not intended to suggest that the changes he drew should be actually made. Rather MacK saw his drawing as a kind of thought experiment for a theoretical first and last hole. I've found no later references to MacK's sketches. He never pushed for changes to TOC to my knowledge.     

The coda to the story is that Crane followed up several years later with his own drawings of proposed changes to the first four holes of TOC. Crane's drawings appeared in last couple of issues of the British GI before it folded in the Great Depression.   

For those interested, there is more detail about the foregoing in my piece on Crane on this site.

Bob

[Scott Macpherson]

Hi Bob,

That's right and I included one of Crane's plans (the one for the first hole) in my book. p76.

My suspicious is that we have more to learn about Colt's views however. I wonder if he did submit any ideas to the St Andrews Town Council in 1914, and if they still have them...?

Scott

[BCrosby]

Scott -

Let us know what you find re Colt in 1914.

It's pretty clear that John Low was involved with the changes on the eve of the 1905 Open. Certainly he got the bulk of the criticism for the new bunkers put in at the time.

Interesting is that Herb Fowler's name also shows up then and later in connection with minor changes made before the 1907 (?) Amateur. Have you run across anything on Fowler?

Bob  

[Paul_Turner]

Scott

Yes Colt classed the courses himself...it was for advertisement/promotion purposes.  The nature of the classification obviously has some flexibility but from comparing with other courses Colt worked on:  Hawtree's current work would be classed BB (assuming he's supervising it all).

I don't have any info on Colt and the R&A in 1914.

[Niall C]

Scott

Colt's classed his courses/work in 5 ways: 

A: New Courses designed
AA: New courses designed and supervised
B: Courses remodeled
BB: Courses remodeled and supervised
C: Clubs advised regarding upkeep or minor changes

For the "St Andrews Eden" he has AA

For "Royal and Ancient GC" he has C.  I assume this means the Old Course.

Neil Crafter I believe has a quote on Colt stating he wouldn't change The Old Course.  I can't recall where this is.

Paul

That's fascinating, I never knew that Colt categorised his work in that fashion. As a matter of interest, how do you think Colt would categorise the present work in relation to his category's above ?

Scott

Thanks for posting that snippet from GI. I recall when I came across it first, I wondered if it referrred to his work on the Eden Course where I think he wanted to make some changes early on if memory serves me right, but equally I suppose it could mean also changes on either the Old or the New.

With regards to the period of changes, would the first period correspond to when they took out the gorse to widen the course or was that largely done in Allan Robertsons day ? It strikes me that in digging out gorse, root and branch, that you are going to create some pretty ugly wounds that would need returfing. I would suggst its probable if not inevitable that in doing that you are going to change the contours either by accident or design. Likewise back in the days (early 1900's ?) when the course was, according to most commentators in a shabby state, with dry bare patches that needed returfed is it not likey/possible that they took the opportunity to iron out what they saw as a few kinks ?

Niall  

edit Paul answered my question above

[Jeff_Mingay]

Adding and removing bunkers and installing new tees for more length isn't really a big deal (anywhere), by comparison with altering contour at St. Andrews. The main issue, for me, is just that: Since Tom Morris built the 1st and 18th greens, it seems no one's significantly, or at least purposefully, touched the contour of the Old Course - especially the putting areas (greens).

For someone to decide that he/she can alter, add, enhance (whatever it it) the ground there, at St. Andrews, is pretty "special". And, to think that those changes to that ground are going to have any effect what so ever on the challenge of the course and the eventual outcome of an Open is "dreamy", in my opinion.  
 

 

[Terry Lavin]

Just curious...is there any possibility that, we, occupants of the planet in 2012, have the benefit of wisdom of time and experience to decide when periods of change are no longer progress and just change?

As to the pros hereabouts, I would say, yes, your opinions have the benefit of wisdom of time and experience. What is lacking is the power to assert your will.

[Niall C]

Adding and removing bunkers and installing new tees for more length isn't really a big deal (anywhere), by comparison with altering contour at St. Andrews. The main issue, for me, is just that: Since Tom Morris built the 1st and 18th greens, it seems no one's significantly, or at least purposefully, touched the contour of the Old Course - especially the putting areas (greens).

For someone to decide that he/she can alter, add, enhance (whatever it it) the ground there, at St. Andrews, is pretty "special". And, to think that those changes to that ground are going to have any effect what so ever on the challenge of the course and the eventual outcome of an Open is "dreamy", in my opinion. 
 

 

Jeff

Back in 1999/2000, with a group of other aspiring golf course architects I walked round TOC in the company of Eddie Adams, the then head greenkeeper. At the back edge of one of the greens, to illustrate a point he was making, Eddie pulled out a pen knife and then proceeded to cut a deep wedge shape out of the turf. We all gasped in horror ("Old Course stabbed to death shocker") and indeed someone might even have fainted, I can't recall. Point made (colour and smell of the turf to illustrate the amount of thatch build up or lack thereof), Eddie calmly replaced the turf, trod on it, and instantly you couldn't spot where the knife had gone in.

That moment has always stuck with me. It showed to me the practical and no nonsense nature of greenkeeping in this country. Wasn't the building up of the back of the 11th by Old Tom a practical solution to coastal erosion/sand spray (someone please correct me if I'm wrong) While I wouldn't claim to recall seeing it at St Andrews, I've seen plenty of turf being relaid on other links with a view to dealing with wear and tear and that sometimes has involved recontouring to keep the turf playable. When you think back to how the Old Course experienced wear and tear like no other, I can't help but think that an awful lot of what people take for natural contouring has been fashioned to a degree by the hand of man at some point, and maybe not way back in Old Tom's day either. For instance I wonder how many of the slightly raised plateau greens aren't man made, pretty few I would think.

Niall

[Adam Lawrence]

Scott -

Let us know what you find re Colt in 1914.

It's pretty clear that John Low was involved with the changes on the eve of the 1905 Open. Certainly he got the bulk of the criticism for the new bunkers put in at the time.

Interesting is that Herb Fowler's name also shows up then and later in connection with minor changes made before the 1907 (?) Amateur. Have you run across anything on Fowler?

Bob  

Fowler was definitely on the Green Committee before WW1, the papers I found researching my piece on him during the summer made that clear. But there was no suggestion of his proposing alterations.

[Jeff_Mingay]

Niall,

There's a MASSIVE difference between things (including contour) changing over time, the greenkeeping staff occasionally making some alterations for practical reasons, and hiring a golf course architect to create and implement a renovation plan for the Old Course.