Patrick,
Do I read you right that you have contacted someone within NGLA to get the old property lines? I am sure we would like more info on the people you contacted.
As you know, memories of long time members have been proven inaccurate in many historical searches elsewhere, so I don't think its OB for Bryan to want to know if your source is on that level, or the club historian, or deeds, or whatever.
And, while I agree the property line he drew is an estimate, probably wrong in some details, and most likely wrong on the east side where there are no clues to real property lines, I don't think you need to call him disingenuous to take a stab at it. Again, most of your post is about what someone else said, and pretty light on facts concerning what you said. Being defensive is not giving a constructive answer to those who, for some reason that is getting harder to fathom, actually care a bit about this discussion.
David,
I understand your points, and again, we aren't far apart on what we think on this, but you always seem so sure it could have happened only one way, and I don't share your certainty on our interpretations.
As you said, every paper was going to get its own spin on the material, and the typical way to do that is to interview the main participants to get a unique quote. Its not hard to imagine they even perhaps talked to one of the actual founders or whatever who put down money. So many times, the historical quotes are both garbled, mixed, and sometime wrong, and it could be for several reasons.
As to fitting any specific land in, yes, there is only a bit of land by 17 and a few smaller pockets, certainly not suited for the mansion type cottages most members may have been envisioning. Like I say, we know the plan was dropped, and our only differences are in the certainty of when and how. Maybe the key is the CBM quote about wanting to be away from things when playing an ideal course. Did he decide that himself? Did an early founder tell him he wouldn't build a cottage there for whatever reason?
Again, never intended when he mentioned the leftover land, or intended but something just didn't work out for reasons we don't know. This stuff is interesting, but not interesting enough for me to argue with you about those details we will never know. Ditto on the original premise. I can see Patrick's interpretation, but I can also see Mike's. Obviously, CBM and others weren't considering some website like this 100 years later debating every word as if they were 100% precise in what they were trying to say.