Walter Travis--our kinda guy!

[TEPaul]

Do all you firm and fast advocates out there realize that Walter Travis was apparently so into firm and fast conditons that he took an enormous f....ing STEAMROLLER to the fairways of GCGC?!

The fact that the enormous steamroller was apparently so heavy it killed the grass, but, hey, who cares about some puny little incidental like that? He obviously got his firm and fast conditions for a while until some know-nothings at GCGC probably tried to crucify him!  

How could we not love a guy like Walter Travis in his quest for firm and fast? He was trying, Baby, he was REALLY TRYING!

[BCrosby]

Travis was also an extraordinarily accurate ball-striker.

I read recently where Hagen said Travis would play everything on the ground through a ten foot corridor that he had determined was the best route to the green. Because he kept his ball so low, he was able to play down the same narrow corridor even in very strong winds.

Which makes me wonder whether he didn't intend the narrow strip on the left of the 16th at GCGC to be fairway. Sounds like a route Travis would have taken.

Especially after he had steamrolled it.

Didn't Travis win a US Open when he was 54? A remarkable guy for lots of different reasons.

Bob

[T_MacWood]

Travis and Emmet had a public debate on this very subject.

[BCrosby]

I hope Emmet won.

[Patrick_Mucci]

BCrosby,

Which makes me wonder whether he didn't intend the narrow strip on the left of the 16th at GCGC to be fairway. Sounds like a route Travis would have taken.

If you physically visited the site, you would reject your theory,
The slope of the land, required trajectory to carry the large bunker off the tee, the position of the bunkers and the blindness of the shot make the shot almost impossible, even with a rifle with telescopic sights.

Do you think that Travis was more accurate, especially with his low trajectory shots, subject to the viscisitudes of the ground, and the equipment of the day, then today's PGA Tour players, Pros and top amateur players ?

[BCrosby]

Pat -

Having never been within 60 miles of GCGC, I defer to your views on the 16th fairway.

Was Travis more accurate with his bump and run game than modern pros are with their aerial game? If that is the question, I would guess not. But there is no way to know, of course.

He apparently played low trajectory shots all the time. Not just when the wind was up. And he beat almost all of his contemporaries (with their more aerial games) almost all of the time. So Travis must have been pretty #*@~ good at it.

Bob

[Patrick_Mucci]

BCrosby,

The slope of the ground pretty much precludes that shot from being successfully executed.

Hitting the ball 200-230 yards, with a + - threshold of 5 yards or less on fairway that slopes right to left, seems more fairy tale then fact.

As Lee Trevino states, "the older he gets, the better he used to be"

[TEPaul]

"Travis and Emmet had a public debate on this very subject."

Tom MacW:

Then for Crisssakes show us what that debate was. What better way could there be to compare some of their philosophies on architecture? I think I'm liking Walter Travis a helluva lot more than Devereaux Emmet at this point. Travis's philosophy on architecture seems to be more interesting.  

I noticed in the GCGC history book or perhaps Labance's book on Travis that Emmet wrote Travis a letter maybe in the 1920s asking him if they couldn't be friends again. There's apparently no record of a response from Travis.

Maybe Walter said;

"Devereaux, I told you and your architectural ideas to f...off 15 yrears ago and I'm telling both you and them to f...off again!"    

If Walter did do that I'm beginning to wonder why anyone would blame him!

[T_MacWood]

I don't know anything about STEAMROLLERS being used at GCGC. But Emmet came out with an article stating heavy-motor mowers were responsible for poor turf conditions and gave GCGC as an example. Travis wrote in response that if that were the case why weren't there poor condtions everywhere the mowers were used--some areas were bad and some areas were excellent. The same with areas they couldn't use the mowers like the west side of the 3rd and the south side of the 16th--why are they in such deplorable condition.

His answer: the problem was related to fertility of the soil, not the heavy mowers. "No, no, we are sure Mr.Emmet has not put his finger on the real source of the trouble." I have no idea, prerhaps an argronomic expert (or Tom Paul) could give us the true answer.

Travis then goes on to answer a letter criticizing him for his criticisim of the blindness at the NGLA....he proceeds to shoot down the critic with several paragraphs of Colt's theories on architecture.

[BCrosby]

It's kinda cool that exchanges in The American Golfer in 1915 sound so much like exchanges on GCA today. Except that the exchanges then took place over several months and our's take place over a couple of days.

Given the similarity of those discussions 85 years ago to those on GCA today, is the lesson that people never learn? Or is it that people never agree?

Or is it that we shouldn't use steamrollers on golf courses?

Bob

[TEPaul]

I have a very serious proposal boys--and it directly relates to GCGC.

I recommend it's high time GCGC completely turn its back on Devereaux Emmet and embrace Walter Travis whole hog.

Look at the facts. Dev Emmet somehow routed a good course there and the routing is basically the same as now. He must've just got lucky with the routing, though! But he built a bunch of geometrically shaped flat greens with geometric cross bunkers on every hole, sometimes twice. Old fashioned thoughtless, boring, penal architecture without question.

Emmet also advocated narrowness! It took Walter Travis to come in there at some point in the first decade of the last century and put some real stuff and some real strategy into that golf course. Travis had to cut most of those cross bunkers in half for some optional routes and he sprinkled tough bunkering throughout for some real strategic interest. Walter had to move greens and put virile contour into the others.

Travis apparently was also into WIDE--wide fairways with bunkering here and there for some real strategic interest.

Emmet appears to have been into narrow.

Travis and his architectural width was thought provoking, intelligent and manly. It follows that Travis's architecture was virile and heterosexual.

Now look at Dev Emmet (what man wants to be called "Dev" anyway?). Dev was into narrow fairways which was mind numbingly, usual and shot dictating, lacking in intelligence and feminine.

Travis wanted firm and fast turf at all costs, like any real man would, and even reverted to an enormous and incredibly heavy f....ing STEAMROLLER to get it!

Emmet probably wanted lush and soft and sensual turf with his gay fairway narrowness philosophy of architecture!

Just look at that famous photo of Dev Emmet. If that guy is not the "Cat in the Hat", who was? He looks like one of the world's all time dandies. Gayest looking blade I ever saw! Look at the expression on his face--it looks like he's trying to imitate the Mona Lisa!

Now look at any photo or Walter. The man never smiles--just like any REAL man! He has a stogie in his mouth at all times, even when he's hitting the most pressure packed shot of his career to win another US Amateur.

And look at Dev in that silly damn effeminate hat and a lilly white suit trying to be the precusor to Tom Wolfe!

If Walter Travis didn't get every single vestige of Dev Emmet's homosexual or at least femine architecture out of that golf course, today's memberhip should do it now!

Even Tom MacWood, who's the world's expert on GCGC's architecture, admitted on this very thread that Emmet (and Hubbell) admitted they had no idea about anything to do with architecture or agronomy when they built that golf course.

Thank God Walter Travis and his wide, virile and heterosexual architecture did something about that.

I propose that GCGC remove that pond on #16 and replace it with manly and heterosexual "asparagus bed" mounds or even virile nutmeg graters laid on their sides.

For God's sake, GCGC, do not replace that pond with some shallow, wrist waving, snow white, girlish bunker that any man can get out of without a second thought.

This is your last chance GCGC---get rid of everything that has anything to do with that little gay Dev Emmet and restore completely to manly, stogie chomping, heterosexual Walter Travis.

You're supposed to be an all-men's golf club and golf course GCGC--so restore to only Walter Travis and start acting like an all-men's golf club and golf course. If you don't start in 2004 to restore that course to all Travis and no Emmet you're going to be known all over the world as a gay club and a gay golf course with homosexual architecture!

[Norbert P]

   Laughing out f*@#ing LOUD !  Wifey came over to see what was so funny.   She thinks you're intolerant but I am having a good guffaw.   "Woman! Get me a beer!" Thump!  "Oof!"

   Damn, she's got an arm like Randy Johnson.  

[TEPaul]

Intolerable?? She thinks I'm INTOLERABLE?? You're damn straight I am! Walter was intolerable too. Any man who's a real man has to be intolerable. You better not let me anywhere near that women of yours Bandoon!

[Norbert P]

 I will oblige, Tom Paul, for your sake.

[ian]

Tom,

I've not laughed that hard at any single post.  

I would like to publicly state I believe in very wide fairways and asparagus beds!

[ForkaB]

Slag

As long as she doesn't look like Randy Johnson, you're in luck.......

Tom

Don't be so sure about Travis.  You know what the psychologists say about guys who smoke big cigars.  Something about compensation and fixation.........

[tonyt]

"For God's sake, GCGC, do not replace that pond with some shallow, wrist waving, snow white, girlish bunker that any man can get out of without a second thought."

Tom,

Thank you for making my evening after coming home from work to this. Luv ya work  

[paul cowley]

.....whats next TP , faggotbunkers that require a limp wristed shot to play out of ?.....................your're a mess  

[T_MacWood]

So much for TE's "Golf Club Atlas is a big world with room in it for everyone"....we may have to ammend that slightly.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood and Paul Cowley:

Well, I'll be damned and go to hell---you both make very fine points there!

And because you have that will certainly cause me to change my mind about what I've been saying. The "Big World" idea of golf and golf architecture ("Golf and golf architecture is a great big thing and there really is room in it for everyone") is the most important thing of all--certainly far more important than the removal of things such as "faggot bunkers" that require limp-wristed recovery shots!

So you've convinced me to change my mind--congratulations. I think things like "faggot bunkers" and other homosexual appearing golf architecture features do have a place in the "Big World" theory and should continue to be built, preserved and in some cases even restored---just not at that "Real" man, Walter J. Travis's golf course and "all-men" golf club---GCGC!

[Bob_Huntley]

With reference to limp wristed golfers, panty-waists and others of their ilk and lack of strength, I must assure everyone here, that apart from Jimmy Bruen, the longest hitter ever to win the British Amateur in the first part of the twentieth century was a.......wait for it, a bachelor!

[Tom MacWood]

Here is another interesting thread on Travis & Emmet.

[TEPaul]

"With reference to limp wristed golfers, panty-waists and others of their ilk and lack of strength, I must assure everyone here, that apart from Jimmy Bruen, the longest hitter ever to win the British Amateur in the first part of the twentieth century was a.......wait for it, a bachelor!



Sir Robert of Huntleyshire:

Are you in some way inferring that Jimmy Bruen had something of a pause at the top of his remarkably powerful golf swing----or would you be inferring that, and perhaps something else?