(Continued)
Hugh Wilson likely had the best intentions to step back from golf course design and construction when he resigned as the Chairman of the Merion Cricket Club's Green Committee in December 1914.
However, fate intervened and in January of 1915 the good word was announced at the annual Golf Association of Philadelphia meeting that agreement had been reached with the City of Philadelphia on a design plan produced by Hugh Wilson's GAP-appointed committee. Construction would begin in the spring and that same committee was appointed to guide that effort. It would be reported that Hugh Wilson spent six months on attending to details of the construction, from early April through seeding in September. Merion Superintendent William Flynn was pressed into service as the "shaper" of greens and hazards and did a stellar job. The course would open to near universal plaudits in May of 1916.
During that summer Merion Cricket Club would throw their hat into the ring expressing interest in holding the 1916 US Amateur, at the time the most prestigious tournament in the country. As one of the only clubs with two 18-hole courses available, it had an advantage. However, the Merion East Course that opened in 1912 had "less bunkering than an average nine-hole course", as it was believed that bunkering should only be placed after observing play over time to ensure optimum strategic impact. The West Course had even less.
With such an opportunity in the headlights, and the shaping of Cobbs Creek largely complete, William Flynn went to Massachusetts in early August, 1915. Much like Hugh Wilson's voyage abroad to study the best golf course architecture abroad in the spring of 1911, Flynn went to Myopia, The Country Club, Essex County, Woodland, Brae Burn, Newton Commonwealth and other leading courses of the state "seeking ideas".
Was he sent by Merion? By Hugh Wilson? Or did he go on his own volition? We don't know for sure.
I'm now going to steal liberally from my IMO piece on Wilson, as I think the following paragraphs describe their relationship and respective roles very well.
In July of 1915, as construction efforts at Cobb’s Creek were nearing completion and the grow-in process begun, the following article appeared in the “Evening Ledger”; “Merion is not trapped and bunkered at present because of the 90 per cent of the club’s golfers who are not cracks. It is sufficiently hard for the remaining 10 per cent and not too difficult to take away a portion of the enjoyment from the others. Should the national championship be awarded to Merion, traps and bunkers could be placed in short order.”
Within months, it was confirmed that Merion would host the prestigious US Amateur championship, which in those days was the most important tournament in the country. Naturally, Hugh Wilson was pressed back into service, this time to add teeth to the club’s course through the creation of stringent bunkering strategies and an attempt to improve some of the course’s basic weaknesses.
Previewing the tournament for “American Golfer” in February 1916, Tillinghast wrote; “Certainly a reference to the Merion course over which the championship of 1916 will be played must be of interest. The course was opened in 1912, and the plans were decided upon only after a critical review of the great courses of Great Britain and America. It was the first of the two eighteen hole courses at Merion, the West Course being opened several years later. The distances are admirable and altogether Merion presents a good test of golf, but in view of the fact that the National title is to be decided there next September, a number of hazards will be introduced to bring the play closer to championship demands.”
With the limited time available to get the course ready before September, Wilson and Flynn must have tore across the landscape of Merion East like a storm bent on construction. Adding over fifty strategically-placed bunkers, all new tees, they also ripped up and rebuilt greens on what are today’s holes 6 and 9, created brand new greens on the 8th and 17th and planted new fairways on holes 10, 11, and 12. Remarkably, the course was in superb condition by the time of the event.
By April 23, 1916 the “Philadelphia Inquirer” reported; “Nearly every hole on the course has been stiffened so that in another month or two it will resemble a really excellent championship course. Hugh Wilson is the course architect and Winthrop Sargent is the chairman of the Green Committee. These two men have given a lot of time and attention to the changes and improvements. Before anything was done to the course originally Mr. Wilson visited every golf course of any note not only in Great Britain, but in this country as well, with the result that Merion‘s east course is the last word in course architecture. It has been improved each yearuntil it is now nearly perfect from a golf standpoint. The club has been very fortunate in having as its greenkeeper William S. Flynn. He is a New Englander and before coming to Merion was a professional in Vermont.”
On the same day William Evans concurred in the “Evening Ledger”; “These changes have been made by the Green Committee under the most efficient chairmanship of Winthrop Sargent and Hugh Wilson, to whose genius Merion owes both its courses. In addition, Mr. Wilson, for many years chairman of the Green Committee at Merion, also constructed the Seaview course and so altered the Philmont course by adding two new holes that it now ranks among the best courses in Philadelphia. Merion is particularly fortunate in having as its groundkeeper William S. Flynn, under whose personal direction all this work is being done. In intelligence he is heads above the average greenkeeper and in addition is an excellent executive.”
(To be continued)