[Peter Pallotta]

The April 1910 “American Golfer” included a little article. Quote:

Mr. R. H. Robertson, ex-President of the USGA, says that the most striking difference between seaside courses abroad and those in this country is that golf was made for the courses abroad, while our courses were made for golf.  On his first visit to Sandwich he was directed to the first tee, and his first remark was: "Where is your golf course?" 

(i.e. because he saw sand dunes and rough etc intermingled with fairway, even on a hole described as fairly "open". The rest of the article recounts how Robertson was having trouble with a bad slice that day, and ends with Robertson’s caddy saying he “felt he owed him a debt of gratitude, for he had been carrying at Sandwich since he was a boy and he had visited that day parts of the course that he had never been on before.”)

My question is, what “significance” did Robertson’s opinion have? Was it indicative of a common belief among the swells back then? Did it/would it hold sway at the time, or would it moving forward? Was this distinction something that any/most of the big name working architects then and over the next 20 years or so would have agreed with?

Peter 

[JESII]

Peter,

I think it is an accurate assesment.

Think of all the images of early American construction crews mowing down trees and blowing the stumps out of the ground.

The courses I have seen in GB (Sandwich included) seem to have been discovered.

[Mark Bourgeois]

I am such a huge fan of antimetabole I find it impossible to get past the syntax to the merits of his argument!

[JESII]

Mark Bourgeois - leading culprit of ripped dictionary pages next to the computer...

[Peter Pallotta]

I'm not not going to look it up, but not now -- not unless Mark doesn't

Good one, JES

[BCrosby]

Peter -

The quote makes sense only if we all agree with Robinson's preconceived notion of the meaning of "golf" in his phrase ".. our courses were made for golf."

It suggests that he has a quite clear idea of what "golf" means and what it means is something very different from the game them furriners play in Sandwich.

I would think a Canadian like you would be highly attuned to the slightest whiff of Imperialism.

Bob the Oppressor

 

[Bradley Anderson]

The April 1910 “American Golfer” included a little article. Quote:

My question is, what “significance” did Robertson’s opinion have? Was it indicative of a common belief among the swells back then? Did it/would it hold sway at the time, or would it moving forward? Was this distinction something that any/most of the big name working architects then and over the next 20 years or so would have agreed with?

Peter 

My impression is that the big name architects felt that what they were doing was right. That is to say that they were not acting on public sentiments or opinions but on their own judgements of what it took to provide a good golf course in America.

I think that they all knew fairly early on that our environment was not temperate enough for a true linksland type golf course to survive, and that when you finally established a healthy stand of grass to grow here, you had better be ready to take care of it with practical methods or it would become overgrown and unmanagable in short order - nothing at all like the linksland courses of Great Britian.

[JESII]

Bob,

I read the comparison differently. I read him saying that the links courses were ideally suited for golf because golf was the game that evolved from hanging out on the linksland. I also read it as saying our courses are being built in hopes of accomodating the game, that is where the architects impression of "golf" comes into play.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Bob,

I read the comparison differently. I read him saying that the links courses were ideally suited for golf because golf was the game that evolved from hanging out on the linksland. I also read it as saying our courses are being built in hopes of accomodating the game, that is where the architects impression of "golf" comes into play.

Are you sure? It sounds like he's saying over there the land drove the golf but over here the golf drove the land. (Antimetabole strikes again!)

Peter, re reply #4: bait me with chiasmus, but with antimetabole I'm off the hook!

Chiasmusally,
Mark

[JESII]

Are you sure? It sounds like he's saying over there the land drove the golf but over here the golf drove the land.

No, I am not sure but your interpretation sounds (to me) just like what I was trying to say.

[Mark Bourgeois]

If I had a nickel for every time antimetabole ended in the gnashing of teeth...

Well, it sounds to me like he's saying that over there golf kinda grew out of the land, that they didn't know any better and invented the game based on what the land gave them.

But over here we had the benefit of learning from that, so we either found the land that was best for the game or we remade the land so that it was "perfect" / improved for the game.

Uh, do we agree? I have no idea.

Mark

[JESII]

Until you implied that he could be saying we might have "found" land perfect for golf. I think his comment says we build our courses...could this be a shot at CBM?

[TEPaul]

Peter:

I've mentioned it a number of times on here but if you've read Macdonald's book you might recall that apparently a few remarks incoming USGA President Robertson made in his incoming speech as the USGA president in 1901 was something quite prophetic to Macdonald (in a negative way) and more like a stake through his heart as to what he was hoping for with golf (architecture) in America.

If you'd like I'll quote it for you.

[JESII]

I would.

[TEPaul]

Thanks a lot Sully:

Since I don't know how to use the search engine on here very well, I can't figure out what'll take me longer---eg looking for it in the back pages or getting Macdonald's book and typing it out again. It's not exactly a small paragraph. If I don't do it tonight, I will tomorrow. It's not about golf architecture, though, it's about Robertson's feeling about "American golf." I've always had the feeling this was something Macdonald did not want to hear at all and in his book he said as much.

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

You still need to type out the long "lost" post comparing Garden City and Myopia first.

Robertson Schmobertson....some of us want to know.

Sully is too embarassed for me these days anyway.   He can wait. 

[JESII]

Is this it Tom?


Robertson said:

"I know that we are grateful for what England and Scotland have done for us in exporting this game for our delectation and amusement; but I think we should guard against being too much restricted and held down by precedent and tradition. I fear that is the fault of the game on the other side. Do not let us be afraid of innovations simply because they are innovations. Nothing can come to America and stay very long without being Americanized in character; and I hope this game will be no exception to this rule. I should like to see American golf."


I found it on a dichotomy of golf thread.


Mike, next time we're drinking red wine, I'm buying and I'm keeping your glass filled so you will open up and speak your mind...

[Mike_Cirba]

Sully,

Let's make it sooner than later.   It's been too long.

[Tommy Williamsen]

To be honest it is an  antimetabole that I do not understand.

[Peter Pallotta]

Thanks, gents - and TE-Jim for that quote. I had a memory of it in the back of my mind when I came across the 1910 article. But Robertson first made mention of "American golf" back in 1901, which means that almost a decade later he was still "on message".  Had the meaning/essence of that message come into sharper focus in those 10 years, and -- in Bob's words -- had the idea of what "golf" meant for Americans gathered into some kind of consensus opinion? I happen to think that all of you got basically the same thing out of what Robertson was saying -- and I'm wondering if the views he was expressing were shared by many/most architects back then

Peter

PS - Mike: patience, my friend. We would've come around to Myopia sooner or later...just after I mentioned Charlie Parker...

Mark - very funny stuff, of the high-brow variety at least....

[TEPaul]

Sully:

That's it. But you need to understand that was from the incoming president of the USGA in 1901 and there were a whole lot of issues other than just architecture (that was probably the least important of them at that time for Roberston). One of them was what to do about The Rules in America. For Macdonald, it had to do with trying to transport to America a certain understanding or "spirit" ABOUT the game that he felt was uniquely St. Andrews becaause golf had been there so long. There was a lot going on, not to even mention the natural competitive dynamics between the two sides of the Atlantic. Macdonald found himself sort of the one on the USGA who needed to represent all of that from the other side to this nation just taking the game up.

[BCrosby]

I had forgotten that Robertson quote.

The not so subtle implication being that us Americans were going to remake golf into a much better game.   

It makes sense that CBM would react to that.

In interesting ways that debate was reprised 25 years later. Crane made similar arguments about the need to get over the "superstitions" and "shibboleths" that propped up the reputations of many historic links courses. Behr, MacK and others (playing the role of CBM) all shot back that he was full of it.

Those divisions about the role of tradition in gca are still very much with us. I'm thinking of Fazio, Nicklaus and others who say quite explicitly that important historical courses don't have much to tell them and can be safely dismissed. All, presumably, in the name of their own better, modern architecture.

On the other hand you have moderns like Doak, C&C, Hanse and others who see themselves designing from within historic gca traditions.

Bob

   

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