Flynn in the West

[TEPaul]

And furthermore, isn't the supreme irony really the fact that even the architects who did pay so much tribute to particularly TOC as the home of golf and architecture, the prototype for all golf architecture in the future, also admitted that there were many things about it they just couldn't use or do in their designs? They very much say that today even while paying lip-service tribute to the linksland and particularly TOC.

Is there anyone who will really deny that is so? I doubt it, and if it is so then why is it so?

That might be one of the true ironies in all of golf course architecture.

Does it actually mean that perhaps the great healthland architecture beginning around 1900 is more important to them as an architectural model simply because IT IS inland like so many of the rest of the golf courses in the world.

The problem with the linksland model just might be that it is so unique and there never was or will be that much of it in the world. But inland sites are virtually endless.

[Forrest Richardson]

Wayne — I am corrected...and have been tasting wine in advance of tomorrow's great feast. It turns out I was recalling William G. Flynn, ancestor of Bob Muirhead, Desmond's great uncle.

Sorry for the confusion.

[wsmorrison]

Forrest,

Thanks for the correction.  We stopped the presses, but we'll start them up again.  They're running very slowly and a completed book won't come out of the machinery until this time next year  

[Mark_Fine]

Wayne,
Hold that cup of coffee (and for goodness sakes don't buy him any alcohol)  

Keep those presses going as I am anxious to add your book to my collection!
Mark

[TEPaul]

"Wayne — I am corrected...and have been tasting wine in advance of tomorrow's great feast. It turns out I was recalling William G. Flynn, ancestor of Bob Muirhead, Desmond's great uncle."

We heard about that guy William G. Flynn, Forrest. Supposedly he was some emmisary of William Morris' English Arts and Crafts movement who was sent over here to see if he could powerfully influence golf architecture. Unfortunately for him it didn't go over well and he was banished to Arizona to see if it would fry his brain or if a rattler would take care of him. Terminal 1A needs to be over the mess that man created over here.

[Forrest Richardson]

Yes, exactly, Tom. And many here will recall his cousin, Billy "Jimbo" Macwood. Macwood was known for his partially published book, "Victorian Archietcture and the Redan — An Admiration"

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Forrest has been into the sacraficial brandy again....

Forrest is correct though Wayne, he took me by Terminal 10 of the north terminal at Sky Harbor on a visit and showed me many remains of bunkers left over from the old Totem Hills complex. Looks to be one of Flynn's flatter designs, albeit one with a great vision for the future:The strategy getting in and out of Sky Harbor is bar none, some of the most perplexing strategies in the world. The routing looked to be one of Flynn's finest...

Forrest explained to me that Flynn routed the course from the view of an old Steerman crop duster that he rented from some cotton farmer in the Valley of the Sun.

[Forrest Richardson]

Tommy, of course, speaks the truth. What he leaves out is that the Flynn Fountain is now home to the TSA's primary depository for cosmetics and shampoo that exceeds U.S. Federal guidelines. It is a shame that the fountain has been transformed to such use...but, then again, it is quite a sacrifice and we cannot ignore such acts in modern time.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

I was so upset seeing the Flynn fountain being used as a repository for Clarol products, that I refused to dispose my non-acceptable items in with them. I had to pay a hefty fine too. But I would refuse again in a heartbeat.

That's me. I'm 100% purist and a traditionalist!

[Jim Nugent]

Tillie went so far as to suggest TOC was no longer a championship course: he said technology advances had left it behind.  He also suggested the superiority of U.S. golf course architecture was one reason American golfers were better than British.  

[TEPaul]

Forrest:

What's the possibility Arizona can be given back to the Indians?

[Mike_Cirba]

Tillie went so far as to suggest TOC was no longer a championship course: he said technology advances had left it behind.  He also suggested the superiority of U.S. golf course architecture was one reason American golfers were better than British.  

Jim,

Even though Philip may object to the terminology, I think Tillie said a lot of self promoting, self-serving, "marketing-oriented" things in his career, particularly during the latter part in the 30s as the market drastically shrunk.

Here's a guy who had courses literally filled with bunkers, including his own original forced-carry "hell's half acre" concept, and all of a sudden, after 22 years of doing so, starts complaining about courses with too many bunkers and "duffer's headaches".   It seems to me just a bit too convenient that at the same time, Tilly also was hired by the USGA to go around the country to look at various courses and suggest ways they could reduce maintenance costs.

Either Tillinghast had a religious conversion, or he just saw an opportunity for himself in recommending the wholesale removal of slews of bunkers at various courses during the Depression years.

I don't think acknowledement of same in any way undermines his brilliance, or the fact that he achieved so much in building so many great courses over his career.  I think it was just the economic reality of him acting very pragmatically and opportunistically during tough times.

[Forrest Richardson]

I believe parts of it have been given back. They are called casinos and golf courses.

[Paul_Turner]

If, by WW1, the Philly architects were so confident in their abilities, then why did they call on a Brit, CH Alison, to finish/fix the design of Pine Valley  

[TEPaul]

"If, by WW1, the Philly architects were so confident in their abilities, then why did they call on a Brit, CH Alison, to finish/fix the design of Pine Valley  

Paul:

That's a very good question. God knows Pine Valley did have an inordinant amount of architects as members at that time---Flynn, Toomey, Thomas, Behr, Wilsons, Fownes etc. Maybe they didn't want to take sides and just wanted to get someone from outside the club.

But my sense is they hired Alison in 1921 because he was Colt's partner and the one representing the firm over here and also because they knew he was good. They didn't just hire Alison, they actually put him on the committee.

Right about that time Alison asked to partner with Flynn (maybe as a result of PV) but Wilson sort of put the kibosh on that saying Flynn didn't need him at that point. Some say Wilson planned to go into business with Flynn.

The club needs to recognize what-all Alison did in 1921 design-wise because it isn't insignificant. It also shows how wrong some of you guys were by saying that the club was trying to minimize or diss Colt following Crump's death and during some kind of ultra glorification of Crump.

Harry Colt was never dissed or minimized down there, not then anyway. That happened many decades later when a very simple research error was made, and made very innocently