I’ve worked and visited quite a few Walter Travis courses at this point and each one has something unique that I have not seen at any of the other courses. I enjoy every time the “Old Man” surprises me and shows me he has more up the sleeve than I first thought. Whether it is the nutmeg graters at Onondaga, the multiple punchbowls at Yhanandasis, the biarritz green at Lookout Point, each pleasant surprise makes me smile.
When I run into a complication, like a new hole built by another architect, I find myself trying to bring them back into the fabric of the course. Sometimes this is easy because of historical documents and the holes ability to be adapted back to the intent and design of the old hole. Just as often the new hole offers no opportunity, and an idea must be adapted from either the existing course or another of his courses. If you can imagine a flat green is a great example of this dilemma, particularly when you have no remembrances or drawings to give you direction. This is the point where architects heads into the “world of grey” and make their best judgment. I personally like to look to other examples of his work that can be “borrowed” and reapplied to try and at least return Travis and make the course consistent.
I haven’t seen all Travis’s work and this is the source of my question. I’ve run into a hole on a Travis course that was built by another architect. The hole that he replaced was not a Travis hole, but one (of 3) that Walter kept from the original layout and accommodated into his own routing for a “new” course. Looking at the land, I was left wondering why the new hole (a par three) was not built as a redan, when the land was ideally suited for it. This was the moment that leads to this question that I have meant to post for months. I honestly have never given this any thought since I work so often to original plans and aerials. I wondered had Walter actually built a redan or was this a concept that he was not fond of.
So I ask you, has he built a redan?
What has he written on the redan?