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Jerry Kluger

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Any really good member designed golf courses?
« on: November 14, 2015, 05:29:38 PM »
I was reading in the Ballyneal thread about a possible second course designed by the members.  I remember being there about 5 years ago and Rupert took us out on ATVs to see a possible routing for a second course but I don't remember who was the architect.  Anyway, can anyone point to courses that were designed by the members and are really good?  I am not interested in courses where the architect who designed the course is a member.

Phil Young

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #1 on: November 14, 2015, 05:47:53 PM »
Oakmont & Philadelphia Cricket Wissahickon (Tilly was a member)

David_Tepper

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #2 on: November 14, 2015, 06:54:59 PM »
I think one of the members at Portstewart (NI) designed the 6-8 holes that were added to the front-9 there 25 or so years ago that greatly improved the quality of the course.

PCCraig

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #3 on: November 14, 2015, 07:04:40 PM »
My home course, Town & Country Club is St Paul, Minnesota was expanded to 18 holes in 1904 by a club member, Ben Schurmeier. Ben was one of the best players in the state at the time and a president of the Minnesota Golf Association.
H.P.S.

Matthew Mollica

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #4 on: November 14, 2015, 07:05:09 PM »
Club member William Meader designed Victoria GC in Melbourne. His one and only course.
"The truth about golf courses has a slightly different expression for every golfer. Which of them, one might ask, is without the most definitive convictions concerning the merits or deficiencies of the links he plays over? Freedom of criticism is one of the last privileges he is likely to forgo."

GLawson

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #5 on: November 14, 2015, 07:16:11 PM »
Pikewood National

Jason Thurman

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #6 on: November 14, 2015, 07:18:58 PM »
We might be able to name a lot of courses from circa 1900 that were designed by a member, as the idea of the professional golf course architect hadn't completely proliferated yet.


Bill Diddel designed Miami View just west of Cincinnati in 1960, but members did the construction work when funding grew tight. They built a good golf course, but the club's founding principles and the DIY effort that spurred its development created a club culture even more impressive than the course itself.


http://www.miamiview.net/club-details/history-13.html
"There will always be haters. That’s just the way it is. Hating dudes marry hating women and have hating ass kids." - Evan Turner

Some of y'all have never been called out in bold green font and it really shows.

Paul Gray

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #7 on: November 14, 2015, 08:07:38 PM »
Designer might be stretching the term a bit but there is the obvious: Woking.
In the places where golf cuts through pretension and elitism, it thrives and will continue to thrive because the simple virtues of the game and its attendant culture are allowed to be most apparent. - Tim Gavrich

RJ_Daley

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #8 on: November 14, 2015, 08:43:36 PM »
As the story goes in Phinney and Whitley' book, "Fairways of Heaven", Dooks undertook the project and assigned individual members one hole per several members to design a course.  Thus a real design by committee sort of approach.  It has been remodeled since, but I believe several of the member designed holes are still there in bones structure.  I thought the course was pretty darn good.
No actual golf rounds were ruined or delayed, nor golf rules broken, in the taking of any photographs that may be displayed by the above forum user.

Tommy Williamsen

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #9 on: November 14, 2015, 09:05:31 PM »
Dooks, although much of the work they did has been changed.
Pine Valley?
Where there is no love, put love; there you will find love.
St. John of the Cross

"Deep within your soul-space is a magnificent cathedral where you are sweet beyond telling." Rumi

Charles Lund

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #10 on: November 14, 2015, 09:22:52 PM »
Agree about The Dooks.

Think there are many examples in Ireland of golf coming to communities as the result of donated labor and consensus type routings.

Ballyliffin Old Links was a 9 hole course in 1947 when it started.  In the mid 60s, members enhanced the course to 18 holes.  Some current members who were and are local farmers donated labor and contributed to the design,  construction, and development.  The cost at the time was 6000 pounds, according to the book Links of Heaven.  Due to the use of mostly donated labor,  fairways were defined and shaped by manual grass cutting, often with hand mowers or push type power mowers.  As the result, fairways maintained natural humps and bumps.

Nick Faldo took a fondness to The Old Links.  He tried to buy the club but did not close the deal when members elected not to sell.  He did some work on bunkering.  Upon completion, he played an exhibition with then 14 or 15 year old Rory McIlroy, who set a course record.

There is a second course, co-designed by Pat Ruddy, The Glashedy course.  It was built in 1995 at a cost of 1.5 million Euros.

Both are rated about 5 on the Doak scale.  Rankings in Ireland place Glashedy in top 10 and The Old Links in the top 20.

Eddie Hackett is credited with designing Carne, although he was deeply religious and affirmed something to the effect that God made it and he found it.  Like other Irish Links courses, community members wanting a community course, donated labor constructed it with minimal earth moving.





Jerry Kluger

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #11 on: November 15, 2015, 12:00:54 AM »
So would it really be a good idea for the members to design a golf course? I would guess that they couldn't have more than 3 members because any number beyond that couldn't agree on anything.  I have attended enough membership meetings at member owned clubs to realize that even getting a simple majority on any subject is a difficult task so I couldn't imagine that they could agree on the design of a golf course. I just could not find a good reason for such a plan.

Nigel Islam

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #12 on: November 15, 2015, 12:17:10 AM »
Not sure if they fit the "really good" part, but......


St. Michael's in Australia
Rich Harvest Farms



Charles Lund

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #13 on: November 15, 2015, 12:27:13 AM »
Reply to Jerry

Probably not a good idea.  The example of The Dooks and other Irish courses created by communities reflect an approach to creating golf courses to serve a community need.

The courses probably would not constitute really good courses in an architectural sense.  But they provide playing environments and a golf culture with a special quality and spirit.

In the modern era, with environmental constraints and specialized construction practices, it is doubtful members would have the specialized expertise, unless one was a golf architect,  one was in the construction business, and one had land development expertise.

I'd suggest that they would have to build it, own it, and then sell memberships.





RJ_Daley

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #14 on: November 15, 2015, 12:49:02 AM »
I agree that on unremarkable terrain needing significant earth work, infrastructure of drainage, shaping, and irrigation, amateur design buffs within a membership probably wouldn't have much or any success. 

But what of some of these Irish links efforts.   Or, as I have pondered the Nebraska sand hills ideal terrain on several land parcels of that sort I have become familiar with.... setting aside the technical demands of accommodating demand/requirments of drainage and irrigation-- the routing and directed shaping of a workable golf course probably could be accomplished by well informed skilled golfers, not trained architects and land survey and ground water engineering savvy professionals.  IMHO...
No actual golf rounds were ruined or delayed, nor golf rules broken, in the taking of any photographs that may be displayed by the above forum user.

Daniel Jones

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #15 on: November 15, 2015, 07:25:49 AM »
I happened to read the profile on Royal County Down just the other day...


McGaw and Henderson credit member George Combe for much of the work and the general routing that the course now enjoys. An examination of this 1907 map shows that the 1st and 18th holes as three shotters and the 10th as a one shotter back away from the clubhouse have taken form. In addition, the 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 7th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, and 15th general playing corridors of today were in use.

Mike_Trenham

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #16 on: November 15, 2015, 07:55:43 AM »
Whitemarsh Valley - George Thomas

Proud member of a Doak 3.

Duncan Cheslett

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #17 on: November 15, 2015, 10:28:54 AM »
What about Alwoodley?

 ;)
« Last Edit: November 15, 2015, 10:34:14 AM by Duncan Cheslett »

Jon Wiggett

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #18 on: November 15, 2015, 11:56:42 AM »
What about Alwoodley?

 ;)

But it only turned out well because the committee neglected to inspect the work otherwise they would have found out their instructions were being completely ignored ;D

Jon

Duncan Cheslett

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Re: Any really good member designed golf courses?
« Reply #19 on: November 15, 2015, 01:08:12 PM »
Very true Jon, and a lesson in the efficacy of design by committee.

I guess Moortown could be cited as another example of a really good member designed golf course.

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