Saw this recently...
From Ron Whitten and Golf Digest:
http://www.golfdigest.com/courses/critic/index.ssf?/courses/critic/finger.htmlA tribute Joe Finger (1918-2003)
A course architect with wisdom beyond his years
Golf architect Joseph S. Finger, who died at his home in Kerrville, Texas on September 28, 2003 at age 85, was the consummate professional. He had a chemical engineering degree from Rice and a Masters from MIT, and when, in 1956, he left the fiberglass manufacturing firm that he'd founded to pursue his childhood dream of designing golf courses, he took his training and discipline with him.
What he found in the business appalled him.
He experienced . . . "profound shock at the realization of the state of golf course design, designers, practices, malpractices and general alchemy and witchcraft being carried out in the maintenance of many 'championship courses' being constructed," Finger wrote in one of his magazine columns that later became the National Golf Foundation's 1973 book, "The Business End of Building or Rebuilding a Golf Course."
Joe didn't mince words. "The transition from orderly and ethical engineering practices in the oil refining and plastic businesses in which I had been engaged, to the nebulous, doubtful and totally nonconforming practices in golf course design, construction and maintenance, was almost too much for [my] system to bear."
So he set out to elevate and standardize the business of golf course design in what became a monumentally important book. The advice, checklists and sample contracts he outlined in that book are still pretty much the standards of today.
Joe Finger also practiced what he preached. By most accounts, Finger's courses are among the best engineered in the business. His routings fit the land. His courses are efficiently irrigated and drain well. Most were built on strict budgets strictly adhered to, and don't cost a bundle to maintain.
He produced some memorable layouts, particularly The Monster at The Concord Resort in Kiamesha Lake, N.Y., a design he did in association with Jimmy Demaret, who had been his golf coach at Rice. Built on land reclaimed from a swamp, The Monster lived up to its name from the very beginning, with lakes, bunkers and pine trees at every turn, including a twin-trunked pine in the middle of the 18th fairway some 60 yards short of the green. "A perfect tree," Tommy Bolt proclaimed when he played the course, "to string up the architect."
The Monster, opened in 1963, boasted a total yardage of 7,672 yards, back when such a distance seemed insurmountable even by tour pros. But Joe told me years ago that he never intended it to be that long. When it first opened, he had installed a practice putting green at the tail end of each championship tee (a nice touch), but they were quickly abandoned and incorporated as new back tees. Voila, additional yardage at no additional cost.
The Concord used to be ranked by Golf Digest as one of America's 100 Greatest Courses, as were Joe's South Course at Colonial Country Club near Memphis (scene of Al Geiberger's ground-breaking 59 in 1977) and Cedar Ridge in Tulsa, which Joe always felt was tougher than nearby Southern Hills. Cedar Ridge has its own infamous hole, the nasty short par-4 third, through the narrowest alley of oaks imaginable, then 90-degrees left and over Little Haikey Creek. It epitomizes the hazards Joe called, "tree traps."
One of his courses that should have made America's 100 Greatest is Pleasant Valley Country Club in Little Rock, Ark., the most immaculate and attractive pine-lined golf course not named Augusta National in the country.
When it came to ruminating about the future of golf, Joe Finger was way ahead of the curve. Back in a 1981 Golf Digest article, he warned of future crises involving high maintenance costs and lack of water, and wrote, " ... we must change our mind's image of a golf course from 'wall to wall' green carpet to the original, beautiful, natural settings of the old-style courses still found in England and Scotland."
To turn the tide, he advocated abandoning tee-to-green fairways and proposed irrigating only tees, landing areas and greens, with "low-mow" areas in between. He also decried the prevailing trend of massive bunkers along fairways and greens, especially ones with flat sand.
"A flat bunker doesn't bother the good golfer," he wrote, "unless he has an unfortunate lie. A penal bunker designed to make him recover with an 8-iron when a 5-iron is needed from that distance to the green is another story, and such traps used sparingly and judiciously will have their place on future courses."
He was also vocal about the late 20th Century trend of massive earthmoving to create golf holes. "Some architects want to defy nature and replace it with something else," he said in 1995. "Good architects realize trees, hazards and waterfalls can beautify a course and challenge a golfer without adding significantly to the maintenance cost. But the public still wants the frills."
It was in 1995 that I did Mr. Finger a great disservice by relying upon a pile of documents provided to me by golf architect Willard Byrd when writing about Atlanta Country Club, then ranked on America's 100 Greatest. "This may be the finest design of veteran architect Byrd," I wrote, "but he's never been given due credit because of a very limited by highly publicized involvement by Joe Finger during construction."
Joe took exception and wrote us that my remark "spits in the face of the facts." Sure enough, Joe was right. A club member who'd been there from the beginning set me straight. Byrd had been hired to do both the course design and surrounding residential planning. But when club founders felt they needed someone with more experience, at Jimmy Demaret's recommendation, they hired Joe, who was responsible for the final routing. He changed Byrd's design by adding the first two and last five holes on land previously ignored. He also prepared green plans, but wasn't there when the greens were built, so Byrd used a different greens mix and changed some contours.
"If you think that my contribution of seven holes-plus to the design is a 'limited contribution,' so be it," Joe wrote us. "But please don't denigrate my reputation with remarks which don't fit the facts."
I thought for sure we published a correction, but can't find one in my back issues, but I do know that in subsequent references to Atlanta Country Club, we've listed Joseph S. Finger and Willard Byrd as co-designers. Still, I think Joe Finger never cared much for Golf Digest (or me) after that, and for that I feel very bad. He had always taken pride in having his courses ranked by Golf Digest, and invariably listed them in his advertising.
In the last years of his life, Joe Finger was working on a book he was calling, "Golf Course Architects and Other Unplayable Lies." I don't know if he ever finished the manuscript, but if so, I hope someone publishes it. I suspect it's full of wisdom, humor and unvarnished truth.