[Mark Bourgeois]

Herbert Warren Wind seems to get all the credit for leading the modern-era appreciation of the awesome track links architecture that is Royal Dornoch.

This would be from his 1964 article; however, in that article he gives credit to Richard Tufts, specifically Tufts's "missionary" work in convincing first Billy Joe Patton and second "Peter Dye, a young golf-course architect from Indianapolis." (The heart of Tufts's interest lay of course in Dornoch's status as Ross's birthplace.)

In fact, Dye played RDGC before Wind, and in the article Wind writes Dye considered it "far and away the finest natural course he had ever seen."

But, confusingly, in his interview over on the Yale golf history site, Dye says it was WIND who convinced him to go north. Was this an example of Wind's reputation for modesty?

Somehow I would guess it all has to go back to Tufts.

As I've been reading all this, I've been thinking there must have been threads here already on:

1. Who really deserves most of the "credit" (ahem) for unleashing the hordes on Dornoch: Tufts, Patton, Dye, or Wind?

2. If Dye had not visited Dornoch, would Harbour Town exist today? How much of Dornoch can be found in Harbour Town?

3. Why would Dye refer to it as the finest "natural" course he had seen? Was he already thinking about "unnatural" design like TPC Sawgrass? Was this an indirect shot at RTJ?

4. In the article, Wind quotes Dye as saying, "No other links has quite the ageless aura Dornoch does. When you play it, you get the feeling you could be living just as easily in the eighteen-hundreds, or even the seventeen-hundreds. If an old Scot in a red jacket had popped out from behind a sand dune, beating a feather ball, I wouldn't have blinked an eye."  Dang -- I thought that was Brancaster or Westward Ho! I can't recall reading that about Dornoch anywhere else; why would he say that about Dornoch -- is it still that way or has something changed?

If someone could point me to those threads -- blast that search engine! -- I would appreciate it.

Otherwise, whaddya think?

Thanks,
Mark

[Tommy_Naccarato]

I fail to see how this is off-topic. Maybe it's me....

[Mark Bourgeois]

I fail to see how this is off-topic. Maybe it's me....

Gotcha! Just having fun with the cast and characters of "The O.T."

Sooooo...while I've got you on the line, what do you know about Qs 1-4?

[David_Tepper]

Mark -

I would offer the following answers to your questions:

1) While Dye's recommendation may have inspired Wind to make the trek to RDGC, Wind's column in the New Yorker about RDGC was likely the first in-depth analysis-review-appreciation of the course to appear in writing and be widely circulated in the U.S. He should get the "credit" for that. It would be interesting to know how well known the course was in Britain at that time of his article. My guess is, not very.

2) While I have not seen Harbor Town in person, I have seen it many times on TV. I have played RDGC 15-20 times.  While Dye's trip to Scotland may have inspired his design of Harbor Town, I do not see much overlap between the 2 courses. There are no water hazards and/or forced carries at RDGC. There are no relevant OB stakes and very few red stakes at RDGC. The greens at Harbor Town appear to be much, much smaller than the greens at RDGC. There are absolutely no trees at RDGC.

3) RDGC does have very "natural" appearance. The course seems to flow along the land and one does not get the sense that much earth was moved to build the course (although this is not entirely the case). I have no idea if his comment was an indirect shot at RTJ.    

4) Regarding Dye's comment about the ageless quality of RDGC, my sense is RDGC was VERY isolated and got very little play when Dye and Wind visited 40 years ago. The course itself sits somewhat apart from the village, so it would certainly have been easy 40 years ago to get a "lost in time" feeling there. Currently, the course gets some 10,000-12,000 rounds of visitor play a year, so it is a wee bit busier than when Dye & Wind visited 40 years ago! Never the less, on the days the jet fighters are not flying overhead, one can find moments of serenity and timelessness there.

I trust Richard Goodale will shares his thought with us on this.

DT        

[Mark Bourgeois]

Thanks, David.

I'm not sure I agree that it's down to Wind, for these reasons (source is Wind's article):
1. Tufts influenced Wind's decision to go;
2. In both literal and influential senses, Wind was drawn north (for "literal" read drawn as driven!) by Sam McKinlay, editor of the Glasgow Evening Times, who created a "thistle"-based rating system a la Michelin and gave Dornoch the highest-possible "three thistles." (He gave the top ranking only to Ailsa, Dornoch, Edinburgh, and TOC. I should post for discussion his "thistle system" and his course ratings.)
3. Wind writes the course always had been well known and highly-regarded in the UK, but distance kept many from actually confirming Dornoch's reputation.

No knock against Wind, but to me it seems more that Wind acted like a "vessel" or "carrier" of the news rather than a true St. John the Baptist type.  That role seems best bestowed upon either Tufts or McKinlay -- at least for modern times.

I am really curious for input on how this apparently significant event in the professional education of Pete Dye filtered through into his work!

Mark

[David_Tepper]

Mark -

I have also read Wind's article more than once. I would not want to get into a debate over who gets the credit for "discovering" RDGC. No doubt, several people (Tufts, Dye, McKinlay) told Wind about Dornoch and urged him to go there. Wind does not claim he discovered RDGC and I don't think I implied that he did. No doubt someone told Tufts and Dye about RDGC and told them it was a course well worth playing. I VERY much doubt they stumbled across it on their own.

Wind's New Yorker essay is clearly what moved the needle on public recognition of RDGC and put RDGC into the consciousness of traveling golfers. I don't there is a need for an ecclesiastical debate on the matter.

I cannot recall if Dye comments upon visiting RDGC in his autobiography ("Bury Me In A Pot Bunker").  I think you may overestimate the impression RDGC made upon him or at least upon his design work. My guess is there are a number of courses in Scotland that Dye saw which have influenced his work. I am not sure RDGC was singular in that regard.  If there is evidence I am mistaken about this, please let me know.

DT  

[Mark Bourgeois]

David, that makes a lot of sense. I just read the article for the first time recently and was surprised by the reference to Pete Dye, Tufts, et al.  I had figured Wind somehow discovered it and talked it up, but the article indicates otherwise.

And I certainly don't know "the rest of the story," i.e., how the article was received afterwards and the relation of it to growth in the number of annual rounds.

I don't know that any of this matters much one way or the other, I'm just curious.

Dye does mention Dornoch and Wind in the Yale interview, so in his mind Wind had some sort of influence on his decision to go; I inferred what he saw at Dornoch made a significant impression.  Maybe, maybe not; that's all...

Cheers,
Mark

[Rich Goodale]

Mark

My guess is that Pete asked Wind about places to visit when he planned his trip to Scotland in 1963 (he would have known Wind and Wind would have known about Dornoch), but somebody ought to ask Pete, if they really want to know his chronology....

The influence of Wind's article is often overblown.  After it was written (1964) there was no surge in visitors to Dornoch, from America or elsewhere.  People just didn't travel those days, and the concept of British golf was still considered something of an amusement in those early post-Palmer years.  That being said, Johnny Miller played there in 1965 (as part of a BYU trip, losing his match to another J. Miller, Jimmy of Brora....) and Bing Crosby in 1971.  What made Dornoch take off as a venue was, firstly, Ben Crenshaw's visit in 1979.  He was obviously influenced by Wind in coming, and while his visit was relatively unnoticed, Ben convinced Tom Watson to come in 1981, and Tom brought Sandy Tatum with him.  A series of articles were written about that visit in Golf Digest and other places, and along with a general increase in golf tourism at the time, really sparked the growth in vists of Americans to Dornoch.  Rick Reilly's piece in SI in the middle 80's (probably inspired by Watson's trip) accelerated the trend.

An interesting factotum which shows the change, is the number of American members at Dornoch over time:

1913--5
1950--3
1967--0
1977--4
1994--154
1998--216

I have no doubt that Dornoch influenced Dye significantly, as he and Alice wrote me a nice note saying so when someone sent them a copy of my Dornoch book to them.  However, as for specific influences, all I remember reading is that he built an homage to the 15th at one of his early courses in Indiana.  Trust Pete to choose to copy a hole that only reveals its greatness to idiots like me over 20+ years.  Vis a vis Harbourtown, I've played it 6-7 times and find it hard to see any direct influence from Dornoch, other than both are exquisite shotmaker's courses.  What's a "shotmaker's course" well....like Potter Stewart I know one when I see one!  Good shots are rewarded, often spectacularly, and bad shots can be severely punished, and there often isn't a helluva lot of difference between the two.

Any other questions?

[Tony_Muldoon]

Richard How fashionable was Dornoch in the 30’s?


I can’t recall when it became Royal but with the Railway Station, visitors like Carnegie and the Weathereds and Balmoral not that far away – was there a first period of fame for the course?

(ps new book just arrived thank you)

[Rich Goodale]

Tony

The club was made "Royal" in 1906, due to the influence of the Duke of Sutherland.  JH Taylor was a regular visitor to Donroch in the early 20trh century, and the Holderness and Wehthered family followed him shortly thereafter.  Up until the mid-20's the names of the latter two families dominate the victor's boards, but after that locals seem to take over.  I don't think this meant any particular diminution of the social cachet of Dornoch, just that the quality of the visiting golfers declined.  The toffs such as Lord Rothermere still spent sumers there, and the annual dinner dance of the club was still held in London every 2 years for a long time.  From people who were there at the time, I understand that the Station Hotel (now the Dornoch Hotel) was very "Grand" up through the early 60's, with white tie dinners most evenings and all sort of nobs taking the train up from Dunrobin Castle to participate.

Rich

PS--I'll be staying en famille at the Dornoch Hotel mid-July.  As it is now mostly a pensioners bus party sort of place, it should be a hoot!

PPS--just to add, since the railway line from Golspie closed down, so did the poshness of the place.  By the time I first arrived there, in 1978, some of the town had the patina of posh (particularly the Burghfield House Hotel), but those days are no more.  Now the place is hoaching with middle-aged, middle class Englsihmen and women and American golf-romantics.  Sic transit....

PPPS--most of what I am writing I am taking from John McLeod's excellent history of the Club, 1877-1999.  If you are really interested in this trivia, buy it.  Most of the money goes to the (excellent) junior golfers program, too.

[TEPaul]

Maybe not today but I'd be glad to call Pete and ask him about this. Pete and Alice's answers to things are always interesting and sometimes pretty unpredictable.

My feeling is that Pete and Alice in their study tour of GB were particularly struck by many of the early rudimentary man-made elements in some of those old golf courses in GB and that's part of what they put into their courses.

What do you think it was that inspired Pete to so prevalently use rail-road ties and an abundance of sharp angles in his architecture? Do you think that was a result of his observations of some ultra naturalism of Dornoch and the like?

Plus there was one thing Pete really liked to do, and that was to get on a bulldozer and use it. Apparently some architects just like to make things more than some other architects do.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Domo arigato, sensei!

Surely your presence confers an air of royalty?

Very helpful re Dye, and, yes, further questions will be coming...

Mark

[KBanks]

Wasn't it Prestwick's sleepers that inspired Pete Dye's use of railroad ties?

It seems like he discontinued their use some time ago, but I'm not certain of that.

Ken

[Rich Goodale]

Tomasso the Unpredictable

Do let us know if you hear from the Jedi master.

Ken is probably right re: the RR ties (sleepers) as there are none of those in Dornoch, at least on the course.  Vis a vis man-made stuff, maybe Pete was clever enough to see that the cool looking 6th green was carved out and bulit-up into the hillside in 1946?  More than a few people revered on this site didn't know that until I told them it was so.

Ricardo the Impeccable

[KBanks]

Rich,

As long as we have you engaged on the subject of your home club, what exactly did Donald J. Ross do to the course at RDGC? Didn't he make some slight architectural contribution to the course?

And, do they still sell the little book on Ross, and the one by Donnie Grant, at the club?

Ken

[TEPaul]

No sleepers at Dornoch?

So what? I doubt Dye would say it was just Dornoch that inspired him over there.

But just as Vostinak seems to think he knows more about what Flynn should have done than Flynn did maybe you think you know more about what Dye did than Dye does.  

However, the only thing I can tell you with total assurance about what Pete currently thinks, as he reiterated it recently, is that the greens of Seminole are the worst in the world, and totally unRoss. However, they are without question some of the best examples of Amos Jones' redesign work.  

[Rich Goodale]

KLen

All I know is from Dr. John's book.  He says that Ross visited in 1921 and Sutherland asked him to help remodel the 1st and 2nd, which were a pair of 230-250 yard holes at that time (1st green in the left side of the current 1st fairway, 2nd tee up on the hill to the left).

So, as I've reported before, Ross must have had a big hand in the new and current 1st green (which is seemingly simple but really cool if you study it) but was overruled in his desire to have the 2nd in a punchbowl to the left of the current green.  Not sure who built the great current 2nd green, or if it was already standing as a product of Morris, Taylor or whomever.

Rich

PS--to Mark Bourgeois.  In re-reading McLeod, I hotice that he also quotes Eric Brown as saying that the hardest shot at Dornoch was the second to the 2nd!  Take that, Ryeophile!

RFG

[Mark Bourgeois]

I for one would like to hear from Dye whether the trip idea originated with him or someone else, whether he went over to "confirm" already-held beliefs and ideas or "for an education," and whether the trip inspired a general design philosophy or just design elements (e.g. sleepers).

Ah, nevermind, you can come up with better questions on that stuff than a chump like me.

My question would be, what's harder: the second shots to Rye's par 3s or the second to the 2nd at Dornoch?

Mark

PS tell him that of all the interviews I've read on this site, I have learned the most from his!

[Mark Bourgeois]

What a cross-post that was!

I rate us both three-thistles for stubbornness.

Sadly, however, I hear L'Academie will be revoking your third-thistle in the research category for continued sole-sourcing.

Don't blame me, take it up with the chairman: Donald Steel.

Mark

[Mark Bourgeois]

This just in...

In "Classic Links," Steel on Royal Dornoch writes Wind's article was significant, but more intriguingly writes:

"...there has been an enormous boost to its popularity in the last three decades, stemming, in fact, from the day in 1963 when Dick Tufts, captain of the United States Walker Cup team at Turnberry, insisted one or two of his team undertake the long journey north.  Billy Joe Patton, than whom there is no greater enthusiast, was ecstatic about what he experienced and was persuasive enough to make me see for myself."

So it took an American(!) to convince Steel to see it for the first time.  Granted, an Englishman might have had a right to fear a journey so far into Scots territory he outran his "supply lines"...

So Tufts's interest stemmed from Dornoch being Ross's home town. But nevertheless, from Tufts we have, so far:
Patton
Dye
Wind
Steel

I can't say any of this is particularly important, but nevertheless it is interesting to draw the line from Ross to Pinehurst to Tufts to Dornoch.  Also, it's interesting that Americans might figure prominently in the rise in global stature of Dornoch.

[Tom_Doak]

When I was caddying in St. Andrews in 1982 I asked Walter Woods (the long-time greenkeeper) how good was Dornoch, the week before I went there.  He said he had heard it was great but he had never been way up there ... it was about a six-hour drive back then.

[Rich Goodale]

Tom

A lot of good golfers from my part of Fife (35 miles from the 1st tee on TOC) have never been to St. Andrews and see no reason to go there.  Fifers are an interesting species....

I thought that Wind's ending anecdote in his article was very telling, when he asks "one of the guiding lights of the R &A" (I'm guessing it was Gerald Micklem) what he knows and thinks about Dornoch and finds that the grandee has never been there, adding "I've no reason to go anyplace near there.  I have all the Shetland sweaters I need."

Mark

Your info on Steel (that he visited Dornoch for the first time in 1963) reinforces my thought that he stole his "hardest shots at Rye are the 2nd to the short holes" from his visit to Dornoch.  My latest info is that when Eric Brown won the Northern Open at Dornoch in 1954 he was reported to have made that same remark about the "2nd to the 2nd.".  A much more elegant and mellifluous phrase, in any case.

Rich

[Sean_A]

I have met very few Englishmen that have gone up to Dornoch.  Addititionally, a fair number of the ones I have met are GCAers and it is likely they were influenced by reading the sources already mentioned.  In the old days before a motorway went up Glasgow/Edinburgh the journey would have been hell.  I am thinking it probably took two full days of driving from the Midlands.  It takes 10 hours now.  Besides, Brits don't travel the distances in cars that the Yanks are used.  In recent times most consider journeying up by plane.  It seems that for most English, if they are gonna get on a plane for golf it will be for a sunny destination.  

Ciao

[Steve Kline]

It seems that for most English, if they are gonna get on a plane for golf it will be for a sunny destination.  

Ciao

It was sunny (perfectly clear ble sky) and 75 when I was at Dornoch last summer. Just spectacular weather. And our room at the on course hotel overlooked the first tee, first fairway, and straight out to the ocean with the sun rising over it.

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