“TE
Perhaps I missed it...where in that Wilson report does he discuss the important process of laying out the golf course?”

Tom MacWood:

Perhaps you did miss it. He discusses it in that report thusly;

‘‘”Our problem was to lay out the course, build and seed eighteen greens and fifteen fairways. Three fairways were old pasture turf…..’


“I'd be curious when that process began and how many days it took?”

It appears from that report that it took from what he describes as the spring of 1911 until September 1st through the 15th, 1911, when he mentions they sowed the course with grass for golf! At that point they apparently let the course grow in and opened it for play on Sept 14, 1912. (in case you didn't realize it when a course is seeded and allowed to grow in that can be assumed that the architectural construction on that phase is finished!).

 “Did they use a topo map?”

If they did, and as I’ve said numerous times on here that topo and Wilson’s sketches or whatever they may have used to design and construct the course apparently has been lost. So far, as hard as we’ve looked and others have looked in and around Merion golf club and the Cricket Club and in other likely places in the last few years we can find nothing left from this first phase about the architecture except a report like this one from Hugh Wilson---This is so unlike the next phase from which we have so much.

 “Did Wilson lay out the course himself or was it a group effort among all or some of the committee members?”

Again, there’s very little left on that kind of detail from that first phase. From a few accounts that remain, particularly Richard Francis----it seems to have been a group effort.

 “Did they seek advice while laying out the course?”

You can see from what Wilson said in that report that all he said is they sought advice from local committees and greenskeepers!

Once again, here’s the extent of what Wilson said in that report about that period of app six months of the architectural creation of the first phase of Merion East.

“…..we collected all the information we could from local committees and greenkeepers, and we started in the spring of 1911 to construct the course on ground which had largely been farmland…..After completing construction of the greens, and thoroughly harrowing and breaking up the soil on both fairways and greens, we allowed the weeds to germinate and harrowed them in about every three weeks. We sowed from September first to fifteenth 1911) and made a remarkably good catch due to two things—good weather conditions and thorough preparation of the soil. …..We opened the course September 14, 1912….”
Hugh Wilson, 1916

I suppose you think or are trying to suggest on here that if they didn’t record exactly who did what or if we can’t now find that record that that indicates they didn’t do it. Well, Tom, you may look at the history of the creation of a golf course like Merion East that way but I most certainly do not! They were the ones charged with designing and building a golf course and that’s what they did. If they, for whatever reason, decided not to do that and to get someone else to do it, one can logically assume the record would show that! The thing I find so comical about the way you seem to go about this is you seem to suggest if they didn’t keep a detailed record or we can’t find it that that must mean somehow they didn’t do it and that someone else must have. That’s a very odd way to look at the history of a golf course that does not have an elaborately detailed record of the time of the first phase of its creation!  

Mike --

Let me add a question:

How do you know, really, that "John Gehman designed the Butter Valley Golf Port in PA in 1968, or that Willie Tucker designed the first nine holes at Bonneville GC in Utah in 1927?"

You may know that Mr. Gehman and Mr. Tucker were in charge -- but how do you know that all of their best ideas didn't come from some Burbeckian underling? (Seems to me a given, in collegial enterprises, that the officially attributed credits and blames for ideas, good and bad, rarely tell the full, true story...and that the full, true story is rarely recoverable -- even the next year, much less most of a century later.)

Don't you think this Merion investigation might be attempting to reconstruct the unreconstructable?

Dan;

To answer your first question, you're correct...in most cases my research (similar to Cornish & Whitten's) has to assume that the principal architect in charge of a project is the "architect of record".  Trying to research some of this stuff can be a daunting task even just to get that basic information.  And, even on modern courses, when I know that most of a design might be attributable to Tom Marzolf, it remains a "Tom Fazio" design because Mr. Marzolf reports to Mr. Fazio.  I am also assuming that most people take some pride of ownership in something bearing their name so they would sign off with approvals first.

In the case of Merion, and your second question, even if it is unsolvable, reading accounts like the one Wayne just provided from Mr. Frances make it worth the getting there.  

"TE
One of the most important phases in the design process is routing the golf course. What do we know about the routing process at Merion?  When was the golf course routed, how did the process evolve, how long did it take, who was involved. Merion is often cited for its brilliant routing over a fairly tight property....it would be nice to know these things."

That's right, Tom, the routing certainly is an interesting process and a most important one and Merion's routing certainly is one for the ages. I guess you just don't want to acknowledge the truth of that little story posted above and what it might mean if extrapolated in a whole routing sense of Richard Francis and how the last third of #15 and the quarry hole came to be both in a routing and architectural sense. It popped right out of Francis's head apparently in a virtual overcoming of a routing glitch and a routing obstacle.

Did Francis actually think of that all by himself? OH MY GOD, how the hell could he? According to people like you he was just a f...architectural novice---how could he have done something like that? But he apparently did, and apparently Wilson and his committee with perhaps the help and maybe even serious designing and drawing input from Flynn, and the help of foreman Pickering and engineer Toomey may've done the routing of the course themselves!!!

I'll ask you the simple question on that one more time. If someone else did that routing to anything more than a minor extent---somebody like perhaps C.B. Macdonald or Whigam or Raynor then why in the hell didn't Wilson and the committee mention that fact as they had done regarding the help Macdonald offered them BEFORE Wilson traveled to Europe for seven solid months of study?

If someone else, like a Macdonald really did help them to a significant extent, Tom, why do you suppose it was never mentioned? This is me is becoming the key here.

Are you really still trying to hang on to this ridiculous notion of yours that those guys were such novices they couldn't have done this themselves? And even worse, are you still trying to hang on to the more ridiculous notion that there was some campaign in this town to glorify Philadelphia architects at the exclusion of others who may've helped them?

I hope little by little (only because you seem so intransigent to what seems logical) despite the fact that a detailed record did not exist or perhaps did but has now been lost, unfortunately, of this early phase, that we're convincing you that these odd notions of yours are simply fiction!

"There appears only to be a brief mention of “lay out of the course” and it is lumped in with other problems… “build and seed eighteen greens and fifteen fairways.” He then goes on to state three fairways were old pasture, I’m not sure what comes next, then the account says they collected all the information they could from local committees and greenkeepers. Information on what…does he specify?"

Tom MacWood:

Is it ever going to be possible for you to come to terms with the fact that this is the best we have so far on the details of this early time? My God, man, you keep acting as if when we can't produce something in a written quotation from Wilson or his committee on every single question you may ever have that that's tanatamount to you concluding that they couldn't have done it! Are you really that obtuse?

I wouldn't even mind if you were if that's as far as you took it but you seem constantly inclined to go even farther and imply that someone else must have done it when you have far less to deduce that from than we do with Wilson and his committee!

I said:

”If someone else did that routing to anything more than a minor extent---somebody like perhaps C.B. Macdonald or Whigam or Raynor then why in the hell didn't Wilson and the committee mention that fact as they had done regarding the help Macdonald offered them BEFORE Wilson traveled to Europe for seven solid months of study?”

In response to that Tom MacWood said and asked:

"That’s a good question….there appears to be other facts he chose not to cover in his report for whatever reason: The routing process is not discussed (as far as I can tell),  the Francis story and the acquisition of additional land is not mentioned and the fact that Whigham and Macdonald visited the site at least twice. Perhaps you don’t consider the W&M visits important but certainly the other two episodes were significant in the golf course’s development.
There are still a number of questions that haven’t answered: When was the golf course routed…is it likely it was routed prior to the construction starting in spring 1911? Crump began constructing before routing, but six years later the course wasn't complete and he was dead...not a good model. It appears Merion was constructed and grassed in relatively short order.
Other unanswered questions: how did the routing process evolve, how long did it take, who was involved?"

Tom MacWood:

At this point I'm really beginning to ask myself what on earth has gone wrong with you??

Did it ever occur to you that Wilson may not have mentioned the Francis story or the Mcd/Whigam visits because he didn't think them very important in the broad scheme of things, probably because they weren't??? At least in the context of a ten page report about the creation of Merion East that Piper asked him to write in 1916? (I'd ask Wayne to scan that entire 10 page report onto this website but when you actually see how concerned Wilson was in that report about things like grubs and worms I'm afraid you might actually conclude that Wilson couldn't have had a thing to do with golf architecture itself!!).

You said:

"Perhaps you don’t consider the W&M visits important but certainly the other two episodes were significant in the golf course’s development."

Tom, it really doesn't matter what I think is important or you think is important, what matters is WHAT HUGH WILSON THOUGHT WAS IMPORTANT!! I keep telling you if Wilson thought the visit to NGLA was so important as to merit the mention he gave it and the appreciation he showed to Macdonald for that NGLA two days but not the apparent visits of Mcd/Whigam to Philadelphia then what does that mean to you. Please try real hard to answer with something other than 'That's a good queston'!! Why do you suppose that was? Probably because they weren't important and consequently he saw no real importance in them and didn't mention them for that reason.

And maybe the Francis story and the routing of the course is important to you and to me but for some reason what was more important to Wilson was the agronomy of the course that took up about 9 1/2 pages of his ten page report on the creation of Merion East in his report in 1916.

Just because what's so damn important to you or to me didn't appear to be so damn important to Wilson sure doesn't mean to me that one should then deduce and assume that he didn't or couldn't have routed and designed that golf course.

Crump over six soild years of being at PVGC daily virtually wrote nothing!!! What does that imply to you---that he didn't think the routing and the design and everything else about the golf course WASN'T IMPORTANT???

Please don't answer that---I'm afraid you might actually say yes.  

"There are still a number of questions that haven’t answered: When was the golf course routed…is it likely it was routed prior to the construction starting in spring 1911?"

Wow! When was the course routed? Was it routed prior to construction? Well, er, ah, that's probably sort of logical to assume, but who really knows, those guys back then were pretty adventurous and pretty clever! Maybe they all just got together and sort of designed a golf course in a vacuum in one of the upstairs rooms of the clubhouse and then went out later on the site to see if they got lucky and it would fit somehow!

You said;  

"Crump began constructing before routing, but six years later the course wasn't complete and he was dead...not a good model."

No, Tom, Crump didn't start constructing before routing, I only said he began construction before he FINALIZED his routing!

"It appears Merion was constructed and grassed in relatively short order."

Yes, that's right. The first phase was done according to Wilson between the spring of 1911 and September of 1911. Maybe that's one of the reasons they continued to alter and evolve the course and its architecture for the next 20 years just as Crump continued to alter and evolve his architecture until the day he died at which point it still wasn't finished. If he'd been down there constructing the course to Colt's hole designs he probably would've finished the course in less than six monts after June 1913! But of course you really wouldn't want to hear that because it might minimize Colt somehow!  

Tom MacWood;

CB was a pretty shameless self-promoter.  

If he had routed Merion, my guess is that he would be praising more than 7 of the holes as equal to anything in the country at that time.  I read this is as him saying to Wilson, et.al., "you're almost half as good as me".  

Tom MacWood said:

"In fact, other than his ultra-ego Raynor,"

Tom:

I've always known that Macdonald had quite an ego but what, pray tell, is his 'ultra-ego Raynor' all about. I'm beginning to wonder if that Macdonald ego has rubbed off on some of biggest fans today to such an extent they're beginning to think that if he was somewhere in some town everybody suddenly became a novice as the big talent hit town and the assumption was he must have done their courses.

I'm a big fan of Macdonald because I love NGLA but the truth is NGLA got the way it did because he basically spent almost thirty years on it perfecting it, just the way Wilson and Flynn spent years perfecting Merion, and Crump spent years perfecting PVGC, and Fownes spent years perfecting Oakmont and Leeds spent years perfecting Myopia.

Oh my God, four out of five of those guys were amateurs who never took a nickel---how did novices like that ever do such things?  

 Paul,
   Did your friend comment on the tee angles of the par threes on the front? I think the old angles are more interesting(assuming that the green contours of today were the same then--big assumption)

I think the original routing of the front nine would be better to play than the current one.
That been said, I do not know if my opinion on that is in some way or another due to the fact that I once read an article on golf course constuction written by CBMc..or could it be because I have also played all the classic links courses and as such in some way perverse to that way of thinking...or could it be ...you get my drift..it does semm as though the original flow would have been better.
I do have one question of interest...why do the members of Merion call their most important event....THE WILSON..... just a thought.
In my ignorant way of thinking, I assume that the membership has a pretty good handle on the history of thier beloved property, but hey..I may be wrong

Paul:

Regarding your post #93 and question about the routing progression of Merion East in the 1916 progression vs now, in my opinion, and despite what your friend who knows Merion East well says, I think it would be unadulterated freaking MADNESS to tamper with the routing progression of that course (even to go back to original) as the way it is now and has been since about 1916 is so unique and so cool as to almost be one a Merion East's primary architectural assets in the world. There's just something totally unique about those so-called "three sections" or "three sets" of Merion East and the full extent of the so-called "short" or middle section just the way it now is is really key! Talk about a course that's routing gets in your head about what's to come and what've you down previous---it's Merion East. So many people try to catch up senselessly on the short middle section if they've made some mistakes on the first six and always in the back of everyone's mind is to get ready and get sort of a jump start through that short middle section to get ready to take on the tough last five!

If I hear anyone over there is even considering such a restoraton back to that first routing progression, I'm driving right over there and telling them that I can tell them there's this guy from Ohio who can personally guarantee that the "advice" of the ghosts of the great Charles Blair Macdonald, the ghost of the great Henry J. Whigam and the ghost of the great Seth J. Raynor is that they definitely NOT consider such a thing. If they ask me how this guy in Ohio knows those great architectural talents feel that way I fully expect Tom MacWood to supply a 1916 article in some esoteric long defunct golf magazine that says precisely that!

TE
I do see your point, and you know how I feel about Merion.
Hell, every stretch has killed me at some time or another, that is the beauty of the place...the course does not know the meaning of "easy stretch"  just get a little off line anywhere and the place will eat your lunch.

I love the course the way it is, that stretch 3-4-5-6 is just great, but you know what, that stretch 1-18 is pretty good to.

"TE
I do see your point, and you know how I feel about Merion.
Hell, every stretch has killed me at some time or another,"

Michael W-P:

Oh I don't know about that. I know what a good player you are and something tells me you haven't had that short stretch take a bite out of your hynnie like it can do if you get too aggressive with it to get something back or dose off on it a bit if you reach it ahead of expectations. I've seen that stretch take massive bites out of some pretty good players' hynnies so bad they really don't have much ass left went they limp on over to the 14th tee!

Tell me something Michael--because I'm not that great a speller--do you think I'm spelling "hynnie" in the British way or in the American way?