What happened to H.Chandler Egan?

[BCrosby]

I seem to recall that Egan played on the Harvard golf team at about the same time Behr played for Yale and Hunter played for Princeton.

No?

I have this picture of the three of them siting around drinking after the Ivies. To have been a fly on the wall.

Bob

[Sean_Tully]

Max Behr was a Amateur champion of New Jersey in either 1903 or 04.

Bob-
Who was the third in your picture?

Robert E. Hunter, not the Wiles Robert Hunter as they were mistaken to be the same especially when they both lived in California. Just checking.

Tully

[BCrosby]

Tully -

I was referring to the Robert Hunter who wrote The Links.

Bob

[Sean_Tully]

Tully -

I was referring to the Robert Hunter who wrote The Links.

Bob

When you refer to the Ivies, that would be the their Ivy League Golf Tournament? If so then that would most likely have been Robert E. Hunter out of Midloathian and later out of Midwick in SoCal.

Wiles Robert Hunter, the author of "the Links," took up golf in 1904 at his doctors advice to relax from his work on his book "Poverty". He had tried to ride horses to get outdoors but that could not have challenged him enough knowing his character. He played alot of his golf at some of the best East coast courses and even beat his close friend Walter Travisin a big tournament at Pinehurst. He was a member at Wee Burn in 1911, I am still tracking some of his info down.

It took me about thirty minutes to convince someone that there were two Robert Hunters and even with pictures the person was not convinced.  

I would be interested in seeing the photo and I could even send you some photos of R.E.H.

Tully

[Lynn_Shackelford]

Like Tom M., I too find it interesting that Egan, didn't play for a long time and then came back to the competitive side.  Jones, Behr and other did not come back.  Maybe the second wife talked him into fulfilling what was an incomplete passage of his life.
In any event, like Ross and others of his time, his routings are brilliant.  I have played Indian Canyon, Spokane.  Time has passed it by, but the routing and greens are outstanding.  Eastmoreland as well is a great routing, and who can say his changing of the short par 4 18th to a par 5 at Pebble Beach was wrong?
This guy was gifted.
And it is an interesting face isn't it?

[Sean_Tully]

Lynn-
A correction to your above statement on the 18th at Pebble. Fowler mad the change back in 1922. The Egan-Hunter-Lapham  changes that were made to Pebble were to bring the holes closer to the ocean for the most part and improve the bunkering. I have two really neat drawings of the holes that shows the before and after for the 6th and the 9th holes.

Tully

[Matthew Hauth]

I am an assistant professional at Riverside in Portland.

@Michael Dugger - The current back nine (NE Part of the Property) was Henderson's design. Egan completed the second nine which is now the Front nine. I haven't figured out if the switch was made as Egan completed the course or at a later time.

I've just read a great history prepared by Dan Hixson on the course. An interesting statement is that Dan came across that Egan may have rebuilt all of the greens prepared by Jim Henderson. One thing is the greens are some of the greatest in the area. A great deal of thought went into the design with regards to drainage. Greens stimping at 11 in the winter is not uncommon at Riverside.

I'll see if I can get ahold of a digital copy of the review if anyone would like to read it.

Matt

[Garland Bayley]

More info tying Hixson to Egan. Great!

Slag Bandoon tells me that Dan spent a great deal of time studying Indian Canyon while he was doing Wine Valley.

[Matthew Hauth]

Now to make the Kill list of Egan courses...

I'll ask him to see if I can peruse the Indian Canyon stuff.

[BCrosby]

Tom MacWood's question from nine years ago remains a good one. Egan was, arguably, the dominate American golfer during the early years of the 20th century.  It's too strong to say he then suddenly disappeared from the game. He continued to play in events on the west coast. But he did not come back east very often, which was where virtually all the most important tournaments were then being played.

Taking up the isolated life of gentleman farmer managing apple orchards in Oregon only adds to the mystery.

A couple of years ago I came across an account of Egan, Bobby Jones and others going on golf outings to Myopia and the Cape in the mid-1920's. Jones was then a student at Harvard. Whether Egan came back east to see Jones or whether he had other reasons for returning to Boston, I don't know. Egan had gone to Harvard, won back to back collegiate championships while there, and over the same years won back to back US Amateurs (the most important American tournament at the time). So Egan and Jones had in common the fact that they were both the best golfers of their respective eras while attending college in Cambridge.

Jones admired Egan greatly. He was a kind of father figure for Jones. But Egan also presents a number of mysteries. If we ever sort them out, I'd guess the most interesting of them had little to do with golf.

Bob



 



   

[Sven Nilsen]

There were a series of reports from some time around 1905 to 1912 noting Egan had moved to Michigan to focus on business and would be withdrawing from the golf scene.  Later reports have him moving back to Chicago, before eventually moving to Oregon.

[BCrosby]

Sven - Interesting.  I did not know Egan returned to the Mid-West for a time. Do you know what kind of business he was trying to do in Michigan? At some point I'd love to see what you found.

Bob

[Sven Nilsen]

Sven - Interesting.  I did not know Egan returned to the Mid-West for a time. Do you know what kind of business he was trying to do in Michigan? At some point I'd love to see what you found.

Bob

Bob:

All of this occurred before the move to Oregon, so there was no return to the Midwest.  Unfortunately, I didn't save those articles.  t bet if you plugged Egan and Michigan into the SEGL search function you'd find the results pretty quickly.

Sven

[DMoriarty]

Egan also lived in Louisville for about a year in 1909-1910.

While living in Louisville he announced his retirement from competitive golf in February 1909 because business did not leave him enough time to work on his game. But then he moved back to the Chicago area a few months later and competed in the Olympic Cup event and was runner-up in the Amateur that year to 19 yr. old Robert Gardner.  He seems to have cut way back on competition in 1910 skipping the Western and failing to qualify for matchplay in the Amateur.  

He also got married in June of 1910.  After that he seems to cut way back on his competitive golf for a while.

He purchased his farm in Medford in the 1911, and may have split time between there in Chicago for a year, but once he settled in Oregon he seems to have been pretty active in golf locally and on the West Coast.  

Perhaps his apparent disappearance was in part a result of East Coast bias in national golf coverage.

[Jim_Kennedy]

He did venture to St. Louis to play in the 1921 Us Am.

[Sven Nilsen]

Copied below is an April 2002 Southern Oregon Heritage Today article that dispels a number of misconceptions put forth earlier in this thread. 


Chief amongst those is the claim that when Egan moved to Medford, OR there wasn't a golf course within 300 miles.  In fact, there was a course in Medford, one that Egan would go on to assist in the redesign of a few years later.


In addition, the article gives a good bit of background on Egan's playing career following his departure from Chicago.

[Sven Nilsen]

The listing of courses done by Egan on p. 4 of the article provides a bit to chew on.


I stumbled across the article while looking for anything covering Egan's work at Tuxedo Park.  I've only seen one other reference to his involvement there, and the timing of the work in 1935 leads one to wonder if it was completed prior to his passing in 1936.


There are a number of courses on the list in the article that seemingly are included due to Egan's association with Mackenzie.  Namely, Harding Park, Pasatiempo, Valley Club, Crystal Downs and Augusta National.  I have not seen anything noting Egan was personally involved with any of these projects.  In addition, I am curious as to what course is being referred to by Rio Campo.


There are a few additions to the list that should be included:


1909 - Louisville CC (Louisville, KY)
1916 - Boise CC (Boise, ID)
1926 - Monterrey Peninsula CC (Dunes) (Pebble Beach, CA)
1930 - Alderwood CC (Portland, OR)
1930 - Sequoyah CC (Oakland, CA)
1931 - Sharp Park GC (Pacifica, CA)
1932 - Medford Public GC (Medford, OR)
1933 - Bayside Municipal GC (Bayside, CA)


And one that I still have questions on:


Multonomah GC (Portland, OR)

[Kalen Braley]

Sven,


I wondered the same thing concerning his role at those courses you mentioned..in addition to Sharp Park and Sequoyah considering I thought those were also MacK courses....


P.S. The one course I've played several times on that list is Indian Canyon and I love it!

[Sven Nilsen]

Kalen:


Sequoyah was definitely an Egan project.  Sharp Park falls into the same category as the other Mac/Hunter projects.  I haven't seen anything specifically linking him to the course, but he was part of the firm that did the design.


Sven


Feb. 18, 1930 Oakland Tribune -

[Pete_Pittock]

Sven,
Best source information for Multnomah GC would be the Multnomah Athletic Club in Portland.

[BCrosby]

I had only a vague memory of this old thread. It is a reminder that getting the story straight about architects and golf courses is almost always best done as a collective effort.


GCA was at its best on this thread. I miss those that are gone.


Bob

[Pete_Pittock]

Re: Multnomah Golf Club.  This article attributes it to William J Lock of San Francisco.


http://www.raleighparkgardentour.com/a-short-history-of-our-neighborhood.html

[Sven Nilsen]

Pete:


Multonomah was most certainly laid out by William Lock.  I have a consultation credit for Egan here, but don't know where it comes from.


Sven

[Sven Nilsen]

Here's a plan of Multonomah noting Lock as architect.

[Sven Nilsen]

A little while back I posted an article on Mackenzie and Egan visiting Coos Bay, OR to check on the Cocoos grass farms in the area.


This Dec. 31, 1929 Coos Bay Times article gives a bit more background on the discovery of this form of creeping bent grass, and by connecting the dots you can form a picture of how Egan was responsible for bringing this strain to the forefront of course construction.