MacKenzie's California bunkers

[T_MacWood]

Pasatiempo, Cypress Point and the Valley Club is a hell of a resume. The boldness of the bunkering is really extraordinary. And although they share similarities, they each have a different unique look and style, if you add the Meadow Club, you have another completely different look & style from the others.

Are the differences due to soil conditions, construction supervisors, a combination of both or some other reasons?

[Bill_McBride]

For starters, only Cypress Point, and only a third of that course, is on sandy, seaside soil.  The original intent was for the bunkers to emulate the dunesland in which those holes (#1, #2, #8, #9, #12, #13) were built.  The bunkering on the rest of Cypress Point and at the other parkland courses is quite similar - large, sprawling, multitudinous, sand-flashed with grassy capes.  The recent bunker renovation at Cypress Point has restored the bunkering on those dunesland holes to emulate the originals shown in Geoff Shackleford's book - love the Packard!  Hopefully the bright white sand is becoming more subdued in hue so the critics can calm down.  

[Tommy_Naccarato]

You forgot to mention Lake Merced, as well as all the others. They were all dramatic and in some cases, different.

Also, count the guys that MacKenzie and Hunter had working for them: Flemming, Cole and countless others. then to really throw a wrench in the mix, think about how Pebble was redone by Egan with American Golf Course Construction Company, as well as Monterrey Peninsula CC, speaking of which, what was the deal there!?!?!?!

While Bob Huntley claims that the Shorse Courses never got built, I have come across items that have claimed it had been started. Started after the Dunes Course had been officially opened.

[TEPaul]

"Are the differences due to soil conditions, construction supervisors, a combination of both or some other reasons?"

Forget about that mundane crap. They're the result of some of the most imaginative, envelop-pushing, adventurous, talented, thoughtful collection of people ever to come together in one place (California in the late 20s) at one time in the entire evolution of golf course architecture, even to date. They may've hit a pinnacle (without actually realizing it) that for various reasons and events that followed them will never be reached again....even though we most certainly need to give credit to a contingent of architects today for trying!  

Furthermore, when it's all said and done, I doubt anyone will ever really touch Alister MacKenzie. All and all, that man was six steps ahead and around the corner from the rest, and probably always will be.

[Tom_Doak]

Tom:  The differences are due to a combination of different people and different soils.

The Valley Club is on heavy clay, and its bunkers have smaller floors and more vertical element than the others.  I think this is the only one where Robert Hunter was heavily involved personally in the construction and shaping supervision.

Pasatiempo and Cypress Point were built by essentially the same construction crew, but the former was done in ravine country on difficult soils, and the latter in sand dunes (though the soils in the back are not so good).  Pasatiempo's bunkers were a good deal shallower originally than they are today.

The Meadow Club was built well before any of the others, and when MacKenzie himself was not residing in California.  I don't think they had nearly the flair of the others originally -- and they certainly were less well preserved over the years, before the recent reconstruction.

In the end, though, I suspect each course's bunkers are different because the crew was constantly improving in their abilities, and because MacKenzie didn't want them to just keep doing the same thing.  That's why ours keep changing, anyway.

[John Kirk]

I'm rather shy about posting, as my knowledge of this subject is unsophisticated.  However, I feel the "California style" bunkers are a unique contribution to architecture.  To my untrained eye, Thomas and Bell bunkers are quite similar in nature.

Maybe it's because I was born and raised in California, but the bunkering at Pasatiempo and other great California courses are my favorites.

A question for Tom Doak...did you try to mimic the "California style" bunkering at Stone Eagle?

Finally, has anyone noticed that this thread features the GCA All-Tom team?

[Tom_Doak]

John:

Way back when we were getting ready to build Black Forest, I took Gil Hanse out to California and we spent about ten days going to all the great MacKenzie and Thomas courses and measuring the sizes of the bunkers and the length of the capes and how many capes in a bunker and all that.  We hadn't tried to build that style of bunkering before and needed some close study.  So, Black Forest is California-style bunkering.

I haven't done that on any of my courses since, we just wing it.  The primary bunker shaper for Stone Eagle just happens to have worked on rebuilding bunkers at Pasatiempo ... but he also worked at Pacific Dunes and Stonewall and Barnbougle before that, even though he only did the edging of those bunkers.  And at Stone Eagle he had several excellent sets of eyes editing his work.  But I don't think of Stone Eagle's bunkers as typical California.

[wsmorrison]

I have never played a MacKenzie course in California so I don't know anything first-hand about the courses except how everybody raves about them.  

I know from photos that the look of the bunkering was/is very artistic and identifiable.  That's pretty much all I've gathered.  Can someone in the know go beyond the look and discuss the strategic placement of the bunkers and any style that might have, in other words prototypical patterns that might have been used.  Did MacKenzie use toplines of bunkers to hide landing areas, foreshorten distances, create perception miscues and interesting angles around greens and fairways?  Was strategy dictated back to the tee by topographic features and/or bunkering?  The floors of his bunkers seem to have a lot of contour.  Is that typical or are photos I've seen misleading?  Looking forward to comments.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Wayne,
I think he did all of the above. It's funny when you see some of this stuff,  I think the designer had one thing in mind and that was making the eye look at these imposing hazards while even more deceptively disguising the target--usually by using the hazard or feature in question as the focal point and thus disguising the legnth. This would mean somehow getting the land that looked uphill to actually be somewhat downhill and the land looking downhill to actually be somewhat uphill. A prime example of this would be the study of his one-shot holes. (par 3's or in MacKenzie's case par 2-1/2 or 3-1/2's)

All in all, the bunkers took your eyes off of the target in an artistic sense. You would step on to a tee and look directly at the first thing that captivated the human eye--I have found that most of the time it was some irregular bunker scheme. with the eye's fixation on these sandy pits with unregular lines, the finer points of the hole become somewhat more disguised.

That's my opinion of it at least.

[T_MacWood]

Wayne
MacKenzie believed in the 'line of charm' or the St. Andrew's strategic style of bunkering. I think aesthetics played major role in that strategy. His bunkers are bold, a little intimidating and difficult to ignore. He was also keen on the idea of giving the golfer thrills. The look and placement of the bunkers results in a lot of thrills. He talks about all these things in the Spirit of St. Andrews.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Interesting thing when you mention Line of Charm because so many people don't actually understand what it exactly means. (Not you Tom)

The point is that MacKenzie placed bunkering into the mindset, He made it all very focal but it was just as much of the routing of the hole or even the course when doing it. all of it used the existing contours of the land but also expounded on the need for creating it. You take a max Behr who created or for the most part--for-his-time, created more movement then anyone and did so masterfully, the bunkers blended-in either much more naturally.  He created more natural hazards (aka sandy waste areas of minimal maintenance) as if they had been there when he got there. However, his bunkers while taking a bit of a page of MacKenzie and Bell, weren't neccessarily lacy-edged, but more thoughtfully shaped and really well placed.

[wsmorrison]

Thank you, Tom and Tommy.  Its nice to get beyond the look and gain an understanding of the use and implications of the bunkers as well.  I hope to remedy this lack of experience of US MacKenzie and visit Naccaratoville someday.

[Willie_Dow]

How great it is to hear from guys who agree with one another.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Willie, I wouldn't want it anyother way. We're all right. Everyone against us is all wrong.....

Wayne, Would enjoy having you out to Palookaville anytime. But you already knew that!

[James Bennett]

Hey Wayne

if you find you enjoy the climate in Palookaville (low humidity days), keep going south-east till you hit Down-Under.  Make sure you get past Sydney otherwise you'll think your still in the north-east of the US.  Its a great climate for playing golf.

James B

[Joel_Stewart]

I think its more because of Hunter (what Tom Doak said) and because Green Hills, Northwood and Meadow Club used Fleming?   I would like to know if Hunter worked at Sharp Park which I believe had the really nice Cypress Point bunkers before it was destroyed.

[Sean_Tully]

Also, count the guys that MacKenzie and Hunter had working for them: Flemming, Cole and countless others. then to really throw a wrench in the mix, think about how Pebble was redone by Egan with American Golf Course Construction Company, as well as Monterrey Peninsula CC, speaking of which, what was the deal there!?!?!?!

Tommy-

I have limited knowledge of AGCCC, but from what I have read and seen of their work they first got their start at Meadow Club and Cal- Club. Their advertisements make no mention of Pebble or MPCC. I seem to recall that the work was superintended by Joe Mayo at Pebble. Recalling the whole letter exchange regarding the Mayo-Mackenzie tiff, it is interesting to note that Mayo had a connection to Raynor and even finished his course in Hawaii after Raynor died. Maybe that was why Mackenzie was not given the job at Pebble as Mayo was a favorite of Morse.

I have wanted to reply to this but I have been busy at work(Aerifing greens), putting together an archive of all our historical info at Meadow Club, and as of a few minutes ago a presentation on Cal-Club that looks at their early history and the roles of Lock, Macan, and Mackenzie.

Your email regarding Spence was without a photo. I can not for the life of me recall what it was, too much stuff going on!

That late night phone call regarding Sampson tenures as a Pro, is Burlingame, Lincoln Park, Del Monte, Pebble Beach(he was the first pro at Pebble), and Sunnyside at the age of 18! He also gave lessons at a couple of the city academys, taught the Stanford team, and gave lessons over the radio as early as 1925. He was as Hagen referrred to him once, "of the highest water." I understand it to be a complement but...
He was also a very close friend of Crosby and was the early swing coach to Venturi before Eddie Lowrey had him switch to another.


Tully

[Sean_Tully]

The Meadow Club was built well before any of the others, and when MacKenzie himself was not residing in California.  I don't think they had nearly the flair of the others originally -- and they certainly were less well preserved over the years, before the recent reconstruction.

Tom

What is your definition of "well"? From what I have seen in my research they were all over the place from 1927-1930. It slows down a little bit after Union League and before they finished Sharp Park. They did have another course to build near the equestrian area at Pebble but that was never finalized before the effects of the depression were felt.

A quick look at some of their work
Original Designs
Meadow Club
Cypress Point

Remodels
Cal-Club
Claremont
Lake Merced

listed in order as found in October 1928 advert

That is a lot of course work in a short period of time for anybody, let alone for the type of work they were doing. I am still trying to figure out who was on site at Meadow Club. It is very interesting that it has such a distinctive bunker design as compared to the courses that would follow. Fleming was brought over to work at Meadow Club and who he brought with him would be very interesting. From all that I hear about Paddy Cole it all shake and bakes with him!  


Tully

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Tull,
Interesting stuff about Mayo,. I had never heard about his involvement with Wailae.

I can't remember where it was, but I think I have come across some stuff that said that Hunter was someway involved with Egan at Pebble. I could be wrong there.

Also, not that there could be any connection, but you know how these things generally work out--I have yet to come across anything regarding Joe Mayo and Charles Mayo, who worked with Willie Watson and maybe Billy Bell.

Oh please Obi Wan Tulley, your my only hope! (You and Tom MacWood!)

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tom MacWood,

Tom Doak's point about soil profiles dictating bunker configuration is a critical element.

You can only design what can be built, designing what can't be built is a waste of time and money.   And, in those days, time and money, especially money was of prime importance.