Farrell's Best Courses in America

[T_MacWood]

In 1928 Johnny Farrell listed his top 15 courses in America:

1. Olympia Fields
2. Oakmont
3. Pine Valley
4. Quaker Ridge
5. Bob O'Link
6. Lido
7. National
8. Pebble Beach
9. Brae Burn
10. Hollywood
11. Merion
12. Lasker's
13. Siwanoy
14. Baltusrol
15. El Cabellero

[ForkaB]

El Caballero?  Wasn't that the Foulpointe replica course?

[Dan_Callahan]

No Myopia? Odd.

[ForkaB]

Not odd, just nearsighted....

[BCrosby]

An odd list. No Country Club. No Pinehurst. No Cypress. No SFGC. No Olympic. No Shinnie. No Fisher's.

And not a single course from Madagascar.

Bob

[JESII]

I wonder how many of our own personal top 15 lists would include only courses the rest would consider top 50.

I doubt I have even played 15 of the top 50 in the US. Going to check...

[T_MacWood]

It should be pointed out that Farrell won the US Open at Olympia Fields in 1928. And was the pro at Quaker Ridge.

Farrell also listed his top 10 in America in 1926:

1. Quaker Ridge
2. Hollywood
3. Lido
4. Oakmont
5. Oakland Hills
6. Whitemarsh Valley
7. Inwood
8. Merion
9. Fresh Meadow
10. Burning Tree

[ForkaB]

An odd list. No Country Club. No Pinehurst. No Cypress. No SFGC. No Olympic. No Shinnie. No Fisher's.

And not a single course from Madagascar.

Bob

Bob

Whilst we are in the silly season, do you (as the expert on these matters) have Joshua Crane's rankings?

Rich

[JESII]

It should be pointed out that Farrell won the US Open at Olympia Fields in 1928. And was the pro at Quaker Ridge.

Farrell also listed his top 10 in America in 1926:

1. Quaker Ridge
2. Hollywood
3. Lido
4. Oakmont
5. Oakland Hills
6. Whitemarsh Valley
7. Inwood
8. Merion
9. Fresh Meadow
10. Burning Tree

Should we assume he won the IVB in '26?  

[Tyler Kearns]

12. Lasker's

?, anybody?

[BCrosby]

Rich -

Below is Crane's first ranking batch in 1924 with his ranking number values. He later added a number of US courses, but I don't have those rankings in a form I can post.

Muirfield          86.5
Gleneagles       84.6
Princes             83.8
Troon               83.0
St. George's      82.1
Hoylake            81.5
Walton Heath    80.4
Sunningdale      80.1
Turnberry          79.9
Deal                  79.1
Prestwick           78.1
Westward Ho!    75.3
North Berwick    72.6
St. Andrews       71.8

Bob

[Tom_Doak]

Reading any single person's ranking of the best courses in the US or world is usually kind of silly -- they are either going to stick pretty much to the status quo, or they will seem very odd, often because of the places they HAVEN'T been.

I recently re-read the 1939 ranking which Tom MacWood produced a while back ... it has been reprinted in "A Disorderly Compendium of Golf", by Lorne Rubenstein and Jeff Neuman, now in bookstores everywhere.  The list of courses itself is fascinating (and not just for Foulpointe at #10, but not as fascinating as the panel which numbered 17 people as follows:

Bobby Jones, Walter Hagen, Gene Sarazen, Robert Trent Jones, Joyce Wethered, Glenna Collett Vare, Bernard Darwin, Grantland Rice, Edward (Duke of Windsor), William D. Richardson, Arnaud Massy, Percy Alliss, Joe Kirkwood, Tom Simpson, Charles Alison, D. Scott Chisholm, and Hans Samek.

I do wonder how many of them had played in Madagascar -- possibly Hagen and Kirkwood had put it in as a joke.


P.S. to Tyler -- The private Lasker's course in Chicago was #23 on this list as well.

[SPDB]

12. Lasker's

?, anybody?

Tyler - Lasker's is Mill Road Farm, a private estate course outside of Chicago designed by William Flynn for advertising magnate Albert Lasker.