What Influenced Bobby Jones?

[Glenn Spencer]

Glenn,

I know what you're saying about holes on courses I have played well on, I agree that they are very likely strong influences for the guys that play first and then build a course or two later. I was really just giving you a hard time, and also waiting for your buddy Mucci to come on here and lecture about discussing courses you have not seen.

Here's my impression of the holes you compared.

#3 at Merion is and always has been much longer than #12 at Augusta, while #12 seems to be much more demanding from a distance control perspective. Both greens are shorter on the left running to longer carries on the right but the Augusta green seems quite uneventful (almost a reward for actually finding it) while the Merion green is extremely undulating. I also believe #12 is downhill considerably while #3 is flat to slightly uphill with a good deal of the green obscured from view.


#10 at Augusta seems like a 'forced' draw to achieve the maximum benefit of the fairway undulation (turbo boost). It is debateable whether or not it benefits the player to get to that turbo boost at Merion (just ask Hogan). In fact, a draw hit off the 18th tee at Merion that lands in the far right corner needs a fairly soft fairway to stay out of the left rough. The right to left slope is considerable enough that it virtually forces a fade into the hill. Add to that the uphill nature of the tee shot at Merion as compared to what appears to be a substantially downhill (although maybe not until after the ball lands) tee shot at Augusta and, again, these holes seem quite different to me. One similarity may be a green that runs away at the rear on both. Merion's does, and it seemed like ANGC did when Wier and Mattice were playing it in their playoff, am I correct?

I didn't realize you were giving me a hard time. To be fair though, you have to get the holes right.  I was saying 3 at Augusta and 12 at Merion. Not the other way around.

[JESII]

Oh crap...well, I'm spent so I'll give it to you...


Forget about Jones, this train of thought will have to address whether or not MacKenzie copied any other holes designed by Macdonald...

[Glenn Spencer]

It was good information about the two holes though. I asked the question earlier and didn't get a response. Is there any Merion at Augusta? Apparently not, I just find it hard to believe.

[Phil Benedict]

If Jones was so taken with TOC why were there so few bunkers at ANGC in the early days?  There are bunkers all over the place at TOC course, aren't there?  One of the most radical aspects of ANGC was the absense of bunkers.

[RSLivingston_III]

As I recall from one of the Jones books, the course underwent considerable change after WWII because of them letting it go to pasture during the war. The original course was kept very F&F before and became a different beast afterwards.

[Bill_McBride]

Bill - It was not clear in '29 that Jones would build his own course. At the time of the MacK meeting in California that year I don't think he was auditioning Mack. I think they were just friends. I don't know of any evidence that Ross was ever in the running. If you have something I would love to see it.

I've got a copy of the MacK TOC map as well. Mack said it contains a mistake, but he went to his grave thinking that no one else had spotted it. I haven't found it. But it keeps me looking, hoping for the eureeka moment that will make be famous.

Bob  

Right, the decision to build the course was made later but I think I've read that Jones' experience with Mackenzie in California was important to the decision.

I'll start studying the map.  Let me know if you find that error first.

How will we know when we find it?  

[Peter Pallotta]

Bob,

can you elaborate on your point, i.e. that, while to say that Augusta was the precedent for U.S. inland courses with TOC strategic options is too strong a claim, "what they did borrow from TOC was what made ANGC a radically new kind of golf course"?

JES II

You said "here is a question I have always kicked around about comparing a hilly course like Augusta to a seaside links course like St. Andrews (neither of which have I played), is there any way to equate the effects wind has on a ball to the hillside effect on a ball?"

It would interesting to know if Jones and Mackenzie might've been thinking along those very same lines in trying to transfer TOC strategic options to a Georgia hill country course

Peter

[TEPaul]

"- Jones said little about US courses. I'm not sure what you can infer from that. Having played PVGC, Merion and any number of the iconic Eastern seaboard courses, Jones had no comment."

Bob:

That's not so with Merion. Jones had a lot to say about Merion. I don't know if he was just being nice or if he truly meant it but he had some pretty special things to say about it. It may've even been Jones who coigned the term "The White Faces of Merion". There is even some things in those "agronomy letters" from Alan Wilson about what Jones had to say about Merion.


Bob, regarding the original huge width of ANGC and the sparseness of bunkering aren't you going to say anything about our supposition of that mysterious "brain trust" that may've been afoot in this kind of thinking at that time?  

[TEPaul]

Peter:

I'll let Bob Crosby agree with, elaborate on or just deny what I'm about to say but we've suspected that ANGC originally may not have just been one of the most interesting designs ever done but also perhaps one of the most comprehensively misunderstood. The reasons why that may've been are complex, to say the least. But how the idea came into being and who all may've been part of the development of the thinking on it could be very interesting. We think they were in the process of really pushing the envelope and we can't exactly figure out whether the envelope just wasn't ready to be pushed like that or what happened. Maybe it was even just the Masters which didn't allow it to flourish.

[JESII]

What is this crap Tom? Write what you're trying to say instead of that vague referrence to pushing the envelope...

[Bill_McBride]

What is this crap Tom? Write what you're trying to say instead of that vague referrence to pushing the envelope...

It takes a lot of words to circle around a subject that completely!

[Marty Bonnar]

Bill - It was not clear in '29 that Jones would build his own course. At the time of the MacK meeting in California that year I don't think he was auditioning Mack. I think they were just friends. I don't know of any evidence that Ross was ever in the running. If you have something I would love to see it.

I've got a copy of the MacK TOC map as well. Mack said it contains a mistake, but he went to his grave thinking that no one else had spotted it. I haven't found it. But it keeps me looking, hoping for the eureeka moment that will make be famous.

Bob  

Right, the decision to build the course was made later but I think I've read that Jones' experience with Mackenzie in California was important to the decision.

I'll start studying the map.  Let me know if you find that error first.

How will we know when we find it?  

I know MacK was a genius gifted with astonishing foresight, but to foresee the re-naming of the 10th hole in 1924(map)34(SoSA), nearly 40 years before it would actually happen is beyond spooky...

FBD.

Mods for clarification...

[Bill_McBride]

Well as always you are spot on.  There is a table in the upper left corner of the map naming all the holes and listing distances (#10 Bobby Jones 316 yards).

Hmmm.     Jones hadn't played much there in 1924 (the date on the map).  Do you suppose that table was added in later years?  I'll bet a couple of pints that's the case.  There are no hole names on the map proper, just that table.

[Marty Bonnar]

Actually, Uncle Wull,
I was just funnin' wit ya.
Have you a copy of HerbWW's 'Complete Golfer'?
The 'same' MacK map there has the original text calling the 10th, well, the 'Tenth'

Somebody has been updating it over the years. I see it's copyright to Henderson and Sons, University Press, St A. Maybe they have rights of correction?

Y.O.N.,
FBD.

[Bill_McBride]

My leg was successfully pulled.    Good job, nephew.

Speaking of that map, GCAer Greg Holland is looking to buy a copy.  Does anyone have a source?  I downloaded mine from some site and can't remember where.  Or from whence.

[Marty Bonnar]

I can't find one on the Great Big Interweb, but as you know only too well, EVERY shop in St A (and not only the golf shops!) sell the wee beauties. Framed/unframed,rolled in tubes/various sizes. Take yer pick!
Maybe you can pick up a stock to take back in March? Or maybe one of the St A Oz ex-pats might assist?

F.

[Bill Gayne]

It was always my understanding that Jones grew up on East Lake in Atlanta that was originally built by Bendelow and redesigned by Ross in 1913. This would have been Jones early teenage years.

Am I wrong in thinking that Jones grew up on East Lake and if not, how could this course not have influenced him? I was a little surprised to see 40 replies go by and no mention of East Lake.

[Bill_McBride]

It was always my understanding that Jones grew up on East Lake in Atlanta that was originally built by Bendelow and redesigned by Ross in 1913. This would have been Jones early teenage years.

Am I wrong in thinking that Jones grew up on East Lake and if not, how could this course not have influenced him? I was a little surprised to see 40 replies go by and no mention of East Lake.

That familiarity with Ross at East Lake was why I always thought there might have been a decision to be made by Jones between Ross and MacKenzie for ANGC.

But I trust Bob Crosby and his research; Bob says there was never a doubt MacKenzie would get the commission so I agree!  

I guess you have to wonder if Ross would have been paid his commission while MacKenzie, a continent away, was eventually stiffed, never paid when he died.  His letters to Clifford Roberts seeking payment are rather pathetic and sad.

[Peter Pallotta]

Bill Gayne,
I thought about East Lake, but didn't think it could be an important influence on ANGC because I'd assumed that Jones had picked a hilly site for specific reasons - and East Lake didn't look to me to be on the same kind of land.  

But then again, that's why I asked the question in the first place: I couldn't think of any other course that sounded - strategically speaking - like TOC but that was on such a vastly different piece of ground.

I'm hoping that Bob Crosby can come back to his last point, i.e. that what they did borrow from TOC was what made ANGC a radically new kind of golf course; and that TEPaul can follow-up on his point about the founders 'pushing the envelope'.  

Peter

[TEPaul]

"What is this crap Tom? Write what you're trying to say instead of that vague referrence to pushing the envelope..."

Sully:

It's not crap. There just aren't easy answers for some of this stuff. Some of us over the years have been looking into some possibilities of perhaps philosophical connections in architecture between various people like Bob Jones, MacKenzie, Behr, Hunter et al that were never really documented that may've happened. We can't prove anything or even document anything about it but it may've happened and perhaps they were up to some architectural ideas that for whatever reason didn't get off the ground. Some of us think the best evidence of it just may've been the original architectural conception of ANGC. if one takes a close look at what ANGC originally was I think they'd be able to understand. TOC has always been mentioned over the years by so many architects as the prototype of it all. But even with so many saying that it never really was copied, even in principle. We think ANGC may've been the first real attempt at in in principle in a place markedly unlike St Andrews.

[BCrosby]

On Jones and EL. Your facts are basically right.

Jones was surrounded by Ross almost his entire life. He grew up across the street from what is now the 14th tee at EL. EL was a Bendelow course redone by Ross in '13 and again revised by Ross circa '23. A second EL 18 was also designed by Ross and built about '27. It's hard to imagine that the club didn't get its most prominent member involved with their new second course. (Interestinly, it was thought by almost everyone to be a better course than the surviving 18 at EL.) Jones spent most of his winters in the 1920's playing Ross's Hill Course at Augusta CC. His summer course was a Ross course at Highlands, N.C. And those were just the Ross courses he played on a regular basis for most of his life.

So Jones knew his Ross. He liked Ross courses. He had a pretty good idea what he would get from Ross with his new course. But Ross's name never came up as a candidate.

At its opening, ANGC was seen a revolutionary course because it was designed to challenge the best golfers in the world AND had  (i) a paucity of bunkers, (ii) no rough, (iii) extraordinarily wide playing corridors,(iv) reachable par 5's and (v) large greens. The common wisdom (then and now) is that if you want to test the best golfers in the world you build  a course that has the exact opposite of such features.

It is in that sense that MacK and Jones pushed the strategic envelope. They took the strategic principles you find at TOC (and some other courses) and stretched them to the breaking point. (I have often wondered what might have happened to gca after ANGC if the Great Depression and WWII hadn't put gca out of business for almost two decades and if someone other than RTJ hadn't dominated things post 1950. But who knows.)

I think it was because Jones thought only MacK would know how to push that envelope is the reason MacK was always the only candidate for the job. Why Jones might have thought only MacK could push the envelope takes us into speculation land. But in the absence of any clear evidence one way or another for his choosing MacK for ANGC (and there isn't any I can find), informed speculation is the best we have.

This isn't the time to lay out that speculation. Suffice it to say tonight that Jones was a bright young man who had developed distinctive preferences in gca. He was also bright enough to follow and understand the architectural debates of the mid-1920's and the important role Mack played in them. And that made all the difference. Jones' seeing Pasa in '29 only confirmed things he already believed about MacK.

Bob



   

[Phil McDade]

I've neither played nor walked Augusta or Merion, but two holes at the courses strike me as having somewhat similar design characteristics -- the 11th at Merion and the 13th at Augusta. Both are located near the low points of each course, and both feature the very ingenius use of a creek fronting/siding the green to create strategy and thoughts on where to place the tee shot to set up the ideal second shot.

It's clear from watching years of the Masters that there is great strategic value in being as far left on the fairway on 13th as possible, as the land is more level and it "deepens" the green, because Rae's Creek plays as more of parallel hazard to the green. Yet the creek is very much in play for a wayward left tee shot. Bail out right, and you're hitting from a hook stance to a green that's become shallower and calls for a controlled fade. (Compare where Nicklaus hit his second on the 13th in the final round in '86 to where Faldo hit his 2nd there in the final round in '96. Both hit great shots from very different spots on the fairway.)

Are there similar strategic placements at play at Merion's 11th? Is there an advantage coming into that green from any particular place on the fairway? I have no idea whether Jones utilized any of Merion's architectural concepts at Augusta, but those two holes have some very similar green/hazard concepts.

[Phil_the_Author]

Bob,

      You wrote that, "At its opening, ANGC was seen a revolutionary course because it was designed to challenge the best golfers in the world AND had  (i) a paucity of bunkers, (ii) no rough, (iii) extraordinarily wide playing corridors,(iv) reachable par 5's and (v) large greens. The common wisdom (then and now) is that if you want to test the best golfers in the world you build  a course that has the exact opposite of such features."
      As I shared with you a few months back when I accidentally discovered the following information, a very similar golf course was built in Atlanta in 1929.
      In the May 1928 issue of Golf Illustrated, William Beers announced that, “Two 18-hole courses, a 36-hole course, and to remodel its three 9-hole course…”
      On Sept. 2nd, the Atlanta Journal reported that “Plans for one of the most elaborate golf courses… in the south were disclosed Saturday… Contract for laying of the course is being prepared for letting to one of five experts under consideration. Among those is Donald Ross, famous golf course architect… Dr. Dan Y. Sage, a director of Ansley Golf Club, and William Hunt, President of the Ansley Golf Club, have been named directors of the Colonial Club, while Bobby Jones… and other prominent Atlantans have been asked to become directors.”
      On October 5th, under the banner headline “FAMED GOLF ARCHITECT PLOTS COLONIAL COURSE,” they reported that “A.W. Tillinghast looks over land he will transform into playground.” A photograph of Tilly standing among high grass in a field next to Harrie Ansley and Arthur Peterson as all three looked at a set of blueprints accompanied the article.
      The article continued stating that, “Ansley wants it to be the finest in the south… He wants to build a course that will meet the requisites for the staging of a national golf championship – something that has never been held in the south.
      On October 6th, the Atlanta Journal reported that the course, which would be more than 7,000 yards in length and have two sets of greens for each hole (one of Bent grass the other of Bermuda) would also, “The course will have little or no rough… Make the new layout different from every other in the country…”
      The course was scheduled to open by June of 1929.
      Sometime after the stock market crashed in November of 1929, the bonds that were floated for the project failed and the club closed a few months later.
      In a piece of high golfing irony, the City of Atlanta would take over the property and in 1934 opens a municipal golf course for its citizens that is still enjoyed by many today on the EXACT SITE of the COLONIAL GOLF CLUB. It was named the Bobby Jones Golf Club.
      There is a POSSIBILITY that this course may have influenced Bobby Jones in how he conceived the design of the ANGC.

[Sébastien Dhaussy]

The land on which ANGC sits does not scream TOC at you. It is very hilly in places. But if you have determined that your new club is going to be in Augusta, almost any site you pick will be hilly. It's a hilly area.

Like the selection of most sites for golf courses, it was chosen for a combination of reasons, not all of them design reasons.

Bob

Bob,

Can you share more with us on this "combination of reasons" ? Why Bobby Jones have chosen Augusta for his course ?

Thanks

[TEPaul]

Bob:

Fine post that #45, particularly the para. beginning "At the opening" and that you say most of the component elements of the course were sort of the opposite of the way conventional thinking at that time was going of how to test the best players.

Don't forget to elaborate on how Jones didn't want to overlook the rest though, at least that's the way he seems to have talked about it. At that time was there a better course to look to that could do that then TOC, at least in their minds?

Would you say at the time ANGC began to come into being that even though Jones and MacKenzie may not have known each other all that well that TOC had basically completely transfixed Jones and that he realized there probably wasn't a designer who understood TOC and its architectural essence like MacKenzie did?