American Cricketer articles

[Joe Bausch]

If you've been keeping score at home, then you know that myself and a few others, including the GCA.com'er now known simply as Guest, have been gathering up articles out of the Philadelphia based magazine called The American Cricketer.  AC was published from somewhere around 1860 to the late 1920's.  Around 1895 was the first mention of golf in the magazine, coinciding with the approximate time golf started to take hold in the area.

From 1912-1914 A. W. Tillinghast was the golf editor of AC.  Perhaps this thread can be a place to post some of the more interesting writings of his.

For instance, this one from May of 1914.  What is of most interest to me is the talk about Pine Valley.  It says Colt is currently in the country and would likely make a visit to PV before heading back across the pond.  From my limited but growing knowledge of the early history of PV, I was under the impression Colt only made a visit in 1913.

[Phil_the_Author]

Joe,

Great article and good pickup on the point about Colt. It will be interesting to see what answers are given regarding the question.

Serious question - I have NO DOUBTS that this was written by Tilly, but I don't see his name on the article anywhere. For attribution purposes only, where does his name appear in the issue to credit him for the piece?

[Joe Bausch]

On the 'info page' of each month of the AC the editors are listed.  Each issue from Jan 1912 till Dec 1914 shows Tilly as the editor.

But now that you are sure this one is from Tilly, I beginning to wonder if it really isn't, since you are so clueless about Far and Sure. 

[Phil_the_Author]

Now wait a second Joe... You mean to tell me that there is nothing in the magazine that DIRECTLY states that Tilly himself wrote the article? Being the "Editor" doesn't make him the writer...

That he was I have no doubt, but from an attribution standpoint, being able to quote from the article and definitively state that "Tilly wrote in an article in..." that attribution MUST be there.

[Joe Bausch]

Correction:  the info says Tilly is the Golf Editor. 

I need to wade through all my photos, and also get those from a colleague of mine that took other years.  Frequently there were many articles on golf all bunched together.  And I don't remember any having AWT name just above or below them.  But I have hundreds of photos to process. 

[TEPaul]

Joe:

Colt may've visited Pine Valley a second time in 1914 but I've never seen any mention or record of that from the club or at the club. At least I've never seen anything he left there in 1914 as he did in 1913 with his hole by hole booklet, and perhaps the whole course drawing that we bought off of Ebay (although the whole course drawing is dated July 1913 which is somewhat confusing because I thought he was back in England by then).

There is one thing that leads me to believe he may've stopped there again in 1914 and that is Colt was given a really neat photo album of the course by Crump (I believe in 1914). Colt had that album in England but for some reason it now resides in the USGA's Museum/Library. If Colt did not stop at Pine Valley and pick it up then Crump must have sent it to him in England. I'm would tend to think Colt stopped there again in 1914 and picked it up.

There is another issue which when I brought it up in the past the Colt aficionadas seemed to get upset and take exception. That issue is that when Pine Valley first officially opened some of its holes for play in the very end of 1913 there were a whole series of articles in various periodicals including by Father Simon Carr and Walter Travis essentially building up the influence of Colt at Pine Valley. I think Crump both consciously and dedicatedly promoted that and those articles (Father Carr was basically Crump's best friend there), and why wouldn't he have at that point? Crump definitely did not act proprietarily about Pine Valley even if he basically owned the place at that time and was spending most of his time there on the course and he was no dummy---eg he was probably trying to promote the course realizing Harry Colt was most certainly better known in architecture than he was at that point.

[Joe Bausch]

Okay, time for more from The American Cricketer.  Some might think this deserves it own thread.   

In the May 1912 issue of AC, again which Tillinghast was the golf editor, there are many pages of golf related articles.  In the "clippings" section is where blurbs from other publications are listed.  Here is one that talks about a member from Merion visiting, as published by the Irish Independent:



I've been able to track down the exact date of the article from the Irish Independent, and it was April 10 of 1912:

[Mike_Cirba]

Joe,

This is an amazing find, yet again! 

It also fits nicely with my long-held theory that Willie Park was the father of naturalism and I'm not sure how much better one can say it than;

"Every bit of ground has to be treated differently....Nature must always be followed and nature will always beat the work of man."


It's also amazing what a good student Hugh Wilson was in following this dictate, and moving architecture in the United States in an almost complete opposite direction from what came before it.

[Mike_Cirba]

It also seems fortunate that Wilson headed to Scotland from Ireland, as the date of the Irish Independent article is the exact same date that the Titanic set sail from Southampton.

Long held rumor has it that Hugh Wilson had a ticket for the ill-fated voyage.

[Phil_the_Author]

Joe,

That find with the AC article and the one from the Irish Independent of April 10, 1912, may be the single most important article posted on this site...

Bravo! Terrific find!

[Joe Bausch]

Joe,

That find with the AC article and the one from the Irish Independent of April 10, 1912, may be the single most important article posted on this site...

Bravo! Terrific find!

Phil,

Thanks for the kind words.  Not being originally from the Philly region but now considering myself to be from here (I have lived here for 17 years), I'm quite proud to have dug up some rather important findings on a historic course pretty much in my backyard.  And there is more to come I can predict with confidence.... stay tuned.

[Mike_Cirba]

The other thing this should put to rest is the idea (which I thought highly plausible) that Hugh Wilson never had sketches of his own, but simply borrowed Macdonald's.

The phrase "making copies" certainly indicates to me that he was sketching and surveying.

[Tony_Muldoon]

Joe,

That find with the AC article and the one from the Irish Independent of April 10, 1912, may be the single most important article posted on this site...

Bravo! Terrific find!

Phil can you please expand on this, I dontunderstand why it's so significant?

Another point isn't there a little2+2=4* going on?    (*possibly)


Where does it state that it was Hugh Wilson in Ireland?  How can we be certain it wasn't Far and Sure?

[TEPaul]

Joe:

I should also note something of an indirect indication that Wilson likely was in the English Heathlands during that March-May1, 1912 trip abroad. The reason I say that and also say it is a bit indirect is because the info is from a letter that Colt wrote to Wilson perhaps sometime around 1920. I'll see if I can find it.

In that letter Colt talks about the fact they have not seen each other in a number of years and that he hopes Wilson remembers him well enough. He also mentioned that he, Colt, had moved his residence and that he feels that Wilson would like his new place as well or better than his old place. He also mentions that Mrs. Colt wishes to be remembered to Mrs. Wilson.

This seems to beg a number of questions about where Mrs. Colt and Mrs. Wilson saw one another----over there or over here, or perhaps both?

But I don't think there is any question that Colt's letter essentially places Wilson in the English heathlands too during that trip abroad in 1912.

[TEPaul]

Joe:

I think those articles you just produced show something else that seems to have been something of a concern both before Macdonald designed and built NGLA and certainly afterwards. It seems to have been a concern both over there and over here and that is exactly how an architect should or would go about designing and building and transalting holes from abroad to holes to be built over here.

It seems like Wilson, at least in the next few years after the beginning of Merion East in Ardmore, went about it in a much more "interpretative" way than Macdonald/Raynor did. This would seem to fit into the way Merion actually looks compared to the way NGLA looks and it would seem to fit into what Herbert Warren Wind said about both Merion and Wilson compared to Macdonald many years later.

[Joe Bausch]

Is there any direct evidence that Wilson and Willie Park, Jr. ever met?

[Phil_the_Author]

Tony,

You asked, "Phil can you please expand on this, I dont understand why it's so significant?"

This was in response to my statement, "That find with the AC article and the one from the Irish Independent of April 10, 1912, may be the single most important article posted on this site..."

There are several reasons for my belief in that and, not surprisingly, they all revolve around history both past and future.

The first part is the history of the contentious debates that have taken place the past few years on GCA. Like it or not the reputation of the site has become 'colored' (stained may be a more accurate word) in the eyes of some as a result.

Among the reasons for the 'contentions' was the challenge raised and the defense given as to whether or not the history of the Merion Golf Club as written in the past and accepted and supported by the club was correct in a number of areas, not least of which was the chrionicle of Hugh Wilson's travel(s) overseas to study the great courses and produce drawings of these which were used in the design of the course. Did he go? When did it happen? Where are the draswings? Were drawings actually made? Weren't these drawings actually ones shown to and supplied by Macdonald rather than drawn by Wilson?

Other ones asked whether or not the hole types (e.g. - Eden, etc...) were meant literally and if so, were they based upon the ones that Macdonald had built at NGLA? The 'old tale' that Hugh Wilson had been originally scheduled for a trip upon the Titanic and missed it at the last minute to visit elsewhere.

ALL of those questions are answered by those two simple extracts. They teach us that we CAN give far more trust to what was written in the past than simply to suppositions raised by future interested ones interpretations, regardless of how well-meaning and plausable they may at first appear.

Frankly, I believe we can put to rest many of the challenges to Merion's recorded historical account based upon these articles. The influences then on the original routing and design of Merion by those other than Wilson and his committee become greatly limited in time and scope for if the influence had been that great and designs finalized, one must ask WHY? Why was Wilson sent, because it can now be proved he was sent. Why did they see a need a need to study the great holes of the U.K. if they trusted the words, recommendations, routings and designs of the man that had JUST created a course based upon these very ideas and was reportedly the expert on them in America at this time? Why doubt the entire history of Merion as recorded based only upon suppositions when there is cocnrete proof that clearly prove it's accuracy?

That is the other part of the historical reason for my statement... the history to come on GCA, for those questions I've just asked are ones that will be debated on these pages. it is HOW they are debated that will either prove that GCA has greatly diminished from what it once was or allow it to rise to what it really should have been and once again can be in the future, that is the world-wide site for SCHOLARLY discussion of all things golf-architecturally related.

Let us hope we all behave as scholars with honor and dignity regardless of our conclusions and beliefs...

[Mike_Cirba]

Is there any direct evidence that Wilson and Willie Park, Jr. ever met?

None that I know of, but Park's theories were already implemented on the ground in the Heathlands when our guy Hughie made his little trip abroad.  I don't know Jim Finegan's source, or have it in front of me right now, but in the GAP 100 year Anniversary book he mentions a few of the courses Wilson visited, which included some heathland courses.

It would also seem that his theories were at least known in golfing circles, as evidenced by the writer's familiarity with them in the Irish Independent article you cited, so I'd be surprised if such things weren't discussed during Wilson's visit and afterwards.

I also would not be surprised if they did meet in person, but I have no direct proof.

[TEPaul]

Phil:

I'm not completely sure what-all you are saying or trying to say on post #16.

That latest article Joe Bausch just posted which is a reference in AC to an Irish periodical and then the posting of the Irish periodical itself is significant to some extent but for what reasons exactly?

Firstly we already knew that Wilson went abroad in the spring of 1912. How do we really know that?

1. Because David Moriarty found the ship manifest which likely proves that.
2. Because Tom MacWood produced an English periodical from the same time that confirms that.

You said in post #16;

"ALL of those questions are answered by those two simple extracts."

All of what questions Phil? All the questions about what SOME thought a trip in 1910 meant? Those questions and assumptions and supposed conclusions I don't think are even remotely understood at this point at least not in light of how what they mean was laid out in David Moriarty's essay on here "The Missing Faces of Merion."



You also said:
"Why doubt the entire history of Merion as recorded based only upon suppositions when there is cocnrete proof that clearly prove it's accuracy?"

Why doubt it indeed Phil? I think the reasons WHY it was doubted are all on the back pages of this website and they go back not just until David Moriarty's essay but all the way back to 2003! I think very few on here understand that.

But again, what did that latest AC article and the corresponding one from and Irish periodical indicate that noone really knew before?

I think it indicates Wilson also went to Ireland which I doubt anyone in the last 3/4 century was aware of and it also indicates the fact that Wilson may've made drawings while over there which we for some months now thought was a story that was first reported perhaps up to 50 years after Merion East was originally built.

That's the real significance of that article posted today---eg it actually says in 1912 that he apparently really did make copies of holes (drawings while he was over there in 1912).

As to what it REALLY means in an historically accurate way that Wilson may've first gone abroad for Merion in 1912 INSTEAD of in 1910 (which the Tolhurst Merion history book reported) is what still is significantly misunderstood by most all observers, in my opinion.

What that really shows, in my opinion, is both where and how David Moriarty's logic, assumptions and his apparent conclusions, and apparently Tom MacWood's too, went off the true historical tracks, and lead to incorrect assumptions and conclusions in his essay! And one of those fundamental assumptions was that since Wilson did not go abroad in 1910 but in 1912, a year after Merion East went into construction, that that must mean that Wilson was a true novice, AND THEREFORE, must have had to rely on Macdonald/Whigam as the real driving creative force behind Merion East!

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

After seeing how incredibly incomplete the Shipping Manifests were in the case of trying to find proof of Tillinghast's travels, I believe that the only thing the 1912 Hugh Wilson manifest proves is that Hugh WIlson went abroad in 1912, and this article and the one MacWood cited previously show he was studying and sketching golf holes during this specific visit.

What it definitely does not show is whether he was ever abroad previously, which I would have to believe he did, and whether golf was ever part of his itinerary.   It most definitely does not prove that he wasn't there prior because in the case of Tillinghast, for instance, we can only find proof of about 25% of his known and otherwise documented overseas travel if we go by the Shipping Manifests alone.

I also say that because the travels of others on the Merion Committee and in the power base of Merion like Lesley, Perrin, and Lloyd at the time all have records of rather frequent travel to Europe the prior decade and up to and including the time Merion was built.   It is inconceivable to me that these golf nuts wouldn't have played the courses in cities they travelled, be it London, Liverpool, Glasgow, or other famous ports of call that also happened to have great golf courses at the time.

[TEPaul]

Mike:

I know what you're saying; I always have. If someone on here actually thinks that just because they haven't or can't find some of those Merion people on those shipping manifests previous to 1910 or 1911 that proves they were not abroad before that, all I can say is, in my opinion, that person or people are pretty naive and don't understand that world very well.

But what I'm really saying is IF none of those people did go abroad before that time (which is really highly unlikely, in my mind) THAT DOES NOT THEN prove they were all such novices that they were incapable of doing what they've been given credit by Merion all these years for doing and that therefore proves (as Moriarty both suggests and states in his essay and on the threads of this website) that Macdonald and Whigam (or Barker ) must have done it for them.

Unfortunately, that rationale just doesn't follow and that is precisely what everyone around here who really knows the details of Merion's history understands, and it's why they all saw no credence in that essay.

If Wilson only went abroad for Merion in 1912, that really is something of a minor detail in the broad scheme of things with Merion East and who routed and designed it. It just is nowhere near as important as some on here tried to make it. That's essentially what I'm saying, even though I still feel some on here do not understand why.

[Phil_the_Author]

Tom,

Let me try putting it another way. Consider what you wrote:

"If Wilson only went abroad for Merion in 1912, that really is something of a minor detail in the broad scheme of things with Merion East and who routed and designed it..."

The reason that I don't view it as a minor detail is central to all the past discussions on the Wilson trip has been the question 'What year did he make it'? Was it 1910 as some have said, 1911 as Tolhurst (I believe that's correct though I'm certain you'll let me know ) wrote or 1912 as some have surmised?

The mentioning in the article of his "making Copies" of some of the holes seems proof positive that the trip to the UK for the purpose of studying the great holes overseas took place in 1912 because it was said that on that specific trip copies of these holes for the purpose of study were made.

Your concluding paragraph comes close to stating why I believe these articles are of significance in that discussion:

"What that really shows, in my opinion, is... And one of those fundamental assumptions was that since Wilson did not go abroad in 1910 but in 1912, a year after Merion East went into construction, that that must mean that Wilson was a true novice, AND THEREFORE, must have had to rely on Macdonald/Whigam as the real driving creative force behind Merion East!"

I believe it shows the EXACT opposite! That Wilson and Committee were novices is a statement of fact, but I believe that it CONCLUSIVELY PROVES that Macdonald and Whigam could NOT have been of any real factor in the design of the original East Course, for IF they were, WHY would the Merion Board decide immediately after building a golf course designed by the supposed preeminent expert on golf course design in America, the man whose understanding of the principles of the architecture behind the great holes and courses in the U.K. and was recognized as vastly superior to all others in this, the man who had just gone to the U.K. half a dozen years before and made drawings of these same holes FOR THAT VERY PURPOSE; WHY would they want to make CHANGES to what he SUPPOSEDLY had designed?!?

If M&W had created Merion east, ESPECIALLY with the incredible notoriety and overnight fame that his NGLA was receiving at that very same time, wouldn't they have trumpeted themselves as the 2nd coming of NGLA?

No, it shows that what was reported on in the beginning, that M&W gave some comments were simply that and NO MORE, for this very reason - that simple little article clearly shows that those at Merion were dissatisfied with what was on the ground and that changes needed to take place.

I believe that it also shows that they recognized that these changes could not come from the mind of M&W, otherwise they wouldn't have sent Wilson overseas.

Hopefully I've made the mud of my reasoning a little less murky and a bit more understandable now...

[TEPaul]

Phil:

Some interesting reasoning on your post there but I have never seen much or frankly any indication that Merion was dissatisfied with what they put on the ground in 1911.

Furthermore, all anyone needs to do is just read "The Missing Faces of Merion" as well as the numerous posts by Moriarty and MacWood on this website both before and after that essay to see what they say and imply.

The clear implication is that since Wilson did not go abroard in 1910 BEFORE the design and construction of Merion East began, THAT therefore indicates he and his committee could not have done what Merion and its history has always given him and them credit for.

That is simply not historically supportable. One can contend until the cows come home if he was a novice or not and what exactly that means but nevertheless the fact is he and his committee did route and design Merion East in 1911 with some advice and suggestions (over about three and a half days total in a span of about a year) from Macdonald and Whigam---something, by the way, the club and Wilson and his brother and others ALWAYS gave Macdonald/Whigam credit for.

That A trip abroad by Wilson to study architecture may not have happened in 1910 does not change these facts, even if that essay and those two who seemingly created it tried to make it appear it does.

[Joe Bausch]

Next up from Tilly's writings in The American Cricketer is this article on alpinisation, together with a figure from the Mid-Surrey course.  This is from early 1913, but I'm not sure of the month, but I think February.

[BCrosby]

Thanks Joe.

Isn't there a lot of "Alpinisation" at Tilly's Somerset Hills?

Mid-Surrey was a phenomenon when built. JH Taylor was in important respects a penal architect and MS where he tried to work out a number of his ideas. Tilly seemed to understand what was going on. The design of the par 5 is a great example of Taylor's thinking. The MS experiment, ultimately, didn't spawn many follow-on designs. But it was an interesting moment in gca. One that it is under-appreciated in terms of the evolution of certain ideas.

Bob