Everything you ever wanted to know about Desmond.

[JLahrman]

Aerial of current #6 and #7 at Stone Harbor taken from Google Earth...

I don't mind filling in the area between the bunkers and the green at #7 but I thought the jagged bunkers looked great.

[Randy Thompson]

Tommy,
Well said, I worked with a shaper that worked with Desmond for many years and he would have killed for Desmond. Some of his designs were definetly different but he had balls and the fact there is no cook method to follow in golf course architecture makes it so damm interesting. The man left his mark deeper then most of us will achieve and the world of golf should be thankful we had his presence for as long as we did!

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tommy,

I don't see how you can embrace DM and reject RJ.

It seems contradictory.

For those that judge golf holes based solely on aerials, I think that process is fatally flawed.

How the hole looks and plays from the golfer's eyes should be the criteria, not how the hole looks from 10,000 feet or from an oblique aerial angle

[Bill_McBride]

Tommy--

Did Desmond Muirhead ever mention his affinity for National Golf Links of America during his conversations with you?  He professed his love for NGLA to me during our one conversation 10 years ago, which I found eye opening.  But then again, he loved the Old Course and wrote an enjoyable book about it. 

Adam, I have that book which he wrote in collaboration with Tip Anderson, the old Old Course caddy.  It's really a good hole by hole tour of the course, and pretty witty at times.

[Mike_Cirba]

Archie,

Your post on Stone Harbor is one of the most intriguing, most compelling, and most emotionally descriptive I've ever read here.

I've never played SH, and I've always had mixed emotions about that, part of me thinking it would be an interesting intellectual experience and the other half thinking that I'd recoil in horror.

After reading your post, I feel I've missed something very controversially fundamental and unique.

[Peter Pallotta]

Mike C - very well said, about Archie's post and DM's work.
Tommy N - I enjoyed your fine posts. I won't post my thoughts - they'd be particularly uninformed, as I barely know and have rarely thought about and have never played DM's designs.
Just an aide though - as an artist, DM strikes me as the Stanley Kubrick of golf design: craftsmanship at the service of intellect.
Peter

[Tom Naccarato]

Archie, Randy, Peter, Adam, John L and the rest of you!

I haven't posted like this on Desmond in quite a many years, and honestly, Ihave a lot of material that would help in this discussion, but it would take hours if not days to scan it and upload it!

John posted that aerial image of Clashing Rocks today. Disappointing for me to say the least-- it now just looks like any other hole. You see Desmond went for the visual aspect and made the holes play like they're namesakes. For instance, and I quote my friend Mike Sweeney:

I hope they fixed that second fairway. I hit more than a few "good drives" off the tee, and then you get up to the landing area and it trickled into the water.

Here is Desmond's description of the hole:

Second Hole, "Ulysses": This hole is named for the hero of Homer's Odyssey. Ulysses was reknowned for his courage and his cunning. These and other abilities enabled him to travel though almost continuous adversity.

The lake which represents Neptune, the God of the Seas and Ships, is Ulysses' principle enemy. The two traps at the 250 yard mark recall the Sirens, the bird -like creatures with women's heads, who drew sailors to their deaths by their magic music. On this hole, they are forcing the tee shot toward the water.

The green is symbolic of Neptune's head, complete with traps in the form of locks, a beard and a trident. Most of the green offers a fair receptacle for a good second shot; the projecting right hand side, however, becomes a peninsula surrounded by water; and when the pin is placed there, the protective ramparts are gone. Psychologically, a very exacting shot is then required.

Those less brave golfer's who go for the dryland part have a nasty downhill putt before them. Only the dauntless few have successfully ogled the Sirens and who then aim directly for the flag are likely to score well.

I believe that on this hole a consistent display of Homeric courage, tenacity and unusual ability, will be rewarded in proportion to the passion shown. Surely this represents the substance and much of the fascination if strategic golf.

Missing in this picture, its all mostly on or near the green. Where what once existed a rather interesting spine that ran down the center of the putting surface, separating the left side from the right--requiring an even more daunting task to a right pin placement. Directly in front of the green was a rather troublesome bunker which represented Neptune's beard. Another bunker was situated towards the back of the green and jutted out into the water with a sort of zig-zag shape to it on one side. The left green-side bunker represented Neptune's hair, or in Desmond's words, "locks" and then a crown-shaped bunker towards the very back. You can still see the remnants--the greener grass section towards that back area where that bunker was located.

The hole looks from the air to be very tough in terms of getting to the fairway, you can just see it and with Mike's description--more then adequate, just a tough golf hole. The point to all of this is that Desmond may not have created a fair and playable golf hole, what he did create was a land form which depicted a story--a legendary mythological story and made you, quite figuratively, experience Ulysses plight.

In the Tom Paul Big World theory of golf course architecture, this is a course to me that is worth studying. Surely not for any classic values, but more artistic, human creativity as a whole.

[Tom Naccarato]

Here is a pretty good depiction of the style of drawings Desmond would do for his clients.

Desmond would simply draw the hole out in his own hand in black pen (and I have two of those pens he used--Pentel blunt edge's in black) and then have his daughter Romy, a very talented artist, watercolor the rest. His was a unique, harsh style, but it represented a lot of what Desmond was about. Even though he utilized his daughter in the production of the illustrations.

[astavrides]

Tommy,

That's a beautiful drawing.  I'd love to see more.

[archie_struthers]

  ;


Tom that's way cool...thanks for the illumination

Being a long time lover of things otherworldly ... ancient mythology ..Tolkein and the like Desmond's work screams out to me and his desriptions of the holes was fascinating ..glad you could recreate same for us! 

Tommy N ...what was his personality like?   Was it Kohleresque or professorial?   ....Indiana Jones or Sean Connery???

As stated above ...Stone Harbor  even today is one of the most fascinating pieces of "art" in golf ....  however appreciating the art doesn't overcome the emotional angst of a string of triple bogies ....

[Rich Goodale]

Tom

That sketch reminds me what some holes look like to some of us some of the time, even though a photograph taken at any of those times would reveal only something fairly benign.  At his best, Mackenzie creates that illusion that Muirhead and his daughter depict.  Those of you (Archie?) who have played DM's courses, is this tgrue for him too?

Rich

[Jerry Kluger]

I never had the opportunity to meet and speak with Desmond and from what I've read, he was very interesting and well read, so it certainly would have been time well spent if I had.  That being said, my experience with his golf course designs is limited to one course, Aberdeen CC in Boynton Beach, Florida.  Here are two observations about this design which I did not care for: 

1. We play golf while standing on the ground and not while flying over the course, so while some of his holes look cool from above, they do not necessarily work from a players perspective; and

2. He failed to take into account the members who would be playing the course and their level of ability. Relative to that, he also did not take into account the fact that the wind is a common and significant factor when playing golf in south Florida.   

[Chris Cupit]

Here is Desmond's description of the hole:

Second Hole, "Ulysses": This hole is named for the hero of Homer's Odyssey. Ulysses was reknowned for his courage and his cunning. These and other abilities enabled him to travel though almost continuous adversity.

The lake which represents Neptune, the God of the Seas and Ships, is Ulysses' principle enemy. The two traps at the 250 yard mark recall the Sirens, the bird -like creatures with women's heads, who drew sailors to their deaths by their magic music. On this hole, they are forcing the tee shot toward the water.

TN,

Please tell me DM  didn't use the Romanized names for his description of Homer's greek gods and heroes   Odysseus and Poseidon NOT Ulysses and Neptune!  I can't believe a Cambridge man would make that mistake.

There is a DM course in Atlanta--in Covington east of Atlanta.  I did play the course but don't remember much.  There was a par three with symetric bunkers all around that looked weird in the advertising pics from above but when you played the course you hardly knew how "bizzare" the hole really was.      

[Tom Naccarato]

Tommy N ...what was his personality like?   Was it Kohleresque or professorial?   ....Indiana Jones or Sean Connery???

Arch, A bit of both. He didn't suffer fools, yet he was willing to take the time to convey his point; It was his way or the highway though, that is unless you had something to offer.

Point in example: He knew I wasn't really a writer, and like Jay, more of enthusiast run ammuck. (though I didn't need a straitjacket) Still he really helped me with my writing--as far as conveying a point--and most--accuracy. This just wasn't about himself, but more others. I think its because he wanted to know what the people I was writing about were designing and building, but he already knew exactly what they were designing and building.

Rich Goodale--That sketch reminds me what some holes look like to some of us some of the time, even though a photograph taken at any of those times would reveal only something fairly benign.  At his best, Mackenzie creates that illusion that Muirhead and his daughter depict.  Those of you (Archie?) who have played DM's courses, is this tgrue for him too?

I think it has everything to do with how much one want to see and how much one wants to learn. Last night I was looking at a picture of the Cal Club from 1929, and it was anything but benign. I think of a course like North Berwick or Brancaster or Northwood for that matter, where quirky man made features sort of expound on the natural aspect of the links themselves, and I think, WOW! look how cool! Obviously it doesn't work like that here int he United States, unless its really old and famous. To me one of the greatest holes yet to be recreated--Death or Glory would look good if Desmond had dawn it and Romy painted it, sleepers and all. The problem with Desmond's work was that it didn't have a raw, natural feature to it ever. Everything looked man-made including fairway mounding and sculpting. (try to think non-symbolic golf course.) The closest thing I played of his that was in fact naturally influenced was Quail Ranch's 17th, which I think is now the 8th, The natural bowl-like green site sitting next to a natural pit/hazard was always rated as one of the best holes in the Inland Empire. (in its day) Sadly those days are long gone and the course is a shadow of its former self.

Alex,
I will try to post some more stuff later.

[Brian_Ewen]

Ryan
I dont understand ...

Your problem with the direction this thread has gone ?

Your renaming of it 3 times ?

Your refusal to put your views on Mr Muirhead onto this thread ?

Its always looked to me that the Curley & Schmidt design team are not exactly immune to the building of what was it again ....?

""wacky/over-the-top/ Desmond-like Golf Holes"" ?

[Tom Naccarato]

Brian,
He renamed it because I asked him to. Simple as that.

Also, I will have you know that Schmidt & Curley, who did more then their fair share of courses here in Southern California, well they brought strategic AND affordable design back to Southern California after about a 60 year drought of any sort of legitimate candidate. the business model for Goose Creek should be closely emulated.

[Brian_Ewen]

It was written tongue in cheek , but probably didnt come across like that .

Apologies all round .

[Tom Naccarato]

Brian,
Not a problem!

I could elbaorate some more on Desmond, but I'm actually late getting out of here for a round at Goose Creek! Gotta go!

[Willie_Dow]

Tom:  Great to have you back on GCA,  and your insite is still vibrant.

I played the old course at Stone Harbor and loved the old green, even though I went into the H20. I also went into the water at the first hole.  But what a challenge, and fun it was !

Never did like minature golf, but major obstacles are fun to explore.

Willie

[Tom Naccarato]

Hi Willie, Happy Thanksgiving!

Lets face it, Anything Desmond did wasn't going to be on a par with the East Course! But, I think he liked Stone Harbor a lot, because it was really the first course he really got to pour it on--in terms of what he was trying to do. (the symbolism-thing)