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TEPaul

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #225 on: April 18, 2009, 01:19:55 PM »
Shivas:

As for the last part of your Reply #241, what did I tell you above about the possibility of your recent interpretation getting disagreed with on here, as well as who it would be doing the disagreeing?  ;)

Didn't take long did it?

If you'd like to get payed for your efforts why don't you send a bill to David Moriarty in California? You know where the Merion "The Missing Faces of Merion" essayist lives, right? I doubt he'd consider paying you for your efforts though, and not because you're not getting to the truth of what happened at Merion back then but because your interpretation of what happened with Merion back then is just not agreeing with his interpretation of what happened.

At this point, I'm not aware of anyone who has a pretty good working knowledge of the details of Merion's history back then that does agree with his interpretation of that time with Merion. A pretty good number of them, including a good number from Merion itself read it about a year ago and found it incredibly lacking and wanting, particularly in the logic of its assumptions, premises and conclusions. There probably are some on here who still have questions but the reason for that is none of them are aware of any or many of the details of the interesting tapestry of that time back then at Merion.

I sure do realize that David Moriarty wants to be given everything that's available because he mentions it on here in just about every other post but I would just suggest to him again that he pick up the phone and call both Merion and MCC about it as of course we've done for many years in the case of Merion Golf and in the last year in the case of MCC. Is there some problem with that or asking him to do that? If so, maybe he might want to explain what that problem is.

As for Merion itself, I'm pretty sure, at this point, they couldn't care less what David Moriarty's opinion on their history is.

That's just life, I guess, and generally everything happens for a pretty good reason. My own opinion has always been that this isn't about David Moriarty or the availability of all Merion's material for him and his essay, which noone around here or at Merion ever asked him to write as far as I know; this is only about the truth of Merion's history which I believe has been found to be accurate on the endless threads about it on here (with the single exception of the actual date of Wilson's trip abroad).

I do admit that all these threads on this website have basically been a debate about the accurate history of Merion East compared to David Moriarty's opinion of what it is in his essay and in his numerous posts on here. As far as his essay goes, I think he should've been comfortable that he actually had all the information available about Merion and from Merion and those who know it BEFORE he wrote his essay and put it on here.

Was he comfortable he had it all BEFORE he wrote that essay? Well, I guess any of us would just have to ask him about that, right? But from the way he's carried on on this website for a couple of years it sure doesn't seem he was comfortable he had all the information available that he needed BEFORE he wrote that essay, and the problem was it showed bigtime when he wrote that essay over a year ago!

But now, most all the available information has been put on here in one way or another anyway; and obviously more people who had not previously been aware of it are beginning to see what it means and why Merion's history has always been reported accurately. Unfortunately for David Moriarty he's probably beginning to see that too but to the extent it increasingly disagrees with that essay he wrote a year ago he's just having a hard time admitting it as it appears he always has had. From the look of it that probably won't ever change. But for the accuracy of Merion's entire history that doesn't matter either.


Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #226 on: April 18, 2009, 01:48:53 PM »
Mike,

I am not going to re-debate all of the old articles with you again.  You read way too much into these things while ignoring those that you do not like, and nothing I write will change this. 


David,

You miss my point.   I have no desire to re-debate the wording in all of those articles crediting Wilson and Co. with you.

I'm merely pointing out the volume of articles during those days crediting Wilson and Co., versus the slim picking of anything and everything I could find that was ever written about Macdonald's role at Merion, and for the next 13 years that both of them were alive, or for the next 25 that Tillinghast, Findlay, and Macdonald were all still alive and I also am pointing out the strange irony of you and others claiming that Macdonald "laid out others" meant he routed Merion while the scores of articles saying Wilson "laid out Merion" means he constructed the course to Macdonald's plans.  ;)

There is nothing ever written during their lifetimes that ever states that Macdonald laid out, built, mapped out, was responsible for, or anything else denoting authorship of the routing and/or hole designs of the course at Merion.

That's all.
« Last Edit: April 18, 2009, 02:44:46 PM by MikeCirba »

Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #227 on: April 18, 2009, 02:15:22 PM »

Yes, Mike, actually I can. Not necessarily a man who literally constructed the course himself but a man who surely oversaw all the construction of the course (and perhaps even paid for a good deal of it) and later had his name alone connected to the course and he got the attribution as its designer (router and hole designer). It was Frederick Hood of Kittanset. It took about 75 years to clear that one up (by the finding of design material of who actually did it) but now the club is just fine with attributing the design of the course to the man who actually did it (with perhaps a bit of help from his friend and mentor Hugh I. Wilson).


Au Contraire, my friend.   Wayne's findings and the efforts of you guys certainly brought everything appropriately to the attention of the club for proper attribution, but at least one Boston newspaper knew the truth prior.

I'm not sure where the modern story of Frederick Hood as designer of Kittansett originated (perhaps C&W??), but in 1986 a Boston Globe article about the coming US Open at Shinnecock reported;

"The original course was laid out by Scottish architect Willie Dunn in 1891. Bill Flynn, whose imprint is also on such American gems as The Country Club, The Kittansett Club and Merion, laid out the present course in 1931. Shinnecock Hills was the first American club to incorporate and was one of five charter members of the USGA."

A 1988 Boston Globe article states, "The Cascades was designed by William Flynn, a Bay State native who designed the Primrose course at The Country Club and The Kittansett Club. "

In fact, I can't find a single article anywhere prior to 1980 that mentions Kittansett Golf and Hood in the same paper, which is my point.   There has simply never been a case where those who were responsible for only "constructing" a golf course received critical press review, much less "deserve the congratulations of all golfers".

Neither can I find anything early that mentions Flynn, but I did see one contemporaneous article where it's at least clear that a golf architect and turf experts were involved.





TEPaul

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #228 on: April 18, 2009, 02:50:51 PM »
Mike:

I don't really know why Kittanset came to view Frederick Hood as their architect, even though he sure was the main man at that club and he was the one who was basically Flynn's "client", if you know what I mean. But it's not as if we weren't aware of articles from back around the time it was built including a very good one by prominent Boston sportswriter A. Linde Fowler who went into some very interesting detail about Flynn, the Philadelphia architect who'd developed a modern form of "scientific" architecture.

Obviously one reason must have been the club never had Flynn's plans and drawings and of course that changed when we showed them to Kittanset about 6-7 years ago and they could see they were identical to the way the course was built.

But one never knows how these inaccurate rumors of a club's history get started and eventually get some currency amongst some people and that is precisely why I think David Moriarty's essay on Macdonald and Merion is not a good thing at all. People who don't know much about Merion's architectural history might see just that one essay in the future and actually think Macdonald routed and designed Merion East or was the driving force behind it or whatever the hell it was or is David Moriarty was trying to say in it which certainly implied there was no way Wilson and his committee could have done what they did do in 1911 because they were all too much the novices or whatever.

And of course you'll recall what he used to construct that premise and assumption----eg the fact that Wilson really hadn't gone over there in 1910 as the club history said. I guess David Moriarty came up with the "novice" idea when he found that ship passenger manifest of 1912.

But what he didn't know (nor did we at the time) was that story of Wilson going abroad for seven months in 1910 and coming back with plans and drawings did not begin until perhaps 50 years after Wilson and committee did what they did at Ardmore and about 35 years after Wilson was in the grave.

So without realizing it David Moriarty based one of his most important premises on a story that turned out to have nothing whatsoever to do with happened a half century earlier during the actual routing, design and construction of Merion East.
« Last Edit: April 18, 2009, 02:56:46 PM by TEPaul »

Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #229 on: April 18, 2009, 04:22:25 PM »
Mike, don't get too excited about the conclusion I've drawn about the final plan that was approved at Merion.

First of all, just because it wasn't CBM's doesn't mean that it absolutely, postively was Wilson's. 

Also, just because the final plan wasn't CBM's, it doesn't mean that he didn't have significant input into the final plan and it also doesn't mean that he didn't create a plan at some point earlier.  It just means that when Lesley's committee dropped from 5 plans down to 1 and asked CBM to approve the plan to take it to the board, it absolutely, positively didn't have enough CBM in it to be considered CBM's plan by anybody in the room at the time.


Shivas,

Personally, I think all along it was mostly Dr. Toulmin, in the stairwell, with the baseball bat.  ;)  ;D

Why do you guys find it so difficult to give Hugh Wilson credit for what he did?   :-\

Seriously Dave...you know how organizations work.   Hugh Wilson was the Chairman of the Committee responsible for the creating a course on the new land.   Whether or not he came up with every single idea is irrelevant.   We already know what Francis did.   We already know what the early 1913 Merion letter said and what the Alan Wilson letter said about who did most of the work..  The fact is, even if he didn't do most of the work, he's the one who was responsible for tying it all together, getting consensus, getting it approved, and then getting it built and then got another course designed, built and opened at Merion another 18 months later.   

Not bad at all, for an amateur. 

Also, you may be interested to know that in 1900, Hugh Wilson was a scratch golfer, had already won the first club championship at Belmont CC (which became Aronimink), played first man on their golf team and that the course at Belmont was designed by three men...including one Dr. Harry Toulmin.

Two years later Wilson was on the Green Committee at Princeton building and opening a course designed for the University by Willie Dunn. 

You had Wilson the young stud brainiac who had played most of the best courses in the country and Griscom as another excellent, experienced player whose ultra-rich family had been involved with Philly golf since the beginning, you had Toulmin the aged veteran who had previous design and course building experience, you had Francis who like Raynor was the engineer/surveyor, you had Lloyd as the money man and course property owner who could take care of land and property issues with a snap of his fingers.


"...Mr. Wilson was sent abroad to study the famous links in Scotland and England.  On his return the plan was gradually evolved and while largely helped by many excellent suggestions and much good advice from the other members of the Committee, they have each told me that he is the person in the main responsible for the ARCHITECTURE of this and the West Course. Work was started in 1911 and the East Course was open for play on September 14th, 1912. The course at once proved so popular and membership and play increased so rapidly that it was decided to secure more land and build the West Course which was done the following year." - Alan Wilson 1926





by the way, if "laying out" meant "constructing" when applied to Hugh Wilson, then is the property reading of the sentence above that "Mr. Wilson has spent every hour of his spare time in constructing and constructing (and constructing and constructing? ;)) this course"?  ;D

« Last Edit: April 18, 2009, 04:47:39 PM by MikeCirba »

TEPaul

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #230 on: April 18, 2009, 07:09:09 PM »
"Why do you guys find it so difficult to give Hugh Wilson credit for what he did?"

Michael:

That's a very good question for some on here. Matter of fact, it's probably THE question. Until a few came along on this website it never was much of a question, and it still isn't.

One of the true significant finds on Merion's architectural history though was from Wayne Morrison when he supplied Merion with the remainder of Flynn's Merion drawings about 5-6 years ago.

Merion had some of them because I believe Bill Kittleman understood to go see Connie Lagerman and/or David Gordon quite some time ago and so now Merion very much recognizes Flynn for what he did for Merion from about 1915 on.

This long running and seemingly endless thing about Macdonald's contribution completely pales in comparison to that.

The thing the recent questioners apparently didn't understand when they found those articles a few years ago mentioning Macdonald/Whigam for what they did for Merion earlier on was that that material had always been part of the club archives and had always been part of the club record and history. Matter of fact, Horatio Gates Lloyd, made a motion on the board that they formally thank Macdonald and Whigam and it was made part of the club record. That however, apparently was material that remainded in MCC's archives since then and never made it to Merion Golf Club's archives.

It probably is a very good question where material such as the latter should ultimately be reposited. Technically it was MCC's and probably always should be. Merion GC as it is presently constituted did not exist back then and wouldn't for about thirty years. 

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #231 on: April 18, 2009, 07:34:04 PM »


TEPaul,

So I see from your posts here and there that civilly discussing the relevant facts is out the window, and you are again back to ad honinem attacks and pontifications about just how horribly misguided all my work has been.   Disappointing, but I cannot say I am surprised.

One reason I hesitate to engage in reasonable, civil discussions with you is that, as is the case here, they always end the same one of two ways. 
-Either you become hostile as soon as I disagree with you (which is why I have been hesitant to address the plethora problems in your "time-line" post),
-or, you guys think you learn something that really puts me in my place (see your reaction to Shivas' interpretation of the use of "approved") and you cannot help but try to rub my nose in what you mistakenly perceive as your smoking gun.   

A cynic might think that any civility on your part is purely rhetorical, designed to get me or others to come over to your side.

Regardless, I am not interested in playing your games.  I will, however, set the record straight on occasion . . .

For the record, you are absolutely mistaken when you claim that you guys and Merion have known all about the extent of M&W's involvement since before all these conversations started, and that you and Wayne explained it to all of us when Tom MacWood first brought forward the documents.    Merion obviously knew long ago when the events happened, but M&W's role had long been glossed over, minimized, and almost entirely forgotten (innocently I am sure, on the part of the clubs).    But you guys have fought each and every revelation in an effort to keep the true history buried deep.   

As for what I should or shouldn't have done before my essay, your opinion has changed on that quite a bit.   Before I wrote my essay you repeatedly lied to me about this, telling me that officials at Merion were very angry about my research and that they wanted absolutely nothing to do with me or my project.  Wayne too had indicated in no uncertain terms ("F--k You" for example) that neither he nor Merion wanted anything to do with my research or theories.  So I found my own information. 

But let's be honest, it would not have changed anything had I contacted you and Wayne, (who you have long indicated knows more than anyone else about Merion.)   I already had everything you guys had, plus a lot more.   

Sure, all of the relevant documents were under your noses, some as close as the library adjacent to the course.  But you guys could not find them, did not understand them, or you conveniently forgot about them or ignored them.  Likely it was a combination of all these.   So going to you guys for information would not have gotten me anywhere.   A few examples . . .
- It was me who brought the Sayre's documents and their significance to light.   Not you guys. 
- It was me who figured out the correct reading and importance of the Hugh Wilson Essay and the NGLA trip.  Not you guys.   
- And it was me who figured out  how and why Merion got the property.   You guys had some of those documents for years, but hadn't a clue what they meant until after my essay came out and after I explained to Wayne in great detail what had really happened with the property.
- As for the MCC records, I knew where they were and tried to get them, but couldn't  get access as a non-member.   It wasn't until you other efforts to counter my essay had failed that you guys finally bothered to go across town to look for those documents.  (Remember, you always speculated they must have been lost in a fire!)   I knew Wayne had gone to MCC for those documents before you guys even told me, and I was very glad that he finally did.  I had hoped someone would bother to go over there once my essay came out.   But that was before you guys started playing games with them. 

So Tom, I think it fair to say that I found out what I reasonably could before my essay came out.  You or Wayne could not have help me, nor would you have.   

Not trying to be uncivil, Tom, but I have grown weary of your back-track and retrenching, where after every new revelation you claim you guys knew it all along, and that almost all of my work has been mistaken and misguided.   While no one believes you, I still I wish you'd get your facts straight.   

Thanks.

Now, hopefully, to the topic at hand. 
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #232 on: April 18, 2009, 07:40:21 PM »
Dave, I realize it is difficult given that we have to guess at what the documents actually say, but I think you've missed something rather important. 

It just means that when Lesley's committee dropped from 5 plans down to 1 and asked CBM to approve the plan to take it to the board, it absolutely, positively didn't have enough CBM in it to be considered CBM's plan by anybody in the room at the time.

Lesley's committee didn't drop from 5 plans to 1.  Nor did Wilson's committee.  Nor did anyone else at Merion.   

M&W dropped the plans down from 5 to 1.    M&W didn't rubber stamp some final choice previously made by Merion, M&W made the final choice.  M&W chose one draft and rejected other drafts.   He had final say over the final plan.  This is not "best practices" or even CYA.  Macdonald was substantively involved. He was "the decider."  He chose the final routing from drafts they provided him (drafts which were in all likelihood created based on his advice, ideas, and input.)

Yet even this underestimates M&W's role.  We do not even know whether the final routing, chosen by CBM, was one of these 5 drafts!  TEPaul admits this.   (By the way, do we really know it is 5? Or is this just another assumption treated as fact?)   

-  And it doesn't matter one bit that TEPaul has admitted above that Macdonald might well have ultimately approved something different than their five iterations of the plan!

I don't think that's what he said.

It is what he said.

"-  And it doesn't matter one bit that TEPaul has admitted above that Macdonald might well have ultimately approved something different than their five iterations of the plan!"

David Moriarty:

I did mention that as at least a possibility, in my mind, even if I've never seen an iota of actual evidence of it. When I mentioned that it was merely total speculation on my part. But I see that as at least a possiblity of what Macdonald/Whigam may've been able to do in a single day there with advice. . . .  I can see the possibility of a bit of routing and hole design switching up in the perhaps #10-#13 sequence (I can explain how that could've quite easily worked as a single day alteration) . . .

[TEPaul claims that M&W must only have had limited influence on the routing because they were only there one day in April, as if they had to be on the site to influence the routing!  Apparently he misses the irony that in the same paragraph he argues that Merion's routing had been influenced by a letter from Macdonald written the previous summer!]

For this particular discussion, what M&W  added or subtracted is beside the point.  The point is that TEPaul has no idea whether or not M&W added or subtracted anything to the one or more of the drafts.  Which means that the documents do not address it, either. TEPaul is speculating. 

So what happened?  I think all we know for sure is that M&W chose the final routing.  Here are some of the possibilities of how this went down.  All are entirely consistent with the facts I have heard thus far.   
  -M&W chose 1 of the 5 drafts and rejected the other 4.
  -M&W chose some combination of the 5 and melded them in to 1 superior plan.
  -M&W chose parts of one or all the plans, but also modified them to his liking. 
  -M&W had already instructed them how to route the course, and the trip back was simply to see if they had gotten it right, and to choose which of 5 iterations of his plan would work best.

No matter how you slice the drafts, CBM was responsible for choosing the routing, and this necessarily involved substantive decision-making on his part.
« Last Edit: April 18, 2009, 07:55:55 PM by DMoriarty »
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

Dan Herrmann

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #233 on: April 18, 2009, 07:45:50 PM »
David,
Question for you - If you thesis is correct, why do you think Merion would have buried the involvement of M&W?  Wouldn't a course designed by them have had a better cachet than one designed by a member?

In today's terms, it's almost like having a Doak-designed course, but not telling anybody, and insisting that the designer was, say, the Green Committee chair.

Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #234 on: April 18, 2009, 08:23:38 PM »
David,

Yes, I'm quite sure that the stroke of genius that M&W achieved during a couple hours at Merion on April 6th, 1911 was far superior to the multiple routings and iterations proposed by the Merion Committee working at it diligently probably about every day for four months.  ::)

Why in God's name would they even draw up plans and work on them all winter and early spring, including five different ones in the final month if they simply knew all along that the Great Router Macdonald, who had to date done a friggin mess of a routing at Chicago, and an out and back with heavy earthmoving at NGLA was going to come in ten months after his prior one-day visit and during about 8 hours of early April daylight and between bullshitting and I'm sure some sumptuous meals and reviewing the Committee's plans just come up with a knock-your-socks-off, world-class, staggering genius of a minimalist routing (as you hyperbolically presented it in your paper, even though 33% of it was wholly changed within 15 years, and another 3 greens were moved and/or wholly rebuilt) as well as the designs of the hole internals.   

Who is the starry-eyed hero worshipper here worshipping myths??   ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::)  :D

Your theory egregiously makes all of these otherwise seemingly good men of excellent reputation out to be liars and worse, and it's also the modern equivalent of Golf Guru Groupieism, with CB Macdonald playing the role of the Rain Man of Golf Architecture, who looks out over 120 acres (that he previously thought would make a pretty fine, rote, sporty, by-the-numbers 6000 yard course) after a pop or two and then has a stroke of genius and instantly and magically creates the Merion course we all know and love today, and then moves on to the next town to to show another group of ignorant village idiots the errors of their ways.

Oh yes, and then all of them conspire successfully over the next 95 years to hide the fact of Merion's true design origins from the rest of the world and they must have pictures of Macdonald with the cabin boy because shy Charlie  never speaks up either over his next 25 years alive, and they also bought off every writer in the Philadelphia area, including TIllinghast and Findlay because these men continue to credit that sneaky Hugh Wilson in every publication through multiple US Amateurs and a US Open at Merion while all of them were alive.

All until you, David, came through and uncovered their clever ruse.

On the other hand, re-reading your lengthy last post you seem to be slightly moving from contending that Macdonald routed the course to him just being "The Decider" (ala George W. Bush) of Merion's various routings so perhaps we are making slight progress here after all.   Of course, he was no such thing either, as the deciders were the Merion Board.

Perhaps they should be credited with the design too?     :o :o ::)
« Last Edit: April 19, 2009, 08:20:15 AM by MikeCirba »

Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #235 on: April 18, 2009, 08:39:01 PM »
Shivas,

My limited understanding is the Committee after returning from NGLA "had laid out five different plans" and then said that M&W came over for a day on April 6th and reviewed the plans and stated that if Merion laid it out according to one of the plans they approved that Merion would have the best seven inland finishing holes in the country.

I would think that means that M&W made the selection of the best plan, which Lesley two weeks later presented for approval to the board for the committee with the recommended plan attached.

Does that make them the designers...the course architects??  That's absurd, Shivas, and you know it.

Actually, if you think about it, "the decider" was the Merion Board, so perhaps they should get the actual credit for the design??  ::)

Weren't you one of the judges of the best architecture contest here recently?   Do you feel by virtue of the architectural judgement you applied in your selection that you also somehow are now responsible for the design of the course you felt was the best of the bunch?  ;D
« Last Edit: April 19, 2009, 08:14:16 AM by MikeCirba »

TEPaul

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #236 on: April 19, 2009, 06:56:12 AM »
David Moriarty:

That post #252 is truly sad. It's sad because it shows more than ever how incapable you are of taking any responsiblity for the complete mess this highly speculative and highly inaccurate essay of yours and your followup posts on here have wrought. You went about it entirely the wrong way by putting something out there with far less than sufficient research material. You did it without asking for anything from us here who would've been willing to help your interest in learning about the history of Merion and who've always had so much more material than you did and still do. Does anyone really wonder why you went about it that way? I don't think so.

You need to take responsibility for yourself and what you've done and just stop blaming everything and anything on me or Wayne or even Merion when others on here, and elsewhere, including those at Merion itself disagree with your interprations which continue to be completely speculative and highly illogical not to mention really insulting of Merion's history and particularly all the fine men who were part of it back then and recorded it.

The on-going problem involved in doing what you've done regarding Merion on a world-wide Internet website is there are a ton of people out there who just don't understand the details of the history of a club like that and they probably never will understand them certainly considering the question of whether they even have the interest to take all the time necessary to read them all, carefully consider them all and evaluate them as we have and Merion certainly has for many, many years. And so the kinds of questions and interpretations you've raised and gratuitously besmirched the club with is able to gain some currency and interest on here and from those people, at least for a while.

It is certainly not lost on me that Tom MacWood has said on here a number of times that in his opinion a club like a Merion is not even capable of producing an objective, unbiased, an factually accurate history of themselves or their attributed architect, Wilson. Apparently you agree with MacWood and everything you have done on this website regarding Merion suggests that.

But the people who live here and know that club, its members and its history a whole lot better than people like you two do know that is just not the case, never has been, never will be.

We're not even interested any longer in trying to disuade others on here from that ridiculous notion of MacWood's and now apparently yours too and all that it's wrought on this website. Neither the club nor us here who've known the course's architectural history so well for so long want your alarmingly illogical interpretations on Merion's history or even care what your interpretations are. Again, it goes without saying they never asked you for your interpreations and you never even bothered to informed them you intended to give them in the manner and modus operandi you have on here. Hopefully this will be a beneficial lesson for the future to others on this website who are good and sensible researchers and GCA analysts of what not to do.
« Last Edit: April 19, 2009, 08:04:44 AM by TEPaul »

Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #237 on: April 19, 2009, 02:18:11 PM »
Shivas, 

My source is the exact same as what was read to you.

EDIT**

Dave,

Sorry...I didn't mean to be short.   I was typing that response on the 17th green at Cobb's Creek playing golf with Joe Bausch.

I also don't mean to come off as "freaking paranoid" or defensive.   Although, I'm not sure that charge is well aimed as I'm not the one who basically said you were whoring yourself cheap on a public website because you didn't agree with my interpretation of the Findlay article and even had the audacity to state that there is no way in hell that Macdonald would have "approved" his own plan.   

So you little shameless tart, take that!   ;)  ;D

I'm also not the one so defensive as to claim an appreciative letter by the Merion membership to the club president a few months after opening recommending a dinner for the committee and special gift for Hugh Wilson as the guy who spent all of his time "laying out and constructing" their new course was simply a public BJ.  ;)

I would think that most of the people who were there would not spend a lot of time and energy lauding the incorrect person, although at about $7 a head for the dinner, who knows.  ;D

But back to the matter at hand.

My interpretation of your question comes from my reading of the MCC Minutes, which I don't have a copy of, but which I've seen enough of to feel comfortable with their meaning.

My INFERENCE is that M&W selected the best of 5 routings, simply because it's referred to as the plan they "approved", which is the common sense language you picked up on as making it impossible that it was Macdonald's authored plan.   As you stated, why in the world would anyone ever approve of their own plan to others?  ::)

There is nowhere I've seen in the minutes that specifically states that anyone discarded 4 plans and picked one.   It simply says 5 different plans were created by Hugh Wilson's committee after return from NGLA, then a month later M&W came and spent the day and reviewed the plans, and there was a particular one that M&W "approved" that was recommended to the board.

Could the Merion Committee have first selected it as their best effort and then presented it to Macdonald for his approval?   Absolutely, and that's probably what they did if you think about it.   Wouldn't they have gone through the five plans themselves prior, and at least narrowed it down to their best effort or two to share with Macdonald?   

All we know for certain, however,  is that he approved it.

Also, because these minutes are not mine, and I don't have a copy, all I can tell you is that I am comfortable with my understanding of what they say, and what they mean, but I am not going to try and quote them from memory.   In fact, that only things I've quoted here are things that were previously presented from the minutes that were already quoted.

My understanding is that you were read the exact same passage the other night, and possibly more, and you came to the same conclusion I did.
« Last Edit: April 19, 2009, 08:18:04 PM by MikeCirba »

mike_malone

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #238 on: April 19, 2009, 08:45:19 PM »
 If  Findlay used the same brain to write that article that he used to design Coatesville CC then I can understand the confusion ;D
AKA Mayday

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #239 on: April 20, 2009, 07:55:40 AM »
I am surprised this debate popped up again.  Like David, I think the weight of evidence still points toward Wilson as the man responsible for the creation of Merion. I still don't think it matters much if he sought outside help, in fact, I would have expected him to seek outside experience.  Like Rich, I do think this entire debate is blown way out of proportion when we consider that so much of the original creation has been altered by yet another player.  Still, when I read the sentences below I don't know how they can't be open to interpretation.  That said and with my beliefs about who created Merion clearly spelled out, here is how I read it. 

"I advised him, preparatory to his trip to Scotland, to watch carefully the seventeenth, or Alps hole, at Prestwick,  which he really imagined existed on his new course.  He is now convinced that it will take a lot of making to equal that famous old spot.  But many of the others, as laid out by Charles B. McDonald, are really great."

Findlay is asking Wilson to take a close look at Prestwick's Alps.  Why?  Because there is a disagreement between the two if what exists at Merion (be it rough layout, plan, sketch or just idea based on land forms) is really suitable in creating a good Alps.  I don't read that an Alps exists, only that that the idea of a Alps exists, hence the use of the word "imagined".  Now, Wilson is convinced that what indeed is "imagined" is not up to scratch to the original and that to make it so would require much effort.  Findlay then ends by backing up the general idea of a template Alps because he knows CBM has created some good examples.  I don't read that one was created at Merion by CBM, only that an Alps has been thought about and possibly CBM chose the land where one might exist.  If anything, I think these three sentences point toward a rejection of CBM's input, at least on this one issue, if indeed it was CBM's idea in the first place. 

Ciao
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

Mike_Cirba

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #240 on: April 20, 2009, 08:07:27 AM »
Sean,

What "other player" do you believe altered so much of the original design?  Thanks.

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #241 on: April 20, 2009, 08:34:12 AM »
Sean,

What "other player" do you believe altered so much of the original design?  Thanks.

Mike

According to Wayne, what we have today is mainly a Flynn course.

Ciao 
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

TEPaul

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #242 on: April 20, 2009, 08:53:10 AM »
Sean:

Given the nature and inclination of some participants on this website to just discuss and debate and argue the hell out of the most remarkable architecture minutae and the meaning of it, I would caution against a remark like that one.

We said the same thing to Tom MacWood when he began these endless Merion threads on Macdonald's part in Merion when he posted a thread entitled "Re: Macdonald and Merion?" in 2003. He asked who was specifically responsible for what on the holes and such of that course and we told him on the first or second post that we don't know that----nobody does, and nobody ever can simply because it was never recorded in anything approaching detail. Most every or any golf course project never does that.

I just wish he had taken our advice and just left it at that instead of creating a ton of unsubstantiatable speculation.  ;)

But with Flynn, if one wants to accept the idea that the things he drew for Merion East may've been the detailed things he was responsible for in concept and design or whatever then we pretty much can tell what he did in detail and when on that course because we (and the club) now have all his old Merion drawings.

But like with Wilson and his committee or Macdonald and Whigam, with Flynn no one ever specifically recorded if the things he drew for the course where solely his concepts and designs, particularly since Wilson was so much part of everything there in that way until he died in Feb. 1925.

Other than that to say Flynn is mainly responsible for the course might be a bit misleading to some people and even to the entire architectural history of the course and I think we've seen on these Merion threads where that can lead in the hands of a few uninformed or even semi-informed architectural speculators!   ;)

However, due to all the excellent research work done in the last few years on the two Merion courses, particularly by Wayne Morrison on primarily the architectural side, Merion G.C. I believe now considers itself to be and perhaps now always lists itself as a Wilson/Flynn design.
« Last Edit: April 20, 2009, 09:09:58 AM by TEPaul »

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #243 on: April 20, 2009, 09:12:19 AM »
Sean:

Given the nature and inclination of some participants on this website to just discuss and debate and argue the hell out of the most remarkable architecture minutae and the meaning of it, I would caution against a remark like that one.

We said the same thing to Tom MacWood when he began these endless Merion threads on Macdonald's part in Merion when he posted a thread entitled "Re: Macdonald and Merion?" in 2003. He asked who was specifically responsible for what on the holes and such of that course and we told him on the first or second post that we don't know that----nobody does, and nobody ever can simply because it was never recorded in anything approaching detail. Most every or any golf course project never does that.

I just wish he had taken our advice and just left it at that instead of creating a ton of unsubstantiatable speculation.  ;)

But with Flynn, if one wants to accept the idea that the things he drew for Merion East may've been the detailed things he was responsible for in concept and design or whatever then we pretty much can tell what he did in detail and when on that course because we (and the club) now have all his old Merion drawings.

But like with Wilson and his committee or Macdonald and Whigam, with Flynn no one ever specifically recorded if the things he drew for the course where solely his concepts and designs, particularly since Wilson was so much part of everything there in that way until he died in Feb. 1925.

Other than that to say Flynn is mainly responsible for the course might be a bit misleading to some people and even to the entire architectural history of the course and I think we've seen on these Merion threads where that can lead in the hands of a few uninformed or even semi-informed architectural speculators!   ;)

Tom

You may well be right, but I have no reason to doubt Wayne as he is well placed to find out the scoop, takes his research seriously and with a pinch of salt.  I don't know him terribly well, but Wayne strikes me a solid citizen with no need to work to a pre-conceived agenda.  At times it may come across this way, but we are all susceptible to hyperbole when our patience is tried.  I only raised the issue of Flynn to add some measure of reality to al of this and perhaps perspective.

Ciao
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

TEPaul

Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #244 on: April 20, 2009, 09:46:56 AM »
"I only raised the issue of Flynn to add some measure of reality to all of this and perhaps perspective."

Sean:

Understood, and accepted in the spirit you offer it. Certainly adding a measure of reality and proper perspective has been my interest in these incredible Merion threads that seem to go off-track anyway at about every single rail and into the mindbending parsing of sentences and arguing endlessly over the meaning of come word in a vacuum, the meaning of both and such from some things that aren't all that relevent anyway in the broad scheme of things to do with the creation of Merion East.  ;) I just offered that post above because I live here, have known Merion intimately including about 100-200 members for about thirty years and I've worked with Wayne closely on all kinds of things to do with architecture for about 6-7 years now, so I'm very close to both. 
« Last Edit: April 20, 2009, 08:47:27 PM by TEPaul »

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #245 on: April 20, 2009, 03:57:19 PM »
David,
Question for you - If you thesis is correct, why do you think Merion would have buried the involvement of M&W?  Wouldn't a course designed by them have had a better cachet than one designed by a member?

Dan, you (and everyone else) would be better off if you ignored the caricatured versions of my opinion offered up by others.  They tend to misrepresent and vilify my theses while ignoring what I have written.

Merion did NOT bury M&W's involvement.   To the contrary, while they did not list out specifics (I wouldn't have expected them to) those who were there- including Hugh Wilson and Robert Lesley- lauded M&W for their involvement.   Over a decade later, even Alan Wilson acknowledged M&W's role in the design process, only crediting his brother Hugh for that which M&W were not responsible.  Even in the disputed article, Hugh Wilson himself is Findlay's source, and so if Findlay meant that CBM planned the routing, it was likely because Hugh Wilson told him so.

Over the years, M&W's important contribution has come to be misunderstood and minimized, although I doubt Merion has ever done anything to intentionally mask or misrepresent what really happened.  Even now, I doubt most of those at Merion have would have any problem fully acknowledging M&W's contributions.  It is but a few overzealous individuals (at Merion and not) who have taken it upon themselves to protect and preserve the Merion legacy, whether it be the full and accurate story or not.  While I am sure they think they are helping Merion, I cannot understand how their efforts are viewed as anything but an embarrassment to anyone following along, including Merion.

Quote
In today's terms, it's almost like having a Doak-designed course, but not telling anybody, and insisting that the designer was, say, the Green Committee chair.

You might be surprised.  I have heard (second-hand) that occasionally a designer will provide a preliminary routing to a prospective client, only to later see that another has built a course suspiciously following the identical routing.   More directly, it was not uncommon around this time for someone within the club to get credit for the creating the course, whether or not they planned the routing.   This was at the very beginning of American golf course design, and our understanding of the process was in flux and the terminology to describe it was inconsistent and ambiguous, and the they did not necessarily emphasize or value the same things we do now.  When the person who planned the routing was an outsider, that person would often only be involved for a relatively brief period of time (often not more than a day or two) and the value of the routing plan to the final product was not always fully understood or appreciated.  In contrast, someone affiliated with the course (such as a chairman of the green committee) would often put substantial time, thought, and effort into a creation of the course, and that insider was often given the lion's share of the credit for its creation.
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #246 on: April 20, 2009, 04:04:07 PM »

____________________________
I am surprised this debate popped up again.  Like David, I think the weight of evidence still points toward Wilson as the man responsible for the creation of Merion.

Sean, glad to have your input. Good timing,as I was recently thinking about some of your posts from long ago, shortly after my essay came out.  But before I get to that, let me say again that I have no doubt that Wilson deserves a huge amount of credit not only for creating Merion in 1911-1912, but also for overseeing it and improving it for many years to come.  However, as you may recall, I have always focused on trying to determine who is primarily responsible for the routing and the hole concepts.  It was in this regard that I was thinking of your old posts.

If I recall correctly, in the past you have indicated that the person(s) responsible for choosing the final design should be credited with that design, because regardless of whatever input they may have sought and/or received from others, the design was ultimately their decision.   Your statement above echos your past posts;  "I still don't think it matters much if he sought outside help, in fact, I would have expected him to seek outside experience." 

Am I understanding you correctly?    If so, I'd ask that you consider a few details that have come out since your previous participation.  Here is TEPaul's version of what happened in March and April of 1911:
-- After meeting with M&W at two days at NGLA, Wilson and his Committee came up with 5 draft plans for Merion.   
-- Shortly thereafter (about three weeks after the NGLA meeting), M&W returned to Merion to review the five draft plans and to again go over the grounds (M&W had already gone over the property at least once before.)   
-- After reviewing all the draft plans and again going over the ground, M&W chose the one plan they thought would work best on the site.   
-- In the process, it is possible that M&W altered this plan, so that the final plan was substantively different any of the five drafts they had reviewed. 
-- Shortly thereafter, Lesley presented the plan chosen M&W to Merion's Board, noting that M&W returned to the site, considered the drafts and ground, and had chosen and "approved" of the version presented.

If this is what happened, then weren't M&W in charge of choosing the final plan?   Sure, the Committee may have come up with some draft plans after meeting with M&W, but short of the Board's final approval it was M&W who made the final decision, at least of those involved in the design.  Wouldn't you therefore credit them with at least this aspect of the design?   

___________________________
To the Findlay Article:

Quote
Still, when I read the sentences below I don't know how they can't be open to interpretation.

This thread proves that the language is open to different interpretations.   That said I think we need to be careful our threads are consistent with both the text and the facts as we know them.   You wrote:

Quote
Findlay is asking Wilson to take a close look at Prestwick's Alps.  Why?  Because there is a disagreement between the two if what exists at Merion (be it rough layout, plan, sketch or just idea based on land forms) is really suitable in creating a good Alps.  I don't read that an Alps exists, only that that the idea of a Alps exists, hence the use of the word "imagined".  Now, Wilson is convinced that what indeed is "imagined" is not up to scratch to the original and that to make it so would require much effort.

As I understand the facts, while the hole may not had all the "finishing touches," it was not a "rough layout, plan, sketch or idea based on land forms."  It had been built and seeded, and it had been built as an Alps Hole.  He wasn't merely considering abstract ideas and possibilities "based on land-forms."   To the contrary, he had tried to build an Alps hole, including the requisite land forms on a CBM Alps hole such as the large berm behind the green.  Moreover, Findlay indicated that Wilson really imagined that an Alps such as Prestwick's "existed" at Merion.  It existed, it just wasn't like Prestwick's. 

Quote
Now, Wilson is convinced that what indeed is "imagined" is not up to scratch to the original and that to make it so would require much effort.  Findlay then ends by backing up the general idea of a template Alps because he knows CBM has created some good examples.

But CBM had not created enough Alps holes for Findlay's statement to make sense as you read it.  CBM had built NGLA's Alps, but I don't even think that the few others he had designed by then were even open.   [I have seen nothing that indicates that Findlay, a professional, had even been to NGLA at this point in time.]   And there is nothing in the text about "the general idea of an Alps."

Quote
I don't read that one was created at Merion by CBM, only that an Alps has been thought about and possibly CBM chose the land where one might exist.  If anything, I think these three sentences point toward a rejection of CBM's input, at least on this one issue, if indeed it was CBM's idea in the first place.

With all due respect, I think your understanding of what happened with this hole is mistaken.  Given all the negative comments Wayne and others have made about Merion's original 10th, one might get the wrong idea that is was immediately identified as folly and scrapped at the very beginning.   The reality was that the hole was praised, and was played as an Alps hole for over a decade.   It is my understanding that the Alps was scrapped because Merion no longer considered it safe and prudent to play over an increasingly busy Ardmore Avenue. Even Findlay ultimately liked the hole.   

After seeing Alps hole seeing Prestwick and realizing that Merion's Alps "will take a lot of making to equal that famous old spot" Wilson did not reject the Alps at Merion.   To the contrary, he got to making it equal that of the famous old spot, and Findlay was very appreciative of the result. Three month's later Findlay praised Merion's Alps, noting that the second shot at Merion closely resembled the second shot on Prestwick's Alps. 

________________________

Sean,

What "other player" do you believe altered so much of the original design?  Thanks.

Mike

According to Wayne, what we have today is mainly a Flynn course.

Ciao 

I don't want to get into it on this thread, but I am very curious as to what Flynn had to do with designing the Merion, particularly when it comes to the routing of the course?   I have read that he flipped the direction of the dogleg on the first hole, but what else did he do?  Is he responsible for moving the second green, or was that under Wilson's watch?   
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #247 on: April 20, 2009, 04:21:25 PM »
Mike, Tom and Dave:

Who, precisely, went from 5 plans to 1? I presume it was the Golf Committee.  If it wasn't, who was it?

And do we know what person or persons actually made that choice?

In other words, who picked the plan that Lesley ultimately presented to the board?

This, to me, seems to be a rather important fact.

Dave's saying above that CBM made that pick.  Is that true or not?  And why?

I wanted to return to this because, as you said, this is a rather important fact.   Sure, Mike sort of answered, but he has now backtracked. 

What about TEPaul?   Is he ignoring the question?  Or did he call you to scold you for acknowledging the importance of the question?  If so, did he happen to mention that it was M&W who chose the final routing?   

Let's settle this point so we can consider the ramifications. 

_________________________________

A HYPOTHETICAL FOR EVERYONE

A golf course architect inspected a site then later met with his team of associates to discuss the project and what the golf course architect thought could be accomplished on the land.  His associates then returned to the site and came up with a number of possible plans for a golf course.   Shortly thereafter the golf course architect returned to the site and reviewed the plans and the grounds.  He then chose the one of the plans, but may have altered the plan before it went to final. Thereafter, his associate oversaw he construction of the course pursuant to the plan chosen and finalized by the golf course architect.

Who designed the golf course? 
« Last Edit: April 20, 2009, 04:50:19 PM by DMoriarty »
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #248 on: April 20, 2009, 05:20:47 PM »
Shivas,

You missed the first part of my post.

Are you still asking who chose the final routing from the five possibilities?   Or do you now know that it was M&W who did?   Because, as you say, it is rather important, yet your question has not been definitely answered by anyone but me.  Since you already know what I think and since I don't even have the documents,  I don't think it was really me who should give us an answer. 

To me, Dave, it's the guy whose plan got chosen, unless the architect/decider changed them so much that the plans more reflect his hand than the the associate's.  Yes, the guy with his name on the door will get the credit or the blame, but to me, if he didn't design it, he didn't design it. 

I think it's axiomatic because it's true that the guy in charge - in almost all human endeavours - gets more praise than he deserves when things turn out well and gets more criticism than he deserves when things go lousy. 

What if the draft plans were all attempts at formalizing the architect's description of what he envisioned to be the best routing and golf holes?

In other words, what if the architect had previously told the associates specifically what they should try to accomplish with each of the specific natural features that existed on the site, and the drafts were their attempts to formalize what he had said?   

_______________________

Who designed Barona Creek?   I am not sure.   I think Todd Eckenrode was the design associate who had most to do with the project, but I do not know if he came up with the routing and hole concepts or if it was someone else.   Perhaps you should ask Mr. Eckenrode.   

Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Alex Findlay Meets with Hugh Wilson
« Reply #249 on: April 20, 2009, 05:45:21 PM »
What if the draft plans were all attempts at formalizing the architect's description of what he envisioned to be the best routing and golf holes?

In other words, what if the architect had previously told the associates specifically what they should try to accomplish with each of the specific natural features that existed on the site, and the drafts were their attempts to formalize what he had said?   


In other words, "hey, Dave, I hate to wreck your weekend, but by Monday I need a two-way stock purchase & merger agreement, with a double-dummy structure, with ABC's management and board to control the surviving company and XYZ's to resign at closing, with a 2-tiered escrow holdback on both sides, with 10% and 5% at 12 and 18 months, respectively, and $1MM baskets on both sides, except for environmental and IP, and a 5% management carve-out on sale of the surviving company...and it needs to comply with 368(a)..."

Yeah, then it's the partner's design, not the associates....



Exactly.
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

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