"Do all involved in the research not have access to the same primary source documents? If not, why not?
NO. Because so far only Wayne Morrison has had access to the old meeting minute books from MCC, and he has chosen to use that material to selectively and piecemeal to support his side of the argument and to attack others, but he has not allowed that material to be viewed, verified, or vetted. Since Wayne no longer participates, he has periodically provided copies of this source material to TEPaul and Mike Cirba, so they could continue the charade. Wayne, TEPaul, and Mike Cirba have brought forward snippets and passages and have claimed that they are exact transcriptions of the source material, but over time their supposed exact transcriptions have changed substantively, thus indicating that, intentionally or not, they are misrepresenting the content of the source material."
John K. Moore:
That's Moriarty's story; obviously our story here, at least 2-3 of us here who have access to this material is substantially different. We feel MacWood first and then very much Moriarty came at this subject with a really adverserial attitude and approach to this subject with us. Particularly Moriarty showed no willingness whatsoever to cooperate with Merion or anyone here in Philadephia about what he was intending to produce and say about the architect or the architectural history of Merion at this particular time (1910-1911). The proof of that is he categorically refused to let us see or even be aware of what he intended to say but instead sent review copies to the likes of MacWood and Mucci and perhaps Nacarrato. Do they have the research material, the knowledge or the detailed background on Merion we do and Merion does?
So that is the way it began. When his essay came out it was lightly researched regarding Merion's own records, meeting minutes etc since he decided not to establish a working relationship with Merion BEFORE he began his essay. Consequently, we (and Merion) strenuously criticized the accuracy of the assumptions, premises and conclusions of his essay and we still do----actually even more so then ever given what we have uncovered from MCC since his essay.
Due to those criticisims he demanded access to all Merion's and MCC material (some private that had never seen public dissemination) so that he could "vet" our criticisms of his essay. He even tried to suggest that this is only the process of "civil discourse" or whatever!
What happened to the "civil discourse" of a working relationship with the club and subject and those who really know it BEFOREHAND?
For some odd reason he seemed to think this is how this overall process should work. Some of us disagree with that maintaining he should have gone to Merion and MCC FIRST and established a working relationship with them as we have rather than make us act as his research assistants to do his research collection for him and AFTER the fact (of his essay).
Had Moriarty established a working research and review process with Merion and us first instead of the adverserial approach he took with us and Merion I very much doubt any of this would have ever happened. But then again, some of us and perhaps Merion too do not really believe he did any of this out of an interest to understand Merion. We think he, like MacWood before him, did it only to try to embarrass us and Philadelphia golf architectural history by trying to find some mistakes in the architectural histories of our most famous clubs and some of their attributed architects. This goes back a long way. MacWood came at the subject of PV and Crump's suicide the very same way before all this Merion stuff. Never once did he contact PV about what he was writing about. Never once did he try to work with anyone who knew more about PV when he started his investigation and continued on with it,
I actually had the rather thankless task of supplying MacWood with PV mayor John Ott's email address just before the Crump suicide In My Opinion piece was put on this website. PV who knew about those rumors for years never knew MacWood's essay was coming. Call me old fashioned or whatever but I happen to think that kind of approach really lacks etiquette, even research and reporting Etiquette and ethics and good old fashioned manners and commonsense! MacWood actually even has a stated reason for this kind of approach which is he believes that most all these clubs tend to lie about their architects and architectural histories by knowingly heroifying or iconizing them!
My old friend John Ott (now deceased) had the rather sad job of taking the email download of MacWood's essay down to the clubhouse after which a board meeting was called to report it---the club clearly never wanted to dredge up that sad event of how Crump died even if they knew of it for years---to them he just died very suddenly and he was gone---why the sordid details since his family clearly covered up the circumstances of how he died?
You heard Moriarty's story, John K. Moore, and the foregoing is our story. If one wants all the research material, some of which had never seen public dissemination and is private, one needs to do a bit more than just rudely and insultingly demanding AFTER the fact of a unsubstantiated and highly revisionistic essay like Moriarty's "The Missing Faces of Merion."