"Merion Memories" by Richard S. Francis

[DMoriarty]

You know what would be funny?  To gather up all the different ways you have described CBM during these discussions. He  runs the gamut, turns around and runs it again; goat to hero, genius to imbecile, novice to expert, dark ages relic to pioneer and revolutionary.  As usual it is your emotions and preconceived notions that determine your version of the facts, and not the other way around.

In June 1910 M&W noted that they could not say for certain whether a first class course would fit without a contour map.   We know that they had a contour map long before the NGLA trip because Wilson sent one to Piper.   Do you really think that they did not send M&W one as well?  Inconceivable. 

Also, Mike, we know of two course visits and a two day meeting.  But what about the communication in between.    Wilson wrote letters about as frequently as you post.  Do you really think he wouldn't have been picking M&W's brain every chance he got? 

M&W came up with much (if not all) of the routing at NGLA while riding the property for a couple of days, and it was much less accessible than Merion.   To think that they could not have come up with a routing defies logic.

[Wyatt Halliday]

Like many I have followed these fascinating threads for some time now. I'm certain there are multiple related threads that I have missed, but one thought keeps echoing in my head. Why....

Why would Merion lose, bury, or deny Macdonald's involvement?

Would they not be at least intrigued by the notion?

I just don't see motive.

[DMoriarty]

Like many I have followed these fascinating threads for some time now. I'm certain there are multiple related threads that I have missed, but one thought keeps echoing in my head. Why....

Why would Merion lose, bury, or deny Macdonald's involvement?

Would they not be at least intrigued by the notion?

I just don't see motive.

Do you mean the modern Merion, or MCC in 1911?

Because I don't think MCC did lose or bury their involvement. In 1914 MCC credited M&W right along with the committee.   And Hugh Wilson certainly sang M&W's praises in 1916.  And in 1910 and 1911 it was no secret that M&W were very involved an helping them immensely.   

It was just over the years things got mixed up a little.  Not intentionally, but mixed up nonetheless.  The timing of Hugh Wilson's trip was misunderstood, as was his praise of M&W, as was the timing of the NGLA trip, and M&W's contributions (and Barker's) sort of slipped through the cracks. 

As for modern Merion, I don't know.   But I do think they have gotten some horrific advice from a couple of guys who thought they had a much better grasp on this material than they actually do.   As far as I know, modern Merion may still believe the old legend as was, before my essay.   Their website still reflects this, anyway.

[Rich Goodale]

As for Merion's "Alps" hole (NLE), none of us have played it and most of us (seemingly including you) seem to think that the pictures of it we have seen are hideous. 

You call it Hugh Wilson's hole, and yet I thought that Macdonald designed Merion. 
Am I as confused as you seem to be?

There's no confusion at all.
In addition to the photos, contemporary criticisms indicated that Wilson's attempt at an "Alps" was sorely lacking.
Noone doubts that Wilson constructed the holes on the golf course, do they ?

Could you cite for me, where I stated that CBM designed Merion ?



I never stated that "(you) stated that CBM designed Merion.  Re-read what I said directly above, please.



PS--Mr. Anderson is on a roll today.  He is right that NGLA's "Alps" is at best a pale and inferior intimation of the 17th at Prestwick.

You're both far, far, far off the mark, # 3 at NGLA is so far superior to # 17 at Prestwick that they're not in the same architectural universe.



I strongly disagree with your opinion, Pat, but I will fight to my death your right to make yourself look foolish in holding it.

[Mike_Cirba]

In June 1910 M&W noted that they could not say for certain whether a first class course would fit without a contour map.   We know that they had a contour map long before the NGLA trip because Wilson sent one to Piper.   Do you really think that they did not send M&W one as well?  Inconceivable. 

Also, Mike, we know of two course visits and a two day meeting.  But what about the communication in between.    Wilson wrote letters about as frequently as you post.  Do you really think he wouldn't have been picking M&W's brain every chance he got? 

M&W came up with much (if not all) of the routing at NGLA while riding the property for a couple of days, and it was much less accessible than Merion.   To think that they could not have come up with a routing defies logic.

David,

This is the least factual, more erroneous post you've probably ever made, which tells me how thin your argument is at this point as more evidence continues to roll in.

Just like happened at Merion, Macdonald first purchased over two hundred acres of property, and then intended to use about "approximately" 110 acres for golf, and sell the rest as a real estate venture to members.

M&W THEN spent FIVE MONTHS onsite working out all of the architectural details of their routing and hole designs for NGLA before turning a single spade of dirt.

We know his first day onsite at Merion he did NOT do a routing.

We know when Wilson visited NGLA they went over Macdonald's sketches the first day and the NGLA course the next.   IF they were going to work on a routing for Merion, why even go to NGLA?   WHy is there no mention of them working on a routing for Merion?? 

We know his second and only other day onsite at Merion he did NOT do a routing.


Now your whole argument has been reduced to telling us that Macdonald magically designed Merion through a PAPER JOB after being onsite ONE day in June 1910 and had one magically ready for the committee in March 1911 even though there is absolutely ZERO evidence of that, nor is that what any of the records indicate, they indicate much the opposite, and Macdonald would have known better than to follow the hideous example of 'Architects" like Barker who did single day routings for $25.

THERE IS NO EVIDENCE OF ANY ONGOING CORREPSONDENCE BETWEEN WILSON AND MACDONALD OTHER THAN A SINGLE REFERENCE THAT MACDONALD TOLD THEM TO CONTACT PIPER AND OAKLEY.


You continually spout this nonsense as factual and there is absolutely no evidence to back it up.

The TRUE FACTS are stated above.

Your posts are increasingly less factual and now just run rivers of hopeful speculation, distortions of history, and little more.

[DMoriarty]

Mike,

Joe Bausch started you a thread on NGLA.   If you want to talk about your theory, flesh it out there, and I will be glad to tell you what is wrong with it.  But I am not clogging this post with a tangent based on your misreading of the NGLA related documents. 

And my argument hasn't been reduced at all.  It has been enhanced by a key fact that you, TEPaul, and Wayne have misrepresented for about a year.    You guys claimed all they did at NGLA was talk about documents and drawings from CBM's European trips.  That is not what the minutes say at all.   It turned out that they went up there to talk about CBM's "plans."   

1. M&W told Merion they needed a contour to tell if the course fit. 
2. Merion had a contour map made.
3. Then they went up to NGLA to talk about CBM's "plans."     

These are the facts.  Ignore them at your peril.   Seriously Mike, do you really think it is logical that they wouldn't sent the contour map to M&W as soon as they had it made?  After all, weren't M&W figuring whether the course would fit on the land?   If they could do this with a contour map, do you really think Merion would have kept the contour from them? 

Seriously Mike, we don't have to pretend we are idiots just because we an incomplete record. 

Plus here was plenty of mention M&W working on the lay out plan for Merion.   That is what the 1916 article was talking about.   M&W gave them a good start in laying out the course.   M&W taught them how to fit the correct principles into the ground at Merion.   Read it Mike. Forget all you past erronious conceptions about planing for trips abroad and discussing vague, hypothetical principles and read it in context with what was ongoing.   At the time of the meeting the committee was already trying to figure out how to lay out the course, most likely based on the preliminary plans of barker, M&W, and Francis/Lloyd.    They went to M&W for help with this, and when they came back they made five attempts at making what they had talked about fit on the land.    Then M&W came back to see if they had gotten in right.   

Yet you claim they weren't involved in planning the course?  Impossible.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Mike,

I may have missed it, but could you show me where David claimed that CBM designed Merion ?

Thanks

[Mike_Cirba]

Mike,

Joe Bausch started you a thread on NGLA.   If you want to talk about your theory, flesh it out there, and I will be glad to tell you what is wrong with it.  But I am not clogging this post with a tangent based on your misreading of the NGLA related documents. 

And my argument hasn't been reduced at all.  It has been enhanced by a key fact that you, TEPaul, and Wayne have misrepresented for about a year.    You guys claimed all they did at NGLA was talk about documents and drawings from CBM's European trips.  That is not what the minutes say at all.   It turned out that they went up there to talk about CBM's "plans."   

Exactly, David...his plans for NGLA, which was still being developed and which wouldn't officially open to the members for several months yet.   He had to be very rightfully proud of them, and since it was evening, and early March, and only light out til 5pm, he couldn't show them the course yet (which he proudly did the next day), but along with his sketches of overseas holes he surely showed them his versions of them...almost certainly he showed them the plasticene models of them...in miniature, so they could see how amazingly he had captured their essence.

1. M&W told Merion they needed a contour to tell if the course fit. 

Again, he told them no such thing.   He simply told them after his single day visit 9 months prior that he couldn't tell for certain if they had enough acreage for their course without a topo map, and suggested they try to get the other 3 acres next to the clubhouse near the creek, probably to give them more room where the lines of the L conjoined.   

2. Merion had a contour map made.

Yes, we know that some 8 months after Macdonald said he couldn't tell if the property was large enough for a course without one, we know Hugh Wilson sent one to Piper/Oakley and wanted to send soil samples from various parts of the property.  We know Macdonald suggested they contact Piper and Oakley.   If Macdonald was the one designing the course, why didn't he just contact Piper & Oakley, who he knew already from his attempts to get grass to grow at NGLA.

3. Then they went up to NGLA to talk about CBM's "plans."     

Once again David, you're simply making stuff up.   There is not a single shred of evidence anywhere contemporaneously where anyone, EVER referred to Macdonald planning Merion.   ZERO.

These are the facts.  Ignore them at your peril.   Seriously Mike, do you really think it is logical that they wouldn't sent the contour map to M&W as soon as they had it made?  After all, weren't M&W figuring whether the course would fit on the land?   If they could do this with a contour map, do you really think Merion would have kept the contour from them? 

Who said Macdonald was "figuring whether the course would fit on the land"?   At this point, David, Merion had already purchased the land based on their single visit back in June 1910 and their very hedged bet recommendation to buy the land sent on a single sheet of paper.

That's IT.  That's ALL the evidence that they were involved.   That Rodman Griscom brought them down and based on their very uncertain recommendation, Lloyd and the Site Committee pushed forward to purchase the land and was able to accomplish that in the Nov/Dec timeframe after getting approval of the membership.

YOU'RE TELLING US THEY DID A PAPER JOB.   THAT IS INSANE after everything they did to build NGLA ON THE GROUND.

STOP LISTENING TO MACWOOD.

MACDONALD AND WHIGHAM WERE NOT SLAM-BAM HH BARKER.   THEY DIDN"T OPERATE THAT WAY.   THAT WAS THE DARK AGES OF GOLF DESIGN IN AMERICA.

Seriously Mike, we don't have to pretend we are idiots just because we an incomplete record. 

Plus here was plenty of mention M&W working on the lay out plan for Merion.   That is what the 1916 article was talking about.   M&W gave them a good start in laying out the course.   M&W taught them how to fit the correct principles into the ground at Merion.   Read it Mike. Forget all you past erronious conceptions about planing for trips abroad and discussing vague, hypothetical principles and read it in context with what was ongoing.   At the time of the meeting the committee was already trying to figure out how to lay out the course, most likely based on the preliminary plans of barker, M&W, and Francis/Lloyd.    They went to M&W for help with this, and when they came back they made five attempts at making what they had talked about fit on the land.    Then M&W came back to see if they had gotten in right.   

Yet you claim they weren't involved in planning the course?  Impossible.

Macdonald gave them a good start in the PRINCIPLES OF GOLF COURSE CONSTRUCTION.   NOT ARCHITECTURE.

YOU TAKE GREAT PAINS TO POINT THAT OUT IN YOUR ESSAY AND NOW YOU"RE TRYING TO HAVE IT BOTH WAYS.

The course was already laid out and routed...Macdonald just helped them pick the best of their five.

[DMoriarty]

Mike,

I may have missed it, but could you show me where David claimed that CBM designed Merion ?

Thanks

Patrick,

This is an excellent question.   It reminds me that I need to step back and not get sucked into the misleading rhetoric that Tom, Mike, and Wayne have spewed for so long.  It also reminds me of why I have tried to avoid the overly simplistic "who should get credit" discussion.  

While the routing and hole concepts are crucial, there is more to designing a course that the routing and hole concepts.    While M&W were surely involved in the details beyond routing and hole concepts - the record of the NGLA meeting and M&W's subsequent visit to determine the final lay out plan confirms this.   But Wilson and the members of his committee were also involved in this process, and their contribution should not be ignored.  

It says something that these guys have to overstate and misrepresent my argument in order to attempt to refute it.  


_____________________________

Exactly, David...his plans for NGLA, which was still being developed and which wouldn't officially open to the members for several months yet.   He had to be very rightfully proud of them, and since it was evening, and early March, and only light out til 5pm, he couldn't show them the course yet (which he proudly did the next day), but along with his sketches of overseas holes he surely showed them his versions of them...almost certainly he showed them the plasticene models of them...in miniature, so they could see how amazingly he had captured their essence.

Again another midstream about-face by Mike Cirba.  Careful Mike, flail around too much and you might drown.

Up until now we've heard that all they did was talk about the sketches and information from his overseas trip, nothing about plans for NGLA. In fact I even specifically asked if they talked about CBM plans from NGLA and I was told, NO, there are no known CBM plans for NGLA.    And if I recall it correctly, I don't think the plasticine model was even in existence yet.   Do you have evidence that it was?

You guys can twist and dance all you like, but the most logical explanation is that the "plans" they looked at were CBM's rough plans for Merion.   After all, if I recall correctly the alleged sentence starts by discussingtheir attempts at coming up with a course, and then notes they went to NGLA to look at CBM's plans.  After trying and failing themselves, they went to see and understand what he came up with.

Again, he told them no such thing.   He simply told them after his single day visit 9 months prior that he couldn't tell for certain if they had enough acreage for their course without a topo map, . . .  

You misrepresent what he said, but still it is a distinction without a difference.   Either way, he told them that with a topo he could tell if the course fit, and they got a topo.

Yes, we know that some 8 months after Macdonald said he couldn't tell if the property was large enough for a course without one, we know Hugh Wilson sent one to Piper/Oakley and wanted to send soil samples from various parts of the property.  We know Macdonald suggested they contact Piper and Oakley.   If Macdonald was the one designing the course, why didn't he just contact Piper & Oakley, who he knew already from his attempts to get grass to grow at NGLA.

Because M&W were not building the course.

Once again David, you're simply making stuff up.   There is not a single shred of evidence anywhere contemporaneously where anyone, EVER referred to Macdonald planning Merion.   ZERO.

Making stuff up?   No evidence?  Unless you guys misrepresented the source material again, then the minutes say they went to NGLA to review and discuss "his plans."  And the "his" refers to CBM, does it not?   

These are the facts.  Ignore them at your peril.   Seriously Mike, do you really think it is logical that they wouldn't sent the contour map to M&W as soon as they had it made?  After all, weren't M&W figuring whether the course would fit on the land?   If they could do this with a contour map,

YOU'RE TELLING US THEY DID A PAPER JOB.   THAT IS INSANE after everything they did to build NGLA ON THE GROUND.

STOP LISTENING TO MACWOOD.

MACDONALD AND WHIGHAM WERE NOT SLAM-BAM HH BARKER.   THEY DIDN"T OPERATE THAT DAY.   THAT WAS THE DARK AGES OF GOLF DESIGN IN AMERICA.

Wow, you managed to insult me, Macwood, and HH Barker all in the same couple of lines.

Clean up your act Mike.

[Mike_Cirba]

David,

Listen to yourself.

HH Barker created a single day routing of the course in a couple of hours and then said he could have it ready for them in no time if they just sign on the bottom line.

THis was the kind of crap that was all over in the early American DARK AGES of golf design.

It wasn't his fault...these guys were foreign pros trying to make a buck.

But, it's also why most of the courses sucked.

Who do you think this article is referring to "laying out" courses in 1910??   Does this mean Barker was out there shovelling dirt and "constructing" courses?   After all, according to you, that's what it meant in a hundred articles that said Hugh WIlson laid out Merion, but it must only apply to hm and no one else, apparently, because every other example of "laid out" we've seen from that time period has meant GOLF COURSE ARCHITECTURE, even if only the primitive "18 stakes on a Sunday afternoon" practiced by the early professionals from Great Britain like Barker.



Sounds like a real Tom Doak, Pete, Dye, Bill Coore, find-it-in-the-dirt sort of architect to me!   


Then, worse yet, you guys tell us that CB Macdonald, who took months and months to plan NGLA before turning a spade of dirt at NGLA just "phoned it in" to Merion, as well,and worse yet, they bought it.

He had one day onsite in June of 1910, yet when the Merion Committee came to visit in March 1911, he miraculously had a plan all ready for them. 

This is unbelievable, David.

Macdonald didn't operate like this.  Never.   The man had too much knowledge and pride to do something so ridiculous and half-assed.

He helped some friends start a new course and gave them great advice.

Period.

[DMoriarty]

Mike,

Enough of your hyperbole and nonsense.   Whatever his methods, HH Barker came up with some very good results.  CBM did not phone it in at Merion.  And you obviously do not understand how CBM worked.

You've got nothing to say that is even worth responding to further.

[Niall C]

David,

I've been dipping in and out of the various Merion threads and while I wouldn't pretend to follow all the discussions, am I right in saying that you believe MacDonald and possibly Whigham were involved in the design of Merion ? That is to say, designing the routing and possibly individual hole designs based on models of other holes such as the Redan etc, rather than merely passing on generalknowledge about course design and his thoughts on specific model holes.

If my understanding of what you are saying is correct, what evidence that this was the case other than a mention in the minutes of Merion that the committee visited MacDonald to look at plans (with no mention specifically of what the plans were of).

I'm struggling to see how this could be the case given the ongoing activity of Wilson and his colleagues and the listing of M&W as giving advice rather than giving them billing as course architects/designers.

Niall

[Mike_Cirba]

Just so everyone is on the same page regarding David's contention that the Merion Committee went up to NGLA to "look at CBM's plans, which he contends were his design for Merion, this is what the Merion Cricket Club minutes say exactly;

"Your committee desires to report that after laying out many different golf course on the new ground, they went down to the National course with Mr. Macdonald and spent the evening going over his plans and the various data he had gathered abroad in regard to golf courses. The next day we spent on the ground studying...."

Recall at this time the recently unearthed NGLA articles make clear that Macdonald's NGLA course was still very much a work in progress with new bunkers being added, new agronomic techniques being tried, new grasses sown, and hadn't even opened to the membership yet.

Recall as well that Macdonald had been at Merion a total of one day, NINE MONTHS prior, looking at unmapped land they were considering aquiring, and had issued a single-page assessment largely expressing agronomic and acreage concerns that he suggested the Merion Committee needed to address...not a single word of any design, or that he'd been asked to do anything but consider and report on the proposed land in question.   

Then, suddenly, miraculously, after presumably going through some laborious gestation period, and without another day on the property, NINE MONTHS later he has a design for Merion and the Merion Committee has to come out to NGLA to pick it up from him....

Call it Charlie's Immaculate Conception. 


Here is what Hugh Wilson himself said about the Merion Committee's two-day trip to NGLA;

"We spent two days with Mr. Macdonald at his bungalow near the National Course and in one night absorbed more ideas on golf course construction than we had learned in all the years we had played. Through sketches and explanations of the correct principles of the holes that form the famous courses abroad and had stood the test of time, we learned what was right and what we should try to accomplish with our natural conditions."

Any mention of a Macdonald plan for the Merion course??   

One might think that would be an important detail to mention, especially given the fact that by 1916 when Hugh Wilson said this every newspaper in Philadelphia was already crediting him with the design of both courses at Merion.

Of course, there wasn't a Macdonald plan for Merion, yet David would take that single word out of two contemporaneous accounts and try to suggest that there was, despite all of the other evidence to the contrary.

We're left being asked to believe that Macdonald did a remote control, paper job for Merion, and as the evidence continues to roll-in, there are simply no actual facts left to support that assertion.

[Sean_Tully]

http://turf.lib.msu.edu/1940s/1949/490918.pdf

Found this while looking for something else. Does mention some land purchase and gives Francis and Wilson top billing.

Tully

[Mike_Cirba]

Sean,

Thanks for pointing out that article, which obviously proceeded the 1950 Richard Francis article and any possible subsequent "misinterpretations" by Herbert Warren Wind and others.   The picture of the 11th is quite glorious.

[Adam_Messix]

There is one thing that has not been considered in this entire discussion.  The major players in the world of "golf course architecture" during the time frame of 1910-1932, were all very friendly with each other and were inclined to visit each others work.  We know this from a number of circumstances; including Travis at Pinehurst, MacKenzie at Rivieria, and many architects at Pine Valley.  Did these gentlemen contribute to the finished products at these famous courses.... probably.  It looks like Emmet and Travis had some influence on NGLA if we are to take newspaper articles as gospel as them seem to be in referring to Merion.  

I can understand Pat Mucci's argument about the metes and bounds, but I think a better idea would be to give it to a neutral party and have them provide an assessment.  

[mike_malone]

 It sounds to me , after all this arguing , that no one deserves design credit for Merion since it was a group effort that was never intended to be attributed to any one person. We are the ones who are trying to jam a modern squrae peg interpretation into this old square hole way of doing things.

    If they had wanted to be clear then about who deserved credit as "designer" I think they would have done so.

   As time went by and researchers wanted a single name "Wilson" seemed the most logical one name to use.

[Mike_Cirba]

It sounds to me , after all this arguing , that no one deserves design credit for Merion since it was a group effort that wsa never intended to be attributed to any one person. We are the ones who are trying to jam a modern squrae peg interpretation into this old square hole way of doing things.

    If they had wanted to be clear then about who deserved credit as "designer" I think they would have done so.

   As time went by and researchers wanted a single name "Wilson" seemed the most logical one name to use.

Mike,

I would generally agree with you, particularly as relates to no one man including Hugh Wilson seeking personal credit, but would you also agree that the reason that the reason it was "logical" is because as the assigned chairman of the committee, Wilson had primary responsibility for decision-making and organizational coordination?

Also, it seems that many others in his own time pointed to Wilson as the primary architect.   We know of Alan Wilson's 1926 mention that the other committee members all said that "in the main", Hugh Wilson was the one primarily responsible for the architecture of Merion East when it opened.

We also know that A.W. TIllinghast, who had insider knowledge and also discussed the course in detail with CB Macdonald during its design phase and even told us he had "seen the plans" was vociferous in his contention that Hugh WIlson was the true architect of Merion, responsible for designing the course.  Tillinghast stated;

"It seemed rather tragic to me, for so few seemed to know that the Merion course was planned and developed by Hugh Wilson, a member of the club who possessed a decided flair for golf architecture.  Today the great course at Merion, and it must take place along the greatest in America, bears witness to his fine intelligence and rare vision."

We also have the scores of news accounts from the years that followed that mentioned him as the person primarily responsible for laying out Merion, and we also have this letter just a few months after the new course opened.




It wasn't some accident of history that Hugh Wilson was credited as the architect of Merion.

[Charlie Goerges]

Call it Charlie's Immaculate Conception. 

Just informing you that you are in violation of copyright law. My mom has owned the rights to this phrase since 1979. 

[Mike_Cirba]

Charlie,

Your mom, too??  Wow...we have a lot in common!! 

[TEPaul]

CharlieG:

Are you saying your mom routed and designed and was the driving force behind Merion East too?

[Charlie Goerges]

TE Paul,

Since she just celebrated the x-teenth anniversary of her 39th birthday, I would say it's unlikely. I can say that if she had done it, she would have taken less time than those "Masters-of-the-Universe" did and no swapping or back-room high-jinks would have been necessary. And that would have been in addition to having three full-time jobs (Charlie, Jon, and David).

[TEPaul]

“Sorry Mike, this thread is about the Francis Landswap,”



David Moriarty:

Yes, it is and it’s nice to see the rest of Francis’ story and not just the part Tolhurst quoted in his 1988 and 2005 Merion history book.

I find this part of Francis’ story to be particularly interesting!

“The committee in charge of laying out and building a course was composed of Horatio Gates Lloyd, Rodman E. Griscom, Hugh I. Wilson and Dr. Harry Toulmin. I was added to it, probably because I could read drawings, make them, run a transit, level and tape.”

Isn’t it interesting that Francis says the Wilson Committee was in charge of laying out and building the course rather than just building the course to someone else’s plan as you claimed in your essay for among other reasons you think “laying out” means only building or constructing according to the Oxford English Dictionary definition?

If that were the case I suppose Francis also could have written his account to mean the same thing thusly ; “The committee in charge of building and building a course was composed of…..”   

I also find it interesting that Francis says he was ‘ADDED to’ the committee to lay out and build the course.

Hugh Wilson wrote the committee was appointed in the beginning of 1911. It would be pretty stupid for a man to say he was added to an existing committee to read drawings, make them, run a transit and tape and level if he had been out there doing all that for months on end in 1910 with Lloyd and some Barker or Macdonald plan BEFORE the Wilson Committee was even APPOINTED as you suggest in your increasingly fallacious essay, don’t you think? 

This entire Francis story including his above remarks is just another good reason why no one should try to write an informed and informative essay with very much less than complete research material and information, as you clearly did. What a waste of time it is that you refuse to admit the obvious by continuing to defend it after all we have produced that proves it to be as wrong as it is. And now including the rest of Francis’ story!! How IRONIC is THAT?!

But what the heck, why don’t you just explain away TOO what Francis said about being ADDED TO the committee by contending he must have been either mistaken or engaging in hyperbole as you said in your essay about other parts of his story such as the quarry top being blown off in a day or two and as you have contended with what everyone else who was around Merion said that not only does NOT support your fallacious and revisionist essay of Merion’s early architectural history but actually factually and concretely denies the assumptions, premises and conclusions of your essay?

[Patrick_Mucci]

Then, worse yet, you guys tell us that CB Macdonald, who took months and months to plan NGLA before turning a spade of dirt at NGLA

Mike,

You're way off base on this.
CBM found a good number of the holes he wanted prior to purchasing the land.
He pretty much routed the golf course prior to determining how much of the 450 acres he wanted to purchase.
He only purchased 205 of the 450 available acreage.
Of the 450 available acres he determined which acreage he wanted since he had essentially routed the golf course prior to the ultimate purchase of the 205 acres.

I thought you knew that.

just "phoned it in" to Merion, as well, and worse yet, they bought it.

He had one day onsite in June of 1910, yet when the Merion Committee came to visit in March 1911, he miraculously had a plan all ready for them. 

How do you know that he didn't visit more than once ?

This is unbelievable, David.

Macdonald didn't operate like this.  Never.   

Are you suggesting that CBM and/or WH and/or SR visited more often ?

The man had too much knowledge and pride to do something so ridiculous and half-assed.

In light of that statement, how would you evaluate Donald Ross's Modus operandi ?
How would you evaluate his ability to never see a site and still design a good golf course ?
Or his ability to route and design a good golf course with but one site visits ?

He helped some friends start a new course and gave them great advice.

Period.

That's what you want to believe and that's what you insist that others believe.

Me, I don't know the depth and scope of his work/assistance at Merion, but, I think its' worthwhile to try to find out who did what at Merion.

While Francis seems to downplay his role, I'd like to learn more about his involvement.  I liken him to SR in that he was probably the only one qualified, by basis of his education and experience, to understand the engineering phase of the routing, design and construction of the golf course.

[Phil_the_Author]

Tom,

I'm not quite sure what this might mean, but I think that there has been some unintentional glossing over of Francis' statement that  he was "added to an existing committee to read drawings, make them..."

Questions this brings to mind...

1- If the members of the committee were able to read and understand drawings why would Francis have been needed for that particular talent?
2- If the members of the committee were able to produce and make design drawings, why would Francis have been needed for that particular talent?
3- If the answer to either of the questions above is "No, they couldn't do so and needed someone who could..." then clearly they were dealing with plans produced by SOMEONE ELSE! (e.g. - possibly the 5 "routing plans" previously mentioned or a finished set of drawings based upon the one chosen or...)
4- If that was the case, then WHOSE DRAWINGS were the Construction Committee working with?
5- WHAT was it about the plans they obviously already had when Francis was asked to serve on the committee that were so difficult to understand that they needed someone who could do so?

Could it be that when looked at in light of the answers to these questions that Francis' writing actually muddies up the waters further rather than clearing things up?