David,
I agree with points to a large degree. They are supported by primary documentation. I don’t want to prolong this, or insult you or anyone, but as I look at this with fresh eyes after a year, and after about a week on this thread, I realize why I came to a different conclusion than you on the timing of the land swap.
First, there is only one document that specifically discusses the final routing of Merion – The April 11 committee report. That tells us in NO uncertain terms, that routing work was done (or at least contour maps) before the March NGLA meeting. It tells us they did five more second round preliminary plans between that meeting and the CBM visit of April 6.
The report also tells us that CBM chose the layout. For that alone, we know it was the final routing, but some more details are known, too. He mentions the last 7 holes specifically, the same ones in the Francis Swap. And, the club knows on that date that they need 3 extra acres, within a week after they finalized the plan, probably after drawing an engineer survey of the final line.
So, we know they are talking about the final routing and the final land configuration – with the details finalized AFTER CBM approved the routing as best. In this light, it makes little sense if any that the three acres were finalized months earlier, except for details. How could they, if CBM gave his blessing on April 6, or if they were deciding on five plans up to that date? Each of those plans would have presumably had a slightly different acreage requirement.
There is not a reason to believe that this document isn’t the final word on the final routing. Just because
• * Tollhurst messed up a few details 50 years later, or
• Some of us think it should have or could have gone down some other way, arguing, for instance that they would have used the “best” Golf Course Architect out there, when in fact they did, when they picked CBM to assist them, or
• Because Wilson only discusses agronomy with an agronomist (duh!)
This report and the action resulting from it, tells us all we need to know. If we don’t believe it, and are looking for contradictory “evidence” in a million other documents, I suppose we can conjure up any theories at all. Some people just think that way.
The details of the time frame of routing are right there. Supposing that “it doesn’t preclude routing beforehand” is possible, but very unlikely. They were documenting the process and they took official action on that report, and spent real money, too!
Those are facts, based on the record. All else is speculation. Now, for my own theorizing, just because…..well, that is what we do.
It struck me the other night that this document strongly suggests the timing of the Francis swap idea. As you know, I had postulated that the story either took some literary dramatic license, OR reflected some urgent need to get a new plan before a deadline. I had thought the Nov.15 meeting was a good possibility, or that construction had started and he wanted to avoid building something in the “wrong” place. But, with the five plans being done before CBM approved them, I now see that the deadline was the April 6 meeting with CBM himself! They needed a good plan for him to approve!
I suspect the land swap idea occurred on April 5, or maybe April 2-4. Expert researchers could check the weather that night to see which night was “fairest” for a bike ride, although we don’t know for sure he didn’t ride in the rain or even snow.
Given the fact that they started plowing up the land in anticipation of construction, as per Oakley, this accounts for the blasting of the 16th green a “few days later.” Once it was located on plan, the Quarrymen, who as David suggests may have still been hauling out rocks, were sent to the top of the hill to blast out rocks so it could be covered with better soil, even if the final design wasn’t in place.
This is perfectly reasonable, unless one of you experts here want to argue that you can grow grass on rock better than dirt!
Again, I have no quibble with anyone, but I really believe the quest to find any other document that the primary one that tells us what happened and when, is as much a result of an attitude to find something wrong as it is to get at the truth. Such discussions can be fun (to a point) and also cause hurt feelings.
But, for me, I think the committee report tells us all we need to know. The other stuff is mostly BS, whether well intentioned, or not. TEPaul has mentioned fallacious logic on here a few times. Here is a link for those interested in what that means, since there is SO MUCH of it on these Merion threads.
http://bus-plunge.blogspot.com/2009/03/logic-and-fallacies-constructing.html