Willie Campbell & Myopia

[TEPaul]

Mike:

If we get enough into Leeds and his history and his history with golf architecture there probably will be some blanks to fill in first. As I think I told you yesterday, Leeds was a pretty unusual guy in a number of ways, among them he had a fairly famous aversion to publicity. One source says the only golf reporter he liked or trusted was Boston's A. Linde Fowler (who really was good, by the way----eg in the early 1920s he wrote a good and pretty seminal article about Flynn and Wilson and Kittanset).

But one of the blanks in Leeds's life for us is the question of how much he was abroad and when. For that ship manifests, particularly in the 1890s, may help. I would note as well that an interest in golf was not his only one with sports. I believe he was also a world class competitive sailor and may've been involved in some of the America Cup yacht races both here and abroad in the 1890s (we should certainly be cognizant of just how much sailing and yachting and at a very high competitive level (including the America Cup) was a part of that same summer community world of Boston back in the 1890s and on).

Leeds was also a very proficent fox hunter, tennis and court tennis player, he played polo and in college (Harvard) he was very good in baseball and football. I believe he played on the 1883 Harvard football team that was captained by Myopia's Master of the Hounds and originator of golf at Myopia, R.M. Appleton. Two years later, Robert Bacon was the captain of the Harvard football team and he was one of the three members who originally laid out the first holes at Brookline. Robert Bacon, was an interesting guy too, a great athlete, a war hero, and one of J.P. Morgan's few "fair haired" guys in that massive business of the financial world back then.

[TEPaul]

Mike:

Regarding your Davis book mentioning Appleton, Merrill and Gardner laying out Myopia in 1894-------because you have not actually produced it on here, it was obviously written too many years after the fact and it conflicts with those newspaper articles about Willie Campbell it is therefore inadmissable on HERE as "verifiable evidence" of anything. It is a completely unacceptable source or confirmation!!!!! And you call yourself a golf architecture HISTORIAN???  

However, and all joshing aside, it is definitely not the case that all the holes of Myopia's original 1894 nine hole course were later abandoned. At least six remain in one form or another to this very day. Essentially on today's course they would be a significantly longer version of #2 with its green in another place, a longer version of #8, a somewhat different version of #9, #11 green, a significantly longer version of #12 with its green in another place, and a different angle version of #13 with its green moved about 30-50 yards to the left.

[Mike Cirba]

Tom,

I found it very interesting that Davis published a total yardage for the first nine holes (something Weeks did not do), yet also credited Gardner, Merrill, and Appleton prior to Weeks' book being published.

So...there has to be another source with that information, most likely in the club records.

Unless Davis is lying as well. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

David,

Yes, I did read it, and after I posted, I did consider editing it to say that your comments were a pretty fair representation as to "where we are" in this discussion. I am sure some would emphasize slightly different points, but all in all you represented our discussion to date.

That said, I would still say that this discussion is nowhere near where it needs to be for us or anyone to draw solid conclusions.  And I am pretty sure no real historian would publish a study on this knowingly having not researched all relevant records known to exist for fear of being wrong. Is that such an unreasonable statement?

[Jeff_Brauer]

BTW, I do understand what contemporaneous source material is, but believe you are very selective about what you deem useful and what you don't.

For example, you say the newspapers are based on sources within the club, but don't seem troubled to figure out if that is true and who it might have been.

At the same time, when Weeks obviously quotes old club material in many places, you are unsure of what he was looking at, despite a 99% chance that he was looking at club records and perhaps the Leeds scrapbook.

All in all, it strikes me as equally plausible that the gossip columnists might have gotten their info wrong as it does that Bush in his quotes, or Weeks in quoting his quotes got it wrong.  As always, I could be wrong.

I also find it somewhat ironic that you dismiss Weeks as perhaps not being accurate from a distance of 70 years after the fact so easily while attempting to decipher history from another 40 years past his history, with fewer relevant documents at our disposal! 

By your own standards, other than the fact it is you doing the speculating/interpreting, you would have to dismiss your authenticity out of hand, no?

[Tom MacWood]

Not sure the source of this information, but my 1974 (pre Weeks book) copy of "Great Golf Courses of the World", by William Davis and the editors of Golf Digest states;

"It was in 1894, however, that the club's first nine golf holes, measuring only 2,050 yards, were laid out by three club members, R. M. Appleton, T. Watson Merrill, and A. P. Gardner."'

"In 1896 Herbert C. Leeds, a club member and its best golfer, laid out on another site the nine holes that form the basis for today's course (the first nine holes were eventually abandoned).   It was 2930 yards long and was shortly afterwards altered again."

Mike
That was written by John P. May, not Davis, and I suspect his source was the same as Weeks', an earlier club history.

[Mike Cirba]

Tom,

Do we know or have clues that a previous club history existed prior to Weeks or are we speculating?

Might both sources of information have come from what is referred to as the "Leeds Scrapbook"?

[Tom MacWood]

I'd like to think of it as an educated guess. I'm speculating that May did not have access to the 'board minutes' a la TEP, so an earlier club history would seem be the most likely source.

[Tom MacWood]

Per the Palmetto Club History, Leeds was involved in laying out the course (15 holes of the 18, 3 were already there) between the years of 1892 and 1895.

From what I've been able to gather golf was played informally at Aiken beginning 1892 on three sand greens. Palmetto GC was organized in 1895, but I don't believe the course was ready until early 1896. That nine hole course was laid out by Leeds. It was expanded to eighteen in 1898. I'm not sure who was added the second nine. Prior to the first annual Winter tournament at Palmetto, in 1896, an article in a NY paper credited Leeds for designing the course, and it also claimed he designed Myopia.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

If a club such as Myopia (or Merion) allowed you to come to the club to read all their collected historical and administrative material that was not part of the public domain, would you do it?

[Tom MacWood]

Might both sources of information have come from what is referred to as the "Leeds Scrapbook"?

Leeds was not a member of Myopia in 1894, its unlikely he would have been snipping out articles of Myopia. Which brings up an interesting question, how come Weeks was not aware of Willie Campbell if he had access to Leeds scrapbook? Just about every article regarding Leeds in 1896, his first season at the club, also mention Campbell as the pro.

[Tom MacWood]

Tom MacWood:

If a club such as Myopia (or Merion) allowed you to come to the club to read all their collected historical and administrative material that was not part of the public domain, would you do it?

If I was in the area, yes.

[Tom MacWood]

JC Jones,

Thanks for the additional information on Palmetto.

That's a club I've been hoping to get to for a long time, as is Kebo Valley.   

Leeds to me seems like the first guy in this country who really started using interesting architecture like optional diagonal carries, and I know he did a lot of study of the great courses abroad.   

I also am absolutely in love with his low profile greens....Myopia is very similar to Garden City in that regard, only on more interesting, varied landforms.   

I'm still not sure why we see so little of that very cool, low-impact feature in modern design? 

You've said this before, but when questioned about it never responded. Was it Leeds who introduced diagonals at Myopia or Campbell? Have you seen evidence diagonals were used on those early courses at Kebo and Palmetto?

[Mike Cirba]

Tom MacWood,

The best example of diagonal strategies exists at today's 4th hole.   Whoever designed it should get the credit.

[TEPaul]

"Prior to the first annual Winter tournament at Palmetto, in 1896, an article in a NY paper credited Leeds for designing the course, and it also claimed he designed Myopia."


Tom MacWood:

How could that be? The NY paper must have been wrong, don't you think? I suppose the NY paper did not do the proper "independent" research to determine that in fact Willie Campbell designed Myopia and that the original 1894 course was no different than Myopia's 1896 course. Furthermore if the NY paper was reporting on a winter tournament at Palmetto in 1896 how could they even know that Herbert Leeds was a member of Myopia in the winter of 1896 and to have designed the course?

[TEPaul]

"If I was in the area, yes."


Tom MacWood:

Very good; at least that's a start. If they told you they did not want you to make copies of original material for the purposes of putting it on the Internet would you still read this material at the club for your own edification? 
 

[Tom MacWood]

TEP
You're not using your thinking cap. There is evidence the original nine was redesigned prior to 1896 (an 1895 report said the course was new that season; Weeks claimed they were looking toward the ridge as early as 1894; the course yardage did not change between 1896 and 1898), creating your so called Long Nine. If this report is correct Leeds involvement with the course came prior to him becoming a member. I know this conflicts with Weeks, err, the 'board minutes,' but those records don't appear to be as complete or as reliable as one would hope.

[TEPaul]

Mike:

I'm not that familiar with Palmetto (it's been about forty years since I was there) but from some I know who know Myopia and Palmetto well I'm told Leeds very rarely "turned" his golf holes. Myopia's #4 is a very rare exception!

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

Whenever the original 1894 nine was changed into the Long Nine, there were some significant differences between them. I realize you would like to deny this or minimize it to try to maintain some perception that Willie Campbell routed the original 1894 nine (which he didn't) and to therefore try to make it look more like Campbell had more to do with the way the course is now but it is impossible to deny there were some significant changes between the 1894 nine and the Long Nine that was used for the 1898 US Open, and then even more changes to the app six holes remaining from the original 1894 nine when the 18 hole course was completed.

Not long after that (the 1898 US Open) Leeds continued to create the 18 hole course which other than some bunkering schemes is essentially the way the golf course still is today. At that point (1896) Robert White was there to be shortly followed (1897) by John Jones who remained at Myopia until 1912. Jones was followed by Paddy Doyle who was there until 1920. He was followed by John Kennan who was there until 1927. At that point Herbert Leeds did not have much of anything to do with the course anymore and a series of others, took over for him, most notably George Batchelder (Edward Weeks's original partner in the history book) took over, and then Tuckerman, the McKeans and eventually culminating with Bobby Knowles, a really good player (some Walker Cups) who actually was responsible for obsoleting a number of Leeds's bunkers in an attempt to make the course not quite so hard for the membership. After Knowles, Mr. Frederick Winthrop began a tree planting program at Myopia. They remained until about a dozen years ago when most all of them were removed under the aegis of Mike Greene at which point the course underwent a restoration that is culminating under the aegis of golf architect Gil Hanse. As of about four days ago the three remaining trees behind #12 green were removed which appears to have stirred up a bit of a buzz! 

[Tom MacWood]

TEP
Get off your high horse. Everything you know about the early course at Myopia comes from Weeks' history, and he admitted he could only speculate. He claimed three holes were changed from the original nine.

Regarding the succession of pros, we can all read Weeks book, you don't have to repeat what he wrote in order to make yourself sound knowledgeable. Weeks did not know Campbell was the pro in 1896, and did not know what years White was employed at the club. He was also not aware of Jones' background and how he ended up at Myopia. So based on that I'm not sure how much stock we should put in Weeks' info, but it is good know about Paddy Doyle and Bobby Knowles.

[Tom MacWood]

Whenever the original 1894 nine was changed into the Long Nine, there were some significant differences between them. I realize you would like to deny this or minimize it to try to maintain some perception that Willie Campbell routed the original 1894 nine (which he didn't) and to therefore try to make it look more like Campbell had more to do with the way the course is now but it is impossible to deny there were some significant changes between the 1894 nine and the Long Nine that was used for the 1898 US Open.

TEP
I thought you said you read in the 'board minutes' the course was changed sometime after Leeds became a member in 1896? Now you don't appear to be as confident in what you read. Why is that?

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

I am glad you can all now read Weeks's book because it is an excellent book of the entire history of Myopia including its golf. You called the whole thing a work of fiction (as you did Merion's Desmond Tolhurst's book) which is ridiculous because you know nothing about Myopia other than a couple of inconsequential newspaper articles from 1894. I have gone over Weeks's book for some years and compared it to everything else I know of Myopia from the people there over the years and what I have read at Myopia from their records. The only error Weeks made in his book, in my opinion, is when he appears to suggest that the second hole on the original 1894 nine was today's 8th. As I pointed out some time ago that could not have been the case because it is provable from club records that three holes of the original 1894 nine were on or partially on Dr. S.A. Hopkins's property! This is why only six holes of the original 1894 nine are identified in Weeks's book (those other three that were on Hopkins's property have never been well described or identified obviously leading Weeks to use the term "a matter of speculation" about them).

With your above remark such as 'get off your high horse' it seems like now that you are beginning to understand the truth about Myopia's architectural history and about the quality of Weeks's book (I realize it may've taken me close to a year and a half to educate you but thankfully it seems to be finally working) you are becoming even more defensive, bitter, petty and insulting.

I know how insecure you can be, Tom MacWood, but please try not to let it be so obvious on here.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

Regarding Weeks's book, I am very glad to see it has now been digitally placed in the hands of some who are contributing on this thread. You've never chosen to admit it or deny it on here but I assume your access to it is via Mike Hurzdan's excellent personal library. Why don't you ask him if he will have it scanned for you so you can put it on your computer as a few others on here now have. If you do that perhaps you could send a digital copy to Moriarty via the Internet. When he gets his hands on it I fully expect him to take the next ten years to explain to us why what Weeks said in the book really doesn't mean what the rest of us read it to say, somewhat like both you and he did with what we provided you on the Wilson report to the Board meeting of MCC on April 19, 1911. 

[TEPaul]

"Weeks did not know Campbell was the pro in 1896, and did not know what years White was employed at the club. He was also not aware of Jones' background and how he ended up at Myopia. So based on that I'm not sure how much stock we should put in Weeks' info,"


Tom MacWood:

Once again, it seems you are confused. It appears you still automatically think what Weeks wrote in his history book is the sum total of what he knew and Myopia knew about its history. One more time, Tom, if Weeks put every detail of Myopia's 135 year history in his history book it would've been about 1147 pages instead of 147 pages!  

But that does not seem to be a concept you are capable of grasping no matter how many times I've explained it to you (is this an example of your tunnel vision or something?) even if a third grader with a decent mind could certainly grasp it.

[DMoriarty]

David,

Yes, I did read it, and after I posted, I did consider editing it to say that your comments were a pretty fair representation as to "where we are" in this discussion.

So first you read my post; but then went ahead and blatantly misrepresented it anyway to try make some unrelated point; then later you considered setting the record straight but left your blatant misrepresentation anyway. Classy.

BTW, I do understand what contemporaneous source material is, but believe you are very selective about what you deem useful and what you don't.

If you "do understand what contemporaneous source material is," then why do you go on and immediately misrepresent it yet again?   I guess you must have another point to make, facts be damned.

1.  I don't just "say" the newspaper accounts were based on sources within the club, I explained, repeatedly, the details that made me think that this may have been the case.  

2.  Weeks didn't "obviously" quote old club material.   He quoted some recollection by Bush and we have no idea when or why that was produced.   A 99% chance?  You know as little about statistics as you do history.

3.  For the umpteenth time, Bush DOES NOT ADDRESS WHO LAID OUT THE COURSE.   You should stop misrepresenting this.

4.  You have no idea what Weeks had at his disposal when he wrote what he wrote, or whether that information was reliable or whether he was simple shadowing someone else's account. Had Weeks the articles stating that Campbell laid out the course, we'd not be having this conversation.

5.  My authenticity? You are obviously in way over your head here, and just making things up to support whatever point you are trying to make.  Unfortunately those points are increasingly unrelated to the topic at hand.