The Bunkering at The National

[TEPaul]

Pat:

You raise some interesting questions about that particular photograph but nevertheless I think that photo is exactly how we are explaining it. I realize because of a camera's lens and such the perspective of various photographs can seem skewed but despite that there is little question in my mind that whoever took that photo was definitely not standing on the ground when he took it (well above it in fact). The road next to that windmill is just way too far below the bottom of the photo even with lens perspective distortion.

[DMoriarty]

Patrick I don't think that we are looking at the green.  I think we are looking at a directional flag.   I think the green is to the left of the photo.

In the 1910 tournament the hole was listed as 215 yards, and John Ward took a two.  Here is the description of his first few holes on what was then the back nine.

Mr. Ward started in in a sensational fashion by winning the tenth (325 yards) in 2 by holing a mashie approach. The eleventh "Sahara" (215 yards) Mr. Ward also secured in 2, driving the green and running his putt down.   The twelfth "Alps" (376 yards) was halved in a very fine 4. Another 2 at the thirteenth "Redan" (185 yards) was recorded by Mr. Ward, giving  him a lead of three holes.

2-2-4-2.  Anyone in their right mind would gladly take that on these four holes. 

Still, even though the hole was shorter than now, in the photo it seems like the green should be much farther to the left.   This was a blind hole and a very early tournament so it seems possible that the black flag is a directional flag for drives.

[DMoriarty]

His primary point here is in that early time in the infancy of agronomic research and understanding it took quite a bit of time to grow grass into the type of maturity some bunker faces and surrounds apparently needed to have to endure (not fall apart) on highly sandy soil and that that can and probably does explain why the photos of those early NGLA bunkers looked as they did back then which appears to be quite different than they may ultimately have come to look under Macdonald's reign at NGLA.

Bradley,

If this is really your point then I suggest that the two photos of bunkers from 1926 undercut your point.

[Bradley Anderson]

His primary point here is in that early time in the infancy of agronomic research and understanding it took quite a bit of time to grow grass into the type of maturity some bunker faces and surrounds apparently needed to have to endure (not fall apart) on highly sandy soil and that that can and probably does explain why the photos of those early NGLA bunkers looked as they did back then which appears to be quite different than they may ultimately have come to look under Macdonald's reign at NGLA.

Bradley,

If this is really your point then I suggest that the two photos of bunkers from 1926 undercut your point.

David,

I apologize to you for not looking at those 1926 photos closely, but after I did I must concede that those bunkers are indeed flashed in way that is not too characteristic of the look and style that we all associate with NGLA. They are definitely not wind-blown or eroded. So that would indicate that CBM did build some flashed sand bunkers. Well there you go.

[TEPaul]

Brad:

One cannot depend on the photgraphs of just two bunkers at NGLA in 1926 to determine the type and style of bunkering at NGLA throughout. NGLA had a number of different types of bunker styles and frankly it still does (all the way from convex sand bunkers to fairway bunkers that have more minimal grassed down faces to the more well known bunkers that have massive grassed down faces and basically flat sand floors. In at least one instance Macdonald even used the "sleeper" (board) look and style on one hole with steep bunker faces---eventually he despensed with the "sleepers" on that hole and used grassed down faces to the original flat sand floors). In that sense it probably wasn't much different than the variety of bunker looks and styles in the linksland early on and even some of the good early inland courses (Sunningdale and Huntercombe in the English heathlands) that he was drawing his GB template and "classical" hole ideas from when he did his three separate study trips abroad (1902, 1904 and 1906). It would be a mistake to assume or conclude that Macdonald took all his architectural ideas from abroad from only linksland or seaside courses! When he was doing his four years of research abroad (1902-1906) there was enough really good inland architecture for him to draw from too! (hence his ideal composite hole course contained in this book).  

Your point is a good one about the efficacy of grassing down sand faces that were too steep initially which took time to grow in, particularly around a number of the pushed up greens. As you said that kind of thing was not just aesthetics but a realistic and necessary eventuality simply to create stability and prevent collapsing. There is a photo at NGLA of the fronting greenside bunkers on #8 that show them sand-flashed up almost all the way to the green surface high above initially. Obviously sand flashed bunkers that steep cannot endure and consequently they were grassed down to more formal sets of bunkers below with flatter sand floors (the front bunkers on the "Bottle" hole). That this needed to happen at NGLA isn't any different than what needed to happen for stability to the quite vertical sand faces of some bunkers at Pine Valley on particularly #2, #10 and #18----eg the initial extremely vertical sand faces that could not endure and were actually collapsing and sometimes taking portions of the fronts of greens down with them.

A course like Merion East, however, essentially just didn't get into creating any bunkers that had faces that were as steep, at least not after the first few years. The sand upsweeps on Merion's bunkers were created to be far more gradual and that is the bunker look that course became famous for---eg "The White Faces of Merion." A bunker historian and genius as competent and informed as Bill Kittleman is can wax long on the angle of repose that is necessary to maintain that type of long and visible sand upsweep (there is actually a physics principle to this that entails both weight (sand), granularity (sand) and angle of incline).

As Ron Prichard has long said, the bunkers of Merion East are probably the origination of the prototypical American bunker style, at least as a permanent type and style and look in golf course architecture as constructed. Did Hugh Wilson get that bunker type and look and style from NGLA when he visited it to study it early on in March 1911? That could be (even though Hugh Wilson actually wrote himself that this type of thing could be studied and determined by simply going to the dunes at the shore and observing Nature itself) but eventually he and Flynn designed and built their bunkers in such a way (much more gradual sand upsweeping faces) that they never needed to be grassed down to flat sand floors for stability as some of the bunkers at NGLA did. Pine Valley was somewhat different in that vein in that instead of grassing down those few original very steep sand faced massive bunkers they just broke them up into much smaller bunkers fairly far below the original highly upswept initial type and style that could not endure due to lack of stability and the stark reality of collapse.

[Tom MacWood]

"Bradley
They all had a learning curve, modern golf course architecture, construction and green-keeping was in its infancy relatively speaking, and it had nothing to do with CBM living in Chicago (your point). He surrounded himself with best advice available."


Tom MacWood:

Why don't you go back and read what Brad Anderson's real point is here? He did explain it to you again but you seem stuck on some minor point that you think he made that since CBM came from Chicago his learning curve stopped somehow because of that and even despite the experts he surrounded himself with at NGLA.

His primary point here is in that early time in the infancy of agronomic research and understanding it took quite a bit of time to grow grass into the type of maturity some bunker faces and surrounds apparently needed to have to endure (not fall apart) on highly sandy soil and that that can and probably does explain why the photos of those early NGLA bunkers looked as they did back then which appears to be quite different than they may ultimately have come to look under Macdonald's reign at NGLA.

Regardless of who or what so-called experts were involved back then we sure do have the documentation to prove the likes of NGLA and Pine Valley had some very serious agronomic problems on highly sandy soil early on.

This thread is on the evolution of the bunkering of NGLA and why and how it evolved as it did.

TEP
He is wrong about both points.

[Bill_McBride]

The only thing that cannot be argued on this thread is that John Ward was a stud.  2-2-4-2.   

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

He is right, and historically right, about both points.

[DMoriarty]

The only thing that cannot be argued on this thread is that John Ward was a stud.  2-2-4-2.   

No doubt.  He had a 32 for the side.   Anyone would have to play very well and get lucky to match that.
______________________________________

TEPaul,   

Did you not read Bradley's last post?   He acknowledges that CBM was intentionally building some flashed sand bunkers. 

The early bunker look wasn't just a temporary state as a result of his supposed inexperience or his supposed unfamiliarity with the conditions.   Otherwise, by 1926 the bunkers would no longer have had flashed faces.   

As for your speculation about Merion or even Flynn originating the flash face bunker look, you should look again at the NGLA photos.   A number of bunkers had flashed faces, and not just the huge ones like the Sahara.   

For example, here again is a photo of the Cape green from 1914, with a grass faced bunker in the immediate foreground, a flash faced bunker right behind it, and two bunkers where the sand is flashed up close to the top bunker line on the right. 

[TEPaul]

Moriarty:

As I'm sure even you recognize, at this point, very few people on this website really see the efficacy of trying to have an intelligent discussion with you on this website as it's virtually impossible. You've proven THAT over and over and over again on just about every thread you've ever participated in. The fact is there is practically noone on this website who you don't argue with simply for argument's sake.


"TEPaul,    
Did you not read Bradley's last post?   He acknowledges that CBM was intentionally building some flashed sand bunkers."


I did read Bradley's last post, and frankly I speak to Brad on the phone enough, and the fact is I know exactly where he's coming from on this issue and the additional fact is Bradley does not know NGLA and its architectural history as well as I do and frankly neither do you. The fact REALLY IS that there was and still is a lot of different bunker styles and looks and types at NGLA. Apparently you may not be aware of that and how could you be if you've only seen the place one time? I've known it for about fifty years, Moriarty. So has Pat. That's a bit different than you no matter how you or anyone else wants to slice it!    

"The early bunker look wasn't just a temporary state as a result of his supposed inexperience or his supposed unfamiliarity with the conditions."


I never said that early bunker look was the result of his supposed inexperience! It seems both you and MacWood are telling Bradley Anderson and me that we are saying that but we aren't. Once again, THAT is not what either of us said even if it IS what you and MacWood keep claiming WE said!  


"Otherwise, by 1926 the bunkers would no longer have had flashed faces."


You just showed him TWO bunkers you claim are 1926 and you are CLAIMING they are the bunker look and type and style throughout NGLA back then. I'm telling you that is not the case and that back then there were a lot of different types and styles and looks with the bunkering of NGLA (and I just cited it all above) and there STILL ARE.  


"As for your speculation about Merion or even Flynn originating the flash face bunker look, you should look again at the NGLA photos."


I realize that and I said it above and perhaps you should review again what I said about that!

  

"A number of bunkers had flashed faces, and not just the huge ones like the Sahara."



They did back then and essentially some of them pretty much still do but others that I mentioned don't for the practical reasons I gave and Brad Anderson mentioned the agronomic reasons for. You seem to be suggesting Macdonald didn't want any of that (grassed down faces) at NGLA and I am telling you now and I will again if you keep pressing the point that I disagree with you and I think (no, I know) you are wrong about that.  

"For example, here again is a photo of the Cape green from 1914, with a grass faced bunker in the immediate foreground, a flash faced bunker right behind it, and two bunkers where the sand is flashed up close to the top bunker line on the right."  

I realize that and I don't deny those bunkers on that Cape hole looked like that initially but that hole was redesigned early on and by Macdonald and didn't look like that in his tenure. Actually that hole under Macdonald (and as restored recently) actually had and has a "beach" bunker; just another of the many different types of bunkers at NGLA both back then and now.

Perhaps what you should do next is go there numerous times as some of us have who understand that golf course better than you do. I do understand how a golf course like that one with that kind of architecture (in my top favorite few in the world) just totally blows away some observer like you who's only seen it one time. That's understandable but I think you can also understand it gets a bit grating for someone like you who's only seen it once (when some of us have been around it for perhaps half a century) tries to tell us that YOU are therefore the expert on Macdonald or NGLA or its bunkers and their history and evolution!

Maybe you think you can understand NGLA and its architecture both back then and today by simply analyzing and arguing old text, but I sure don't! There is a whole lot more to understanding architecture and the history of the architecture of a great course like that one than the way you've gone about it on here.

What did Macdonald, the man you seem to so idolize say himself, Moriarty? "To truly understand a golf course you have to play it in every kind of wind, weather..........." 

Why do you think you should be the exception?   

[Tom MacWood]

Tom MacWood:

He is right, and historically right, about both points.

With all due respect history is not your strong suit.

[DMoriarty]

Again with the I know more because of access nonsense?  Give it a rest already.   I don't know why you are trying to turn this into yet another ugly thread, but you are on your own.

You guys were trying to explain away the look in those early photos as transitional, but the look stuck until the mid-20s at least.  While a number of bunkers lost their look between then and now, the agronomic reasons offered by you and Bradley don't explain it.

Bradley's post where he acknowledges that he was wrong about these bunkers was quite refreshing and appreciated.  You should try it.   You'd gain more respect that you will lose face. 

And Tom, from the beginning of this discussion I have acknowledged that this was not the only bunker style at NGLA, and even explained what I thought some of those differences were and possible reasons for them.   So please don't pretend that I ever wrote that this was the only style at NGLA. 

As for the date of those photos, I explained from where I got them, so if you don't believe me about the date you can look it up yourself.

[TEPaul]

"With all due respect history is not your strong suit."


Tom MacWood:

It is of course very true to say that historians and even very good ones have pretty much always had their differences and disagreements about how to look at history generally and present it, and even about the very same subjects. As I've said many times on here, and with all due respect to you too, I think you are an excellent historical researcher but not good at all with historical analysis. I think it would serve you better and the subjects you're interested in if you would stick to the research end of things and perhaps team up with someone who knows how to analyze historical material and history better than you do. Or failing that you could always just admit to some of the real and inherent reasons you come at some subjects the way you do. That would probably be good advice for all of us!

The other issue you know very well I've had with you is the fact you either don't want to or feel you can't get to actually intimately know the subject you are dealing with such as a club, its administrative records, its memberhip, their ethos etc, etc. I think any dedicated historian who goes about it that way is not and cannot do more than half the job, at best!
 
 

[TEPaul]

Moriarty:

As to your post #186, those are just some of the things I truly feel about studying and analyzing golf course architecture, at least comprehensively and that includes the necessity of real familiarity and generally over time. There is nothing ugly about it or about me saying it even though I both can and do understand why you resist it and say the same kinds of things about it and about the way I look at it that you always have on here. It has just occured to me that your secret desire in life would be to have lived my life!  

I can completely picture you reeling in panic and hysteria over that one but it is nonetheless likely the case.

[Bradley Anderson]

I have been out with a nasty fever and cold. What the hell happened when I was gone? Now I got Moriarty saying that I acknowledged that I was wrong?  

Well I was wrong to assume that there were no sand flashed bunkers at NGLA. Clearly in the picture David has found, there are bunkers that have sandy faces. And I think this supports the ideas David presents at the beginning of this subject.

But I still think that there would have been grow-in issues with bunkers on Long Island at this time, especially through the green.

Here we know that before 1913, the Long island clubs were reseeding the fairways every fall to recover from what dried up and died in the summer months. So if significant portions of fairway turf, which is more inclined to collect rain water than bunker surrounds turf ever can, has to be reseeded every fall, well I think one has to assume that all those bunkers, through the green, would have taken some time to grow a defined edge. I think the density and health of the turf would have taken time to provide stability. Probably the bunkers near the greens would have benefited from the irrigation coverage on the greens and approaches before 1913. But obviously there are a lot of bunkers outside that radius.

If there were grow-in issues, than that might explain the difference in how some of those bunkers appear in the early photos, and now.

But I don't think anyone can deny that those are some incredible photos that show a lot of different styles being attempted.

One thing that I have not mentioned is I still don't entirely agree with those who call the look we associate with Mac/Raynor bunkering as "engineered". I have always observed that nature is loaded full of things that are strait and square. Bodies of water lay flat. Trees grow strait. What makes those Mac/Raynor courses so pleasing to look at is the ease with which the eye connects all the lines. You are aware that these features are block like, and yet they feel natural and so comfortable to look at. Did CBM ever write about this or comment on this?

[Tom MacWood]

"With all due respect history is not your strong suit."


Tom MacWood:

It is of course very true to say that historians and even very good ones have pretty much always had their differences and disagreements about how to look at history generally and present it, and even about the very same subjects. As I've said many times on here, and with all due respect to you too, I think you are an excellent historical researcher but not good at all with historical analysis. I think it would serve you better and the subjects you're interested in if you would stick to the research end of things and perhaps team up with someone who knows how to analyze historical material and history better than you do. Or failing that you could always just admit to some of the real and inherent reasons you come at some subjects the way you do. That would probably be good advice for all of us!

The other issue you know very well I've had with you is the fact you either don't want to or feel you can't get to actually intimately know the subject you are dealing with such as a club, its administrative records, its memberhip, their ethos etc, etc. I think any dedicated historian who goes about it that way is not and cannot do more than half the job, at best!
 

TEP
I understand the analysis criticism. I'd guess over the years I've disagreed with you on nine out of every ten issues which has proven to be pretty good judgement/analysis on my part, including when Wilson travelled abroad, Crump's suicide, the influence of popular culture on early GCA, Willie Campbell & Myopia, William Watson & White Bear YC, Herbert Strong & Engineers, HH Barker, Horace Hutchinson, Joshua Crane, William Flynn's formative years, Aronimink, SFGC, Quaker Ridge, Garden City, ANGC, Jockey, Bayside, Ekwanok, etc. I think you will find analysis is much easier when you have the facts in hand, and considerably more difficult when you don't.

Bradley
Where did you come up with your information that in 1913 every club on LI reseeded the fairways in the fall? LI is relatively large island made of all sorts of different conditions and environments. What golf course on LI set the standard for condition in 1913?

Do you think you might be over generalizing Macdonald & Raynor's architectural style?

[DMoriarty]

Moriarty:

As to your post #186, those are just some of the things I truly feel about studying and analyzing golf course architecture, at least comprehensively and that includes the necessity of real familiarity and generally over time. There is nothing ugly about it or about me saying it even though I both can and do understand why you resist it and say the same kinds of things about it and about the way I look at it that you always have on here. It has just occured to me that your secret desire in life would be to have lived my life!  

My God, how pathetic is that claim?   Sorry to disappoint you Tom, but I have no interest in living off the laurels of the long dead.

As for your approach to research, I second Tom MacWood's post below.  You are the best evidence of why research through osmosis rarely works.  You've been the most clueless about the very things you about which you claim special insight, and repeatedly so.

________________________________________________

Bradley,

You wrote

But I still think that there would have been grow-in issues with bunkers on Long Island at this time, especially through the green.

Here we know that before 1913, the Long island clubs were reseeding the fairways every fall to recover from what dried up and died in the summer months. So if significant portions of fairway turf, which is more inclined to collect rain water than bunker surrounds turf ever can, has to be reseeded every fall, well I think one has to assume that all those bunkers, through the green, would have taken some time to grow a defined edge. I think the density and health of the turf would have taken time to provide stability. Probably the bunkers near the greens would have benefited from the irrigation coverage on the greens and approaches before 1913. But obviously there are a lot of bunkers outside that radius.

If I recall correctly, one of the early accounts (Hutchinson in 1910 maybe?) noted that NGLA irrigated both greens and fairways to maintain the turf.   If this was true then I don't think that what you are saying would necessarily hold, would it? 

Take a look at the bunker edges in the following photograph, also posted above.   




Does it look like they had not been able to get a defined edge on any of the bunkers in the photograph, or does it look as if they edges they have were created to look the way they do?  These aren't that far from the green, but at least a few of them are not right on the green either.   

There are more fairway bunkers in the photos on the first page, and a number appear to have flashed faces and defined edges, don't they?  So I am not sure that your logic necessarily applies to this situation.  Are you? 



I don't deny that there were grow-in problems, but my understanding is that most of these problems occurred in 1907-1908, when the course was first constructed and seeded.   So some of these bunkers had been around a while before the course actually opened for play. 

[Anthony Gray]

  So is the bunkering now what CBM intended?

  Anthony

[DMoriarty]

  So is the bunkering now what CBM intended?

  Anthony

I think that CBM intended the bunkering to look natural, like what one might find on the links courses.  I've no reason to believe that the bunkering as it looked in 1910 or 1914 or 1926 was not as he intended.   But it was not all flashed-face rugged bunkers then, so I assume that it wasn't intended to be.  There were obviously some of these, but there were also some flashed face bunkers with a more defined edge, and also some grass faced bunkers.  All three of these types can be seen photo immediately above.  CBM emphasized variety in almost every aspect of golf course design.

As for the bunkers now, I'll let you draw your own conclusions . . .

Are the bunkers now as CBM intended?   If not, is the departure purely aesthetic?  Or is it also an issue of placement and playability?

[TEPaul]

"TEP
I understand the analysis criticism. I'd guess over the years I've disagreed with you on nine out of every ten issues which has proven to be pretty good judgement/analysis on my part, including when Wilson travelled abroad, Crump's suicide, the influence of popular culture on early GCA, Willie Campbell & Myopia, William Watson & White Bear YC, Herbert Strong & Engineers, HH Barker, Horace Hutchinson, Joshua Crane, William Flynn's formative years, Aronimink, SFGC, Quaker Ridge, Garden City, ANGC, Jockey, Bayside, Ekwanok, etc. I think you will find analysis is much easier when you have the facts in hand, and considerably more difficult when you don't."


Tom MacWood:

On some of those issues you just cited, I had the facts long before you ever did (even if it will be a cold day in Hell before you'd ever admit to that )and the ones you mentioned where you think you supplied some "facts" (and probably did) I don't agree with your analysis of what they mean anyway----never have as you well know. You can just continue to say on here that you are right and I am wrong but just listening to and watching you say that on here constantly in no manner or means makes what you say about the analysis of those issues right, in my opinion. In the final analysis, it seems the presentation of what this issues mean historically is the most important thing of all as most people tend towards the logical when they review these analyses and presentations. In that vein you might want to start considering how some of these clubs look at these things themselves after becoming aware or and considering some of the things that are written on here. Unfortunately for you to be able to do that you really will need to establish working relationships with these clubs if for no other reason than just to find out.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tom, MacWood, David and TEPaul,

Can't we have debates, passionate, heated debates without the personal angst thrown in.

Some of these "arguable" topics are very interesting, and would be more so without the backround nonsense.

I'll be back tonight to comment on the bunkering at NGLA.

Anthony Gray,

When I was in Southampton over the weekend I stopped by and spoke to both Macdonald and Raynor.
They were in a particularly good mood and very satisfied that 100 years after its introduction, that NGLA remained as an icon in American golf and was hosting the Walker Cup in 2013.

I'll detail more about our conversation when I post tonight or over this weekend.

[TEPaul]

Sorry Pat, but if Tom MacWood is going to continue to say on here history is not exactly my strong suit I am going to have something to say about that.   And furthermore, that isn't even personal, either way, as the subject of GCA history is what we talk about on here every day.

[TEPaul]

"If I recall correctly, one of the early accounts (Hutchinson in 1910 maybe?) noted that NGLA irrigated both greens and fairways to maintain the turf.   If this was true then I don't think that what you are saying would necessarily hold, would it?"



Moriarty:

If you recall correctly? If you RECALL WHAT?   

If you had the first damn clue of the volume (quantity in millions of gallons per year) requirements of a site like NGLA's both back then and very much still today you probably wouldn't say something like the above, at least not to make this point about the look of those bunkers you seem to be trying to make on here.

Do you have any idea about the irrigation volume requirements of a site like NGLA's compared to say one like Merion East? If so, let's hear from you what it is. The point is that issue very much relates to what Bradley Anderson has been saying about the growing in or grassing of many of those NGLA bunkers.

[TEPaul]

Bradley:

Your post #189 is a very good one. Good points and questions and much to think about.

[TEPaul]

"Did CBM ever write about this or comment on this?"


Brad:

That is a particularly good question. To my knowledge I don't believe he did write about that specifically, at least not that I've ever seen. But the thing for us to consider about that, and certainly as to NLGA's "look" that way with certain of its bunkers as well as how or why or when it became necessary to grass some of them down (or to use boards) to flat floors for stability at least, all we really need to consider is the verticality of some of those original faces whether they were originally sand and unstable for that reason and when he grassed them down for that or other reasons.

Of the truly vertical bunkers originally, I give you as the best examples at NGLA I'm aware of----the massive Redan bunker, the massive bunker fronting #8 green and perhaps the massive sand face fronting the Eden originally (if one is to believe the caption in the photo of that hole really is that hole). But I'm pretty sure there are a number of other examples originally at NGLA with that kind of verticality.


Essentially this is no different than some original massive sand faces on bunkers at another course with a real natural sand soil structure like NGLA's, Pine Valley. They also had to grass or vegetate plenty of areas including massive vertical sand bunker faces to create the necessary stability to prevent them from collapsing. However, at PV they seemed to do most of it by creating a different look----eg multiple individual bunkers surrounded by sod compared to the massive single grassed down face of say the Redan bunker.