A Compilation of Routing Maps, Plans and Architectural Drawings

[Jim_Kennedy]

Nice layout - Bill wasn't diddel-ing around, the course was 6,563 yards.
 

[Jim_Kennedy]

North Shore CC  - Glenview, Illinois







ACC - Portland, Oregon

[Matthew Rose]

The article accompanying the drawing says this course in Lincoln Nebraska was only going to be temporary, so the greens were sand, but there is still an 18 hole course at the site.


The completed 27 holes at Pioneer:

Wow, thanks for this. I used to go to the park when I was little, and I worked and played here in college. I always knew that there had been a third nine at one time, but I have never actually seen the plans for it. The practice range now sits where the first and second holes on the auxiliary nine were.


Otherwise the 18 hole course more or less exists just as drawn here, although there are no bunkers on the course anywhere, and I don't believe there has ever been a pond near the 14th green as long as I've known.


I also thought that the nines were originally reversed.... but they've flipped the nines at least twice in the last 30 years. I seem to recall when I worked there that they switched them every 10 years or so to even out play.

[Sven Nilsen]

Western Hills GC (Cincinnati, OH) - Cincinnati Enquirer March 16, 1913

[Dan Moore]

Do we know what the oldest routing map in the United States?  The oldest I have seen for Chicago is the 1897 map for the 18 hole course of the Chicago Golf Club in Wheaton. Are there any others in the United States which predate that one?

[Jim_Kennedy]

[Jim_Kennedy]

[MCirba]

Jim,

Thanks...it was always a mystery as to the designer of Hagerstown

[Sven Nilsen]

Do we know what the oldest routing map in the United States?  The oldest I have seen for Chicago is the 1897 map for the 18 hole course of the Chicago Golf Club in Wheaton. Are there any others in the United States which predate that one?

There was an 1896 map of Shinnecock that was printed in a number of papers.  I've seen an 1895 map of Belmont Springs floating around.  The earliest might be from a June 18, 1895 The Sun article which has maps of Morris County, St. Andrew's, Baltusrol, Tuxedo and Lakewood (see post #78 in this thread, courtesy of Joe Bausch).


Sven

[DMoriarty]

Sven and Dan,  Not sure whether it is the oldest routing map, but here is a routing map of the William Davis routing of Shinnecock Hills from around August of 1891:



Here is a routing map of Willie Dunn's 12 hole version (and adjacent 9 hole Women's Course) from 1893.  Note the contour lines:

[Niall C]

Out of interest what is the oldest plan with fairways edges shown by a line ?


Niall

[Bret Lawrence]

Niall,


I am not sure what the oldest map with fairway lines is and I haven't gone through every map on this thread.  However, I do recall being amazed by the detail on the 1898 version of Royal St. George's Golf Club.  You can view this map in Reply #347.  Are there any layouts older than this one, showing the lines of the fairways? 


Bret

[BCrosby]

Benjamin Hall-Blyth's map of the New Course dates to 1894. I understand that there are drawings of Westward Ho! and perhaps Hoylake that date to the mid 1880's.


It is hard to know whether these older maps are pre- or post-construction. We know that Hall-Blyth's is pre-construction because it is the map submitted to parliament for the approval of the R&A's purchase of the golfing grounds of TOC and surrounding property.


Whether other early maps were meant to guide the construction of the course or reflected the course as-built is hard to sort.


Bob

[Niall C]

Brett


It was actually that plan that I was thinking of when I posed the question. During the Scott Taylor saga I had suggested that the Road Hole sketch was outwith the time it purported to be from because it showed the fairway line which wasn't the done thing back then (IMO) and Mike C had posted the plan as a reposte of sorts. However if you look at the plan closely it differentiates between rough and fairway by using a symbol to represent long grass with the absence of any symbol for the short grass/fairway areas, and there is no actual line to represent the fairway boundary. I suspect that the plan also had a coloured wash to represent the different areas.


Bob


If I recall the BHB plan rightly it shows the course as one continuous stretch, hole after hole, rather than individual hole fairways. As you suggest the purpose likely was to show the extent of the playing area relative to the ownership boundaries. Not sure I've seen the Westward Ho and Hoylake plans but if they were in the Golfing Annuals/Handbooks of the time then I think they were just routing drawings but could be wrong.


Niall 

[BCrosby]

Niall -


Do you know where one might find a good digital copy of BHB's map of the New? The reproductions I've seen in books are not very good. The original is huge and I assume requires a special scanning machine.


Given the absence of clearly defined fairways on TOC at the time, I'm not sure why drawings of the New would show them.


Bob

[Jim_Kennedy]

From the Balsam's site:






Elk's course by Donald Ross  -  Wyandot GC - Ohio
http://billlisassportinglife.blogspot.com/
(Story is in the 2014 archive)

[Jim_Kennedy]

]

[Niall C]

Niall -


Do you know where one might find a good digital copy of BHB's map of the New? The reproductions I've seen in books are not very good. The original is huge and I assume requires a special scanning machine.


Given the absence of clearly defined fairways on TOC at the time, I'm not sure why drawings of the New would show them.


Bob

Bob


I had a look in Scott MacPhersons book last night but the BHB plan he has is of all the courses. The plan you refer to (I think) hangs in the new Links clubhouse for the New/Jubilee courses, or at least it used to. Or perhaps its a copy of what's in the R&A clubhouse. If I ever get in there I'll let you know !


It might be worth getting in touch with Scott as he might be able to send what he's got.


Niall

[MCirba]

Niall,

I don't recall the source of this 1888 drawing but came across it this morning looking up something else in my files.   

If nothing else I think it at least suggests that there were areas through the green that were specially prepared in contrast to the surrounding rough areas.   Crude Mowers?  Sheep?   Got me.

But it does differ from the common stick drawings in that regard, much like the later ones you mentioned from Royal St. George's.

[BCrosby]

Thanks Mike. Good find.


My guess is that the Troon drawing is of the course as-built.


What are the earliest pre-construction drawings? I have always assumed that BHB's of the New was not the earliest. But maybe it is?


Bob     

[Niall C]

Mie


Many thanks for that. I think I have seen that before but not sure where, in the club history book perhaps ? As Bob says it looks like an as built drawing. While the plan says 1888 (the year the course became 18 holes), I'm not entirely convinced that it was produced then but was maybe a later plan showing how the course was back then. What is interesting is that it shows a continuous course rather than individual hole fairways which is similar to how I remember the BHB plan of the New course. As you say, I don't think they would be relying entirely on sheep for cutting the grass and I suspect that they were using horse drawn gang mowers about then.


Bob


I recall Tom Paul asked that very question on here but I'm not sure he got a satisfactory answer. Certainly there were routing plans produced, either side of the Atlantic, before BHB did his plan for the New course but the question is whether they were produced after or before the courses were built/laid out. Given how elementary a lot of construction was back then compared to now, how much use would a plan have been for building purposes ? What I mean by that is when were plans produced for construction purposes ? I know (or at least I think I do) that Old Tom and Archie Simpson did separate plans for Cruden Bay in the mid 1890's prior to construction but I think that was more for consideration by the railway company to decide which plan to go with.


Niall
 

[Rees Milikin]

Howey GC (FL) - 1917 Routing

Sven,


Do you have an idea who drew this routing and where it is from?

[Sven Nilsen]

Rees-

No idea.

Sven

[Jim_Kennedy]

Rees,
One place you can find it is here:


http://floridahistoricgolftrail.com/courses/mission-inn-resort/?alttemplate=FeaturedCoursePage

[MCirba]

Niall,

Thanks for your thoughts on the Troon map.   I wish I could recall where I came across it!   

I found a few things of interest in trying to "date" it.   First, the key gives yardage from each green to the next by their hole names, not their numbers.   The course total is listed as "Total Lin Yds. 5856 or 3 miles 1 furlong 156 yards".   The map is also to a very precise scale.

The map also seems to have been functionally utilized as it indicates the "High Water Mark of Ordinary Spring Tides".   

Hope that helps.