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Jeff_Brauer

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #75 on: April 26, 2010, 11:08:08 AM »
Bob,

I just started to read your piece and am fascinated!  I will have more time tonight, but it is amazing how Crane came up with what looks like a GD or GW rating system all those years ago.  I would love to see TMac's counterpoint and am sure he makes a mix of points that some would agree or disagree with.  For one, seeing how much pub this got, I am sure the magazine editors ate it up just for circulation reasons rather than being douped.  I hope they got better sales figures for gca articles than the current golf magazines do......
Jeff Brauer, ASGCA Director of Outreach

BCrosby

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #76 on: April 26, 2010, 11:20:16 AM »
Jeff -

Thanks for taking the time to read my piece. But what is most interesting about the debates triggered by Crane was not his ratings. Other than  initial outrage over TOC's low rating, no one debated that this course or that should be rated here or there. The ratings details fell to the wayside pretty early on.

The more enduring subject of their debates (see referenced discussions by Croome, Ambrose, MacK, and Behr, interviews with Colt, Abercromy, etc.) and what my piece is really about is Crane's analysis of golf architecture. That, and not the ratings, is why the debates took off and got so heated. And why they were/are important.

Bob

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #77 on: April 26, 2010, 04:25:10 PM »
Bob:

Thanks for your Reply #74!

As you know since we've talked about this subject for so many years that I feel even if the so-called Crane vs Behr/Mackenzie debate was a hugely important and fundamental one to both golf architecture and golf itself, for a number of reasons I don’t think it was particularly well joined at the time by the participants. Frankly, I view that as a great tragedy. I wish it had been and it should've been but there were too many circumstances involving personal attacks and deflections, debating ploys using inadequate terms that prevented it but the real shame of it to me was that the real fundamental baseline issues of golf and golf architecture they were debating just couldn't quite be well enough explained back then, particularly by Behr who I think did a Yeoman's job of it nevertheless.

This may be the main reason that debate seems to some today to have been something of a blip in the broader scheme of things. If that is true, however, I still believe it is hugely important and fundamental to both golf architecture and golf itself.

And that is why I think your reprising of it in your essay "Joshua Crane" was so important too. Particularly important in your essay was your recasting of the terms and concepts in that debate from the commonly used "Penal vs Strategic" to the far more appropriate and understandable terms of Control, Predictability and Proportionality (C,P & P) as well as your term "Equitable Architecture."

As you know I always thought you should have hit a lot harder with perhaps the fundamental aspect of all about golf that makes it so different and frankly unique compared to most all other ball or stick and ball games with human competitors or opponents----eg THE BALL IS NOT VIED FOR IN GOLF!! (I realize you mentioned it in footnote #5 in Part III and inferred it elsewhere yourself or from a quote or so from Behr).

As time goes by, I realize more and more that alone and what ALL it really means for golf and golf architecture and the way it should be compared to the road it should never really go down, but has, is at the very heart of all of this.

Max Behr saw that and he articulated it well enough, in my opinion, but with a mind and a writing style like he had ironically his messages were probably doomed to not be very well understood. It's hard to tell whether Crane understood this or not or just neglected to admit it or acknowledge it for obvious reasons.

Frankly, Behr's articles on the comparison of golf to other stick and ball games between human opponents vying for a common ball and how the latter of necessity must maximize control and predictability with defined limitations of space simply to make those games utilize both SPACE and TIME efficiently between human opponents vying for a common ball is pretty special, as well as why by contrast, since golf has no vying for a common ball it needs none of this and therefore can and should maintain its natural random outcomes of luck.

Unfortunately, it seems unless that fundamental message (the ball is not vied for in golf) is constantly hammered home most golfers will continue to intuit, as Joshua Crane did, that golf like those other games should always strive for greater fairness and equity and it seems given the last eighty years after that debate most have agreed with.

One additional sidebar on the concept of “equity” as used in the Rules of Golf is that so few seem to understand how unique that concept is as it is used in Golf’s Rules, at least by that party who might be termed the old “Conservative” (purist) party.  

« Last Edit: April 26, 2010, 04:32:44 PM by TEPaul »

Tom MacWood

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #78 on: April 26, 2010, 11:02:27 PM »
Bob
I liked your essay, but I thought it was misleading on occasion and didn't address what I believe was a much bigger story.

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #79 on: April 27, 2010, 06:43:54 AM »
Tom MacWood
Sr. Member
 Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #78 on: Yesterday at 09:02:27 PM »   
 
"Bob
I liked your essay, but I thought it was misleading on occasion and didn't address what I believe was a much bigger story."





The STORY probably doesn't get much bigger than this (the following):





The ideas that underlay what I have described as “equitable architecture” have dominated popular views of golf design since before the Golden Age.[6] That domination is now so pervasive and has lasted so long that it is widely believed today such views are timeless and beyond questioning. But the Crane debates are a reminder that such views represent only one perspective – and a controversial one at that – of what the fundamental organizing principles of good architecture ought to be. Those debates recall to us that equitable architecture has a history, that its prominence today was not preordained and, most importantly, that as a design philosophy it is fraught with worrisome issues.[7] Perhaps by giving those views a more fitting name, we will be better able to assess its strengths and weaknesses.

The claim here is not that Crane is somehow responsible for the most widely held modern views about golf architecture. He’s not. Golfers aren’t thinking of Crane when they say that “fairness” and resistance to scoring are the sine qua non of good golf design. Nor is the claim here that the USGA, the PGA or Augusta National all have Crane in mind when preparing their venues for golf competitions, even if the ideas on which their preparations are based are remarkably similar to Crane’s. By the time golf architecture awakened from its long sleep during the Great Depression and World War II, Joshua Crane was a forgotten figure of a bygone era.

The claim being made here about Crane is not a causal one. The claim is rather that, first,  Crane and other the proponents of equitable architecture all draw on similar intuitions about “fair play”. Second, that Crane helps to see why importing such ideas from other sports into golf architecture seems so natural and how central they are to the most widely held views about golf design. And finally, that the responses of Behr, MacKenzie, Croome and others to Crane’s project give us the clearest, most thorough articulation we have of why taking equitable concerns appropriate to other sports and importing them into the design of golf courses is a problematical enterprise. Which is to say, if you want to understand the real points of friction in disagreements over foundational issues in golf architecture since the Golden Age, you would do well to use Joshua Crane and the fuss he stirred up in the 1920’s as your starting point.


[6] MacKenzie, Behr and other Golden Age designers had no doubt that such views dominated during the Golden Age. Rightly or wrongly, these architects often depicted themselves as a misunderstood minority swimming against the tide of popular opinion.
[7] Why it is misguided to transpose equitable principles from other sports into golf goes to the very heart of the theory of strategic architecture. Strategic golf design entails (in a strong sense) a view of golf as being agnostic to the kinds of competitive equities that play a central role in other sports. The case for that entailment is, in essence, the flip side of the narrative above. That, however, is a topic beyond the scope of this essay.


The End

Robert Crosby, All rights reserved
   

« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 06:47:51 AM by TEPaul »

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #80 on: April 27, 2010, 06:50:55 AM »
Tom MacWood:

Thanks again for emailing me your so-called 'counterpoint essay' of Bob Crosby's essay, "Joshua Crane." I've now read it carefully.

Tom MacWood

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #81 on: April 27, 2010, 06:51:25 AM »

The claim being made here about Crane is not a causal one. The claim is rather that, first,  Crane and other the proponents of equitable architecture all draw on similar intuitions about “fair play”.


Who are/were the other proponents of equitable architecture?

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #82 on: April 27, 2010, 07:05:55 AM »
“Who are/were the other proponents of equitable architecture?





The recent historical record affirms the continuing popularity of “equitable architecture”. Nothing captures the essence of the “equitable school” better than Sandy Tatum’s 1974 response to player and press complaints about the overly “penal” nature of the US Open at Winged Foot that year. Tatum quipped that, “We are not trying to embarrass the best players in the world. We are trying to identify them.” The oft-repeated mantra that the central mission of a golf course is to “separate the wheat from the chaff” also captures the idea. Other nostrums such as, “This course is tough but fair” or “I like this course because it is all in front of you” or “there is nothing tricky about this course, you get what you deserve” or “I can’t complain, the punishments fit the crime” are other examples. Such locutions have become clichés. And they all, at root, assume that a golf course’s central mission is to function as a venue for equitable golfing competitions.

Trent Jones and other post-World War II architects broke with their Golden Age forebears in a number of different ways, but one of the most significant was the added emphasis they put on shot “controls” and sporting equities in their designs. The concept of a “Monster” course, an idea that first became popular in the early 1950’s, is in many respects the application the Crane’s CP&P principles in extremis. Trent Jones, summing up the design philosophy that informed his changes to Baltusrol for the 1967 US Open, wrote:

…[W]e have come to two definite conclusions: first, that modern players are hitting the ball farther and second, that they are hitting the center of the fairway more often. Therefore it is my contention that values should be tightened to meet the high standards which the great improvements in clubs and balls have made possible. In doing this, traps must be moved out to where they will have the same meaning they had in the Jones era, and fairways must be narrowed to develop a comparable latitude for error as when they were played by wooden-shafted clubs.

In tightening these values we have one sole objective – to test the play of modern golfers, so that the best man wins, and the golfer who has made the least shots and played the most brilliant golf is declared the champion. The tightening of any values must be done fairly. There should be no tricks, nor any trickiness on any part of the course.

Writing about his work at Oakland Hills in 1953, the original “Monster” course, Trent Jones noted:

…We have tried to eliminate anything that might be considered tricky. Al Watrous, the club’s popular pro, has hit hundreds of balls to prove the values were testing but just.
In a nutshell, Oakland Hills has been redesigned with target areas to be hit from the tee and by second shots on long holes and pin areas to be aimed for at the green. The truly great and accurate shots will earn their just rewards. The slightest miss or badly executed shot will be punished. A great champion should emerge.

Trent Jones’s set-up philosophy for US Open venues has been, in effect, institutionalized by all of the major sanctioning bodies in the US. But they are views that might have been lifted from a passage written by Crane eighty years earlier. Narrowing of landing areas with rough or bunkering is about “shot controls”; using stimp meters to assure consistent green speeds; using “thumper” machines to assure consistent turf firmness and carefully conditioning turf are all about “predictability”; and the emphasis in recent years on graduated rough and penalties are all about “proportionality”. All of which means that there is not much light between modern tournament set-up philosophies and Crane’s CP&P principles.

It’s also not coincidental that Crane and Trent Jones had similar responses to improvements in balls and clubs. While Behr, MacKenzie, Bobby Jones, Simpson and others wanted improvements to equipment rolled back rather than tamper with classic golf courses, Crane’s response to such improvements was to “modernize” those very same golf courses. Trent Jones would have concurred with Crane. In their respective eras both embraced advances in technology and believed those advances demanded a range of “improvements” to older, classic golf courses. Such sentiments have only gained momentum in recent decades as further leaps in technology have heightened the pressure to “fix” Golden Age courses.
*                                       *                                       *



The claim here is not that Crane is somehow responsible for the most widely held modern views about golf architecture. He’s not. Golfers aren’t thinking of Crane when they say that “fairness” and resistance to scoring are the sine qua non of good golf design. Nor is the claim here that the USGA, the PGA or Augusta National all have Crane in mind when preparing their venues for golf competitions, even if the ideas on which their preparations are based are remarkably similar to Crane’s. By the time golf architecture awakened from its long sleep during the Great Depression and World War II, Joshua Crane was a forgotten figure of a bygone era.


The claim being made here about Crane is not a causal one. The claim is rather that, first,  Crane and other the proponents of equitable architecture all draw on similar intuitions about “fair play”. Second, that Crane helps to see why importing such ideas from other sports into golf architecture seems so natural and how central they are to the most widely held views about golf design. And finally, that the responses of Behr, MacKenzie, Croome and others to Crane’s project give us the clearest, most thorough articulation we have of why taking equitable concerns appropriate to other sports and importing them into the design of golf courses is a problematical enterprise. Which is to say, if you want to understand the real points of friction in disagreements over foundational issues in golf architecture since the Golden Age, you would do well to use Joshua Crane and the fuss he stirred up in the 1920’s as your starting point.

THE END

Robert Crosby, All rights reserved
   




« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 07:08:50 AM by TEPaul »

Tom MacWood

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #83 on: April 27, 2010, 07:15:39 AM »
Who were the proponents of equitable architecture in Crane's day?

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #84 on: April 27, 2010, 07:30:21 AM »
“Who were the proponents of equitable architecture in Crane's day?”



I would say Joshua Crane and anyone else of Joshua Crane’s day who subscribed to the following:



After making the required measurements and applying his weighting formulae, Crane believed he had “furnished an accurate and graphic method of exposing the weak point of any particular course.” In other words, after a “scientific” assessment, the specific things that needed improving (that is, things that would make certain features more “ideal” under his system) would jump off his spreadsheets, ready to be “recorded” by the architect and then installed by the green committee. It was just a matter of collecting the data.[1]

Crane used his ratings in exactly that way. Specific proposals for improving a hole were derived from the deficiencies uncovered by his rating of that hole. His rating of a hole was, in effect, a short hand description of changes required to bring the hole closer to Crane’s “ideal”. For example, his rating of the 16th at Pine Valley proposed lowering the mid-body ridge to make the green visible from the tee, removing trees, and installing a diagonal bunker across the front of the green to provide more “control” for the approach shot, all for the purpose of making it a hole that would come closer to a 100% rating. For the 5th at Myopia Hunt Crane’s proposed improvements included:

"…adding twenty yards to the second shot to encourage carry of the bunker to the left, shortening the bunker slightly giving nearly two thirds of the fairway to the right, and enlarging the further (sic) bunker on the right so that the right hand end is a little nearer the tee and the left hand projects half way across the fairway to control the long driver a bit more. Then the fair but severe rough on the left substituted for the present bushes, and mounds and swamp on the right by sand dunes and bunkers, a … hole will be ensured …which will force both control and length if par is to be secured."

These proposed “improvements” were, in essence, the application of Crane’s larger reformist program to specific features of a given hole. His rankings were the business end of the big stick with which Crane wanted to push golf design into a new and better era. Much as modern discoveries in chemistry had overthrown antiquated beliefs in alchemy, so a “calm scientific investigation” of specific courses would overthrow older “superstitions” that had plagued golf architecture and propped up the reputations of many older links courses. Crane saw himself as bringing the sweet light of reason to a hidebound golf establishment:

"The popularity of golf and consequently the real charm is due to the improvement of its clubs, longer balls, better tees, better fairways fairer rough, better control, better greens. Who would want to go back to balls which could only be driven one hundred yards? The thrill would be gone. Who would want to play on courses as they were fifty years ago? Is the beauty of a property laid out on a hole, with green turf and white sand, a detriment to our enjoyment of the open spaces and lovely surroundings? Do we want to play a wide open expanse of lawn-like country, with no punishments for wild shots?

No. The standard of play is improving because the punishment for poor play is becoming universally fairer. Why do good billiard players insist on a perfect table and balls and even constant temperature?

Why do tennis players insist on tight rackets, uniform balls and level courts?

Why do polo players insist on a new ball every few minutes and on having the field as well rolled and smooth as possible?

Because the better player usually wins, no matter what the conditions and implements (a very common argument of those insisting that a large amount of luck is necessary for pleasure in golf), the real pleasure lies in the manipulation of these implements in a skillful and thoughtful way, and under conditions where victory or defeat is due to superior or inferior handling, not to good or bad luck beyond either player’s control.

No! Golf course development is on the right track, and those who take the other attitude are already finding themselves side-tracked by their own ignorance and lack of comprehension of the demands of human nature for fair play."


Crane’s aim was not merely to make courses more difficult. He was not the clownish “penologist” sometimes depicted by his critics. Rather Crane was a crusader for “fair play.” Though hazards should be robust, the punishments they inflict should be “proportional,” by which he meant punishments ought to be commensurate with the degree of the missed shot. Crane objected, for example, to the wall along the right side of the 16th at the Old Course. Its proximity to the fairway centerline meant that even minor misses to that side would suffer draconian consequences. Crane had similar reservations about water hazards. Trees were likewise a disfavored type of “control” for Crane. They might block one player but leave others with clear approaches to the green, thus failing to punish similarly shots that were similarly missed. Trees also caused uneven turf conditions, creating inconsistent playing conditions and thereby giving luck too big a role in competitive outcomes. Particularly problematical were blind shots. A well designed hole should unambiguously signal the consequences of a good or bad play and blind shots, by definition, failed to provide such signals.

For Crane there were consequences for courses that didn’t live up to his edicts. When luck or fluke interfered with competitive results, the problem wasn’t just “unfairness.” The problem was that golf’s claim to being a sport was put at risk. The issue was exemplified for Crane by an incident during the final match of the 1911 U.S. Amateur.

"It is impossible not to wonder if Herreshoff and his friends felt that [luck was an acceptable part of things] when Hilton on the thirty-seventh hole in the finals at Apawamis, having sliced his approach thirty or forty yards off the green, strikes a rock and bounds onto the green, thereby winning the U.S. championship. The true sportsman deplores such happenings, and happily the modern architect is striving to eliminate these rawnesses (sic)."

« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 07:34:37 AM by TEPaul »

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #85 on: April 27, 2010, 07:36:21 AM »
Who were the proponents of equitable architecture in Crane's day?

Tommy Mac

I think JH Taylor and to some degree J Braid were proponents of equitable architecture in Crane's day.  To some degree they won out on championship courses, but thankfully, these chaps had the good sense to know when to apply these equitable principles and when not to.  

Honestly though, I believe the concept of equitable control was taken much further in the States with designers like Tillie and Flynn with the culmination of acceptance of this sort of design theory being the '51 Open at Oakland Hills.  After that Open a pattern was set which wasn't seriously questioned until fairly recently.  One could also argue that the Crump and Fownes were perhaps the extreme of this idea.  

Gosh, taking the idea to its extreme with matters such as eliminating blind shots, Colt, Dr Mac and CBM could be accused of being influenced by equitable design

I don't think the idea is either/or because design is on a continuum between penal and strategic with the concept of fairness falling anywhere one likes on that continuum.  

Ciao
« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 07:43:13 AM by Sean Arble »
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

Tom MacWood

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #86 on: April 27, 2010, 09:09:58 AM »
Who were the proponents of equitable architecture in Crane's day?

Tommy Mac

I think JH Taylor and to some degree J Braid were proponents of equitable architecture in Crane's day.  To some degree they won out on championship courses, but thankfully, these chaps had the good sense to know when to apply these equitable principles and when not to.  

Honestly though, I believe the concept of equitable control was taken much further in the States with designers like Tillie and Flynn with the culmination of acceptance of this sort of design theory being the '51 Open at Oakland Hills.  After that Open a pattern was set which wasn't seriously questioned until fairly recently.  One could also argue that the Crump and Fownes were perhaps the extreme of this idea.  

Gosh, taking the idea to its extreme with matters such as eliminating blind shots, Colt, Dr Mac and CBM could be accused of being influenced by equitable design

I don't think the idea is either/or because design is on a continuum between penal and strategic with the concept of fairness falling anywhere one likes on that continuum.  

Ciao

Sean
What attributes of Taylor and Braid's architecture make them equitable...and what time period are you referring to, both men had very long design careers?


BCrosby

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #87 on: April 27, 2010, 10:10:40 AM »
Tom Mac -

Taylor, 1902:

"[D]ue care should be exercised in seeing that each hole is placed well clear of obstacles, and that hazards should only be calculated to catch and punish a player who after playing a bad or faulty stroke deserves to meet such fate."

There are a number of other passages along the same lines. As far as I can tell Taylor consistently advocated the placement of hazards so as to catch bad shots that "deserved" their fate. The worse the shot, the more severe the hazards should be. Ergo, his adocacy of cross bunkers, meant to most severely penalize the most severe miss - the top. it was all about building courses where the severity of the hazard matched up with the severity of the miss.

All in all, pretty classic "equitable" approach to gca. In the same vein, Taylor thought it "unfair" if almost good shots are punished more severely than worse shots. See my Taylor quote in the Crane piece about Tayor's dislike of c/l bunkers. His dislike of the Road Hole had a similar rationale. Which is also what "proportionality" means in the context of gca. A concept inseparable from equity.

It's possible Taylor changed his mind about this later in life. I don't know. But certainly those were his views up to WWI when he was most active as an architect. During those years he was the poster child for equitable architecture. Which, btw, is one of the reasons he drew the ire of John Low and Tom Simpson.

You have noted in the past Taylor's objections to courses with "too many bunkers". Those objections, however, are entirely consistent with - in fact they reaffirm - his being an "equitable" architect. 


Bob

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #88 on: April 27, 2010, 10:21:25 AM »
"After a while the pots even made their appearance in the fairway, but generally placed in such a position that the worst of bad shots was quite safe, while the good drive or second shot invariably came to rest comfortably tucked up right under the bank. The worst of this type of hazard was that they were rarely seen from the tee, and not until your caddie exclaimed with a grin, ‘Your in, sir,’ did you know that the depression with its velvet-like piece of turf at which you had so carefully aimed was lurking-place of that monster the ‘Spittoon’ as one professional unkindly called it.

This type of bunker is the one that is so much in vogue today, but quite recently there has sprang up a system that bids fair to oust it from public favor. This style of bunker which I claim conceit was of my own initiating, takes the form of irregular hills and hollows, the idea being able to copy Nature as closely as the hand of man admits. This new type was first laid down on the links of the Mid-Surrey Club, to whom I have the honour of being the resident professional. Naturally there was a certain amount of skepticism when the scheme was first mooted, but I prevailed upon the committee to allow me to try the effect on one hole.

The value of this system of bunkering lies in it’s powers of graduating the punishment meted out to those golfers who at times wander from the narrow, straight path. The hills and hollows can be constructed that the further the player gets off the course the worse the punishment. The punishment can be made to fit the crime, as it were, and there are few to be found who will not agree that this is as it should be. It is obviously unfair that the ball just finds its way off the course should be treated with the same severity as the ball that is half-way towards the next county."

The Evolution of the Bunker by J. H. Taylor (an excerpt from his book The Art of Golf)



Sounds to me like the man was into the same kind of "equitable architecture" and "fairness" philosophy Joshua Crane was!

« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 10:23:41 AM by TEPaul »

Tom MacWood

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #89 on: April 27, 2010, 10:46:55 AM »
The state of golf architecture was quite different in 1902 and 1911 than it was in the 20s. Should Taylor's comments in 1902 or 1911 be judged against the accepted norms of golf architecture in 1926 or 1927 when Crane was debating Behr? It is not a historically appropriate comparison IMO. Didn't Taylor's ideas evolve over time?

Crane was not breaking any new ground with most of his ideas on golf architecture, they were the conventional thoughts at that time, especially in America.

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #90 on: April 27, 2010, 11:07:06 AM »
While I understand trying to pin down words, I think it probably better to look at the courses.  Often times the writings of a chap don't match what he put in the ground.  Sometimes, the writings are an ideal for the writer and most ideals are nearly impossible to achieve.  This is why I think JH's bite was much worse than his bark - same with Braid.  Plus, we have to consider that perhaps Hawtree tempered JH to some degree.  Anyway, I am not going in search of examples from each period in JH's life as I am satisfied I understand what JH's feeling on the matter were - as best as we can understand from this vantage point looking back. 

To me, the far more important question is the American architects because I believe there was a serious break in design theory by the time teh Golden Age came round.  It has always been my impression that some of the guys of the Golden Age were seriously into creating fair and difficult courses. Indeed, many of these courses today remain difficult despite their yardage not increasing all that much relatively speaking. 

Ciao
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

Peter Pallotta

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #91 on: April 27, 2010, 11:10:50 AM »
It was such a fluid time, it seems to me. (What happened, for example, to the discussion in GB&I after 1913 and Ouimet's U.S. Open win -- suddenly, you had people saying that British courses weren't 'testing' enough...the same complaint that some had -- or once had, and would have again -- about American courses.)  And then there was that article I read a while back, from 1906, about what they called "Thinking Golf" and how it was all the rage in America. It mentioned Walton Heath as a wonderful example of Thinking Golf -- the idea being that hazards should be placed/arranged so that players could think and play their way around them instead of being forced to go over them. And the article noted that the great amateurs of the day were more enamoured of the Thinking Golf idea than the professionals were, one of whom (I think it was Taylor, or it may have been Braid) thought it 'unfair' that a worse player was not necessarily penalized for being unable to get over a hazard that the better player could.  

Peter

BCrosby

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #92 on: April 27, 2010, 11:20:11 AM »
The state of golf architecture was quite different in 1902 and 1911 than it was in the 20s. Should Taylor's comments in 1902 or 1911 be judged against the accepted norms of golf architecture in 1926 or 1927 when Crane was debating Behr? It is not a historically appropriate comparison IMO. Didn't Taylor's ideas evolve over time?

Crane was not breaking any new ground with most of his ideas on golf architecture, they were the conventional thoughts at that time, especially in America.

I agree with both points. Remember, however, that one of the reasons Crane wrote what he wrote was because in the 1920's he saw the "equitable" architecture he preferred as losing ground to strategic architecture as promoted by MacK, Colt, Darwin, Behr, etc.

Crane, with a different twist or two, wanted to reinstate many of the same ideas that Taylor had advocated earlier. Their views were not identical but they were certainly kissin' cousins.

I would add about their similarities that both Taylor and Crane reflect the architectural assumptions of the everyday golfer much better than a MacK, a Darwin or a Behr do. It is no less true today. Crane's argument was really with the professional golf architects of the Golden Age, not with street views of what good architecture should be. In a rough and ready way, you can see Crane as someone who was articulating and elaborating design ideas based on the street view. I think the same is also roughly true of Taylor's views.

Bob    

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #93 on: April 27, 2010, 11:31:47 AM »
The state of golf architecture was quite different in 1902 and 1911 than it was in the 20s. Should Taylor's comments in 1902 or 1911 be judged against the accepted norms of golf architecture in 1926 or 1927 when Crane was debating Behr? It is not a historically appropriate comparison IMO. Didn't Taylor's ideas evolve over time?

Crane was not breaking any new ground with most of his ideas on golf architecture, they were the conventional thoughts at that time, especially in America.

I agree with both points. Remember, however, that one of the reasons Crane wrote what he wrote was because in the 1920's he saw the "equitable" architecture he preferred as losing ground to strategic architecture as promoted by MacK, Colt, Darwin, Behr, etc.

Crane, with a different twist or two, wanted to reinstate many of the same ideas that Taylor had advocated earlier. Their views were not identical but they were certainly kissin' cousins.

I would add about their similarities that both Taylor and Crane reflect the architectural assumptions of the everyday golfer much better than a MacK, a Darwin or a Behr do. It is no less true today. Crane's argument was really with the professional golf architects of the Golden Age, not with street views of what good architecture should be. In a rough and ready way, you can see Crane as someone who was articulating and elaborating design ideas based on the street view. I think the same is also roughly true of Taylor's views.

Bob    

Bob

The thing is, I can't think of a single non-championship course in the UK which matched this idea of equitable control.  And if I were to push it, I think guys like Colt would pop up more than either JH or Braid.  So, assuming there were very few examples of equitable architecture I would have thought guys like JH were fighting upstream - BUT I ahaen't seen a JH course I would say is heavily leaning toward EA.  In fact, the ones I have seen were soundly designed and adhered to more strategic principles even if they weren't terribly exciting courses.  IMO, the debate rests solidly on American designed courses because I just don't see where JH's views gained any traction in the UK.  Mind you, we could be mis-interpreting JH and indeed the nuances of the entire debate.

Ciao  
« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 11:36:02 AM by Sean Arble »
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BCrosby

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #94 on: April 27, 2010, 11:38:00 AM »
It was such a fluid time, it seems to me. (What happened, for example, to the discussion in GB&I after 1913 and Ouimet's U.S. Open win -- suddenly, you had people saying that British courses weren't 'testing' enough...the same complaint that some had -- or once had, and would have again -- about American courses.)  And then there was that article I read a while back, from 1906, about what they called "Thinking Golf" and how it was all the rage in America. It mentioned Walton Heath as a wonderful example of Thinking Golf -- the idea being that hazards should be placed/arranged so that players could think and play their way around them instead of being forced to go over them. And the article noted that the great amateurs of the day were more enamoured of the Thinking Golf idea than the professionals were, one of whom (I think it was Taylor, or it may have been Braid) thought it 'unfair' that a worse player was not necessarily penalized for being unable to get over a hazard that the better player could.  

Peter

Peter -

"Thinking golf" was first associated with John Laing Low circa 1902, a vastly under-appreciated figure in the history of gca. But I've never been clear about the export of the idea from Britain to the US. I remember reading Travis as saying that the idea came to US gca in 1906 and that that year marked a turning point in US gca.

But what exactly happened in 1906? Did Travis go to Woking, throw down a couple of beers with Low and Paton, and come back a changed man?

Bob  

Jud_T

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #95 on: April 27, 2010, 11:44:42 AM »
And the article noted that the great amateurs of the day were more enamoured of the Thinking Golf idea than the professionals were, one of whom (I think it was Taylor, or it may have been Braid) thought it 'unfair' that a worse player was not necessarily penalized for being unable to get over a hazard that the better player could.  



Sounds like your typical GCA post today!   :-\
Golf is a game. We play it. Somewhere along the way we took the fun out of it and charged a premium to be punished.- - Ron Sirak

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #96 on: April 27, 2010, 12:58:50 PM »
"I remember reading Travis as saying that the idea came to US gca in 1906 and that that year marked a turning point in US gca.

But what exactly happened in 1906? Did Travis go to Woking, throw down a couple of beers with Low and Paton, and come back a changed man?"



Bob:

Obviously Travis was abroad playing golf a number of times. According to both himself and C.B. Macdonald he fell in love with the type of golf and courses he played over there.

Macdonald also mentioned that Travis and incoming USGA president R.H Robertson took a golf tour to GB in the summer of 1901. Macdonald said both he and some of the USGA board members felt that should imbue both Travis and Robertson with the "spirit" of the game over there but for some reason they were disappointed that it didn't rub off as they'd hoped. I think Macdonald was talking more about the Rules and administrative stuff here.

Nevertheless, when Travis mentioned "thinking golf" came to the US in 1906 he may've been referring to what he did at GCGC with its architecture. I think it had to do primarily with more bunkering and more interesting greens that he felt the good courses over there had then but most all the American courses, apparently including GCGC early on, did not.

Also, I think it is pretty safe to say that in the first half of the first decade of the 20th century Walter Travis was considered by Americans to be the most prominent person in America not just as a golfer but in most all things to do with golf.
« Last Edit: April 27, 2010, 01:03:33 PM by TEPaul »

BCrosby

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #97 on: April 27, 2010, 01:35:52 PM »
TEP -

I suspected that the 1906 date Travis referred to had something to do with the timing of his redo of GCGC. But I don't know much about the GCGC history.

Bob

TEPaul

Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #98 on: April 27, 2010, 02:01:22 PM »
Bob:

It seems Travis was not exactly the most modest of men. I think it was also 1906 when he wrote he taught Donald Ross about modern architecture at Pinehurst.  ;)

Tom MacWood

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Re: Strategic School Of Architecture
« Reply #99 on: April 28, 2010, 06:21:46 AM »
The state of golf architecture was quite different in 1902 and 1911 than it was in the 20s. Should Taylor's comments in 1902 or 1911 be judged against the accepted norms of golf architecture in 1926 or 1927 when Crane was debating Behr? It is not a historically appropriate comparison IMO. Didn't Taylor's ideas evolve over time?

Crane was not breaking any new ground with most of his ideas on golf architecture, they were the conventional thoughts at that time, especially in America.

I agree with both points. Remember, however, that one of the reasons Crane wrote what he wrote was because in the 1920's he saw the "equitable" architecture he preferred as losing ground to strategic architecture as promoted by MacK, Colt, Darwin, Behr, etc.

Crane, with a different twist or two, wanted to reinstate many of the same ideas that Taylor had advocated earlier. Their views were not identical but they were certainly kissin' cousins.

I would add about their similarities that both Taylor and Crane reflect the architectural assumptions of the everyday golfer much better than a MacK, a Darwin or a Behr do. It is no less true today. Crane's argument was really with the professional golf architects of the Golden Age, not with street views of what good architecture should be. In a rough and ready way, you can see Crane as someone who was articulating and elaborating design ideas based on the street view. I think the same is also roughly true of Taylor's views.

Bob    

Bob
Crane developed his rating system because he felt it was a better/more scientific way of evaluating championship venues. Golf architecture had been in the process of eliminating 'unfair' aspects for years. He wasn't pushing a new equitable architectural system, he was a product of the mainstream American architectural ideas at the time, which included some aspects of equity, but was much more than that. There was definitely a penal aspect to modern American golf architecture that is lost in your term equitable. Back then they referred to it as scientifically designed golf courses, and that is much better term IMO. Taylor had nothing to do with this American style of architecture, in fact he warned against it.


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