Jim,
I agree if you are talking about the portion of the site by the Inn. Mike's original yellow rectangle extended from the canal all the way across, and was much larger than 120 acres originally proposed.
Pat,
Sorry to say that your logic on this one is easily assailable. Although we will never know, I do know that I have several emails etc. telling me I DO NOT look silly in this. I presume you have a few of your own.
None of the roads, even the north road in whatever configuration it was in by 1907 was hard to move. They would have built the new road, put up barriers until ready, and then transferred traffic when ready, just as they do today. In fact, the realty company was PLANNING on moving the road anyway, according to their master plan, so they obviously didn't think it would be a financial disaster, although history does show that they sure didn't believe that moving it for CBM's golf course served their purposes.
That wouldn't have necessarily stopped CBM from offering on it anyway, out of ignorance or ego that they would accomodate him. And, CBM tells us just that. Just because they DID reject him, obviously because their base level or detailed thinking when CBM offered to buy 120 acres in the middle of their plans, and because he told us he was rejected (pretty strong words, actually) means that he MUST HAVE offered somewhere near the canal, and perhaps been a bit surprised at the reaction, right?
To my mind, its very possible/probable that they told CBM "We love ya, but you do know that your offer would make us move about ten miles of road we have planned in great detail, no?" (or some similar reason - wanted lake front, utilities closer, access to train station, etc.)
We agree that the developers simply weren't going to change their plans (and most likely roads) for him, but did want NGLA there, so they offered to let him take a look at the final property.
It just seems to me that your logic that ignores what did happen (rejection) in favor of what we now know did happen. It also seems simple to me that CBM simply got there to offer on the land a bit past the shelf life of his idea, because of the work the developer put in during a short time frame.
Nothing more, nothing less. While I understand the reasons the developers DID reject him in that area, I don't think he never offered there - he tells us so, but doesn't tell us the reasons why. Maybe he is up in heaven saying "If that fool Mucci could see it wouldn't fly, why couldn't I? D'oh!"
BTW, I also agree that we won't ever know where it was offered and can't draw any finite conclusions. It is simply our web version of those Disney kid adventures when they go out looking for buried treasure, no? And, I have briefly looked at the topo in the Cold Springs and Canal areas and also wonder just where those holes might have gone. Even on what looks from the topo to be better land, it had to be a challenge to fit those holes in, and he eventually abandoned the pure copy idea in favor of a mesh of concepts and fitting the land. Actually, for pure templates, the land along Cold Spring appears to me to be a bit flatter, and might have been easier.
But, those kind of speculations are fun for history and architecture buffs and keep us coming back, no?
Sleep well.
For that matter, we don't know how the course would have been routed, and it could very easily (I presume) been routed to parallel important roads rather than have them cross fw, as later happened at NGLA and SH.
We agree that set in stone by the time Charlie made the offer.