On what scientific basis did he claim that NGLA was the "inspiration" for Pine Valley and every other good course built over almost three decades??
I wonder if Mike ever bothers to consider a thing he writes? The "scientific basis" for Whigham's opinion on the importance place of NGLA in the history of golf course design?
As for how Whigham could have come up with the outlandish opinion that NGLA was generally inspirational to courses that followed, perhaps it was because
Whigham's opinion on the matter was commonplace. As has been repeatedly discussed, the National had been widely acknowledged among the experts as a groundbreaking, conversation-changing, revolutionary course from its inception! And perhaps it was because Whigham had witnessed, first hand, the incredible changes which occurred as a result of CBM's efforts at NGLA.
And who better to comment on NGLA's profound impact than Whigham? He not only witnessed the changes first hand, he had been writing about the evolution of America's golf courses and their shortcomings since the mid-1890s --over 40 years. Even early on, Whigham far from a complete neophyte like so many here. He was very familiar not only with the great golf courses in Scotland, but with golf courses worldwide, and came here having grown up in one of the truly great golfing families in a home overlooking one of the great links courses. He had designed courses himself at the dawn of golf in America, and been side-by-side with CBM at NGLA, Piping Rock, and others. He had articulated many of the underlying concepts at NGLA in his tremendous and influential articles, and had remained active and interested enough in the evolution of American golf design throughout his life to have been at Cypress during its construction.
After CBM's death, was there anyone in America more qualified to discuss the evolution of American Golf course design than H.J. Whigham? If so, who?
Yet Mike demands the "scientific basis" of Whigham's opinion regarding the general impact of NGLA? Preposterous.
While Whigham did write about NGLA as being an inspiration for the courses that followed, he obviously meant it was inspiration in a general sense(my underline):
"For the National has been much more than just a good golf course: it has been a the inspiration of every great course in the country, though plenty of them will not show a trace of the Macdonald style." And as mentioned above, the National had been widely acknowledged among the experts as an inspirational course from the opening of the course and for decades thereafterfter!
From his post, Mike would apparently have us believe that Whigham held up Pine Valley as an example of a course inspired by NGLA. Not so. As you can see above, CBM holds up Cypress Point, not Pine Valley. But what of Mike's intimation that Whigham was giving CBM credit for Pine Valley? Mike just happened to leave out the part of the quote above where Whigham left no doubt that, in his opinion,
"Pine Valley was a George Crump creation and a noble work of golf architecture." Cirba makes claims about how Whigham overstated CBM's influence over Pine Valley and then leaves out the part of the quote directly about Pine Valley? Despicable.
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I understand why Mike wants to deflect attention away from the real example, Cypress Point. Not long ago, Mike was up to his usual tricks, and made some self-serving statement about how Whigham "was engaging in gross hyperbole and exaggeration." Only he put it the form of a question to Neil Crafter, who knows a thing or two about MacKenzie and Cypress Point.
Mike Cirba:
Neil, Good to see you here. Do you agree with Whigham that NGLA was the inspiration for every great course Mackenzie designed in this country or do you think he was engaging in gross hyperbole and exaggeration? Neil Crafter:
Against my better judgement! Mike, the Whigham eulogy mention of Cypress Point I read as being more about the inspiration of NGLA in the overall project sense, rather than specifically the course and its architecture. Whigham would have known a good deal about Cypress Point, the project, the course and its architects, far more than any of us have been able to dig out 80 years hence. Whigham specifically refers to the conception of Cypress, which as we know, belongs to Marion Hollins. . . .So unlike Mike, Neil is capable of understanding that Whigham was speaking of NGLA's general influence, "in the overall project sense, rather than specifically about the course and its architecture," and that Whigham would have known about the project and was in a better position to comment than we are.
Rather than heed Neil's answer or consider Neil's reading, or heeding the quotations from Spirit of St. Andrews were Mackenzie largely confirms what Whigham wrote, Mike simply ignores it all and dismisses his own question as rhetorical:
"Neil, Deftly handled, but my question was rhetorical as Whigham's statement was so over the top as to be clearly hyberbolic exaggeration, essentially crediting his Father-in-Law with every good thing that happened in architecture in the US from 1910-1940."This is what I am talking about when I refer to his complete lack of self-awareness and his pathological inability to exercise even the least bit of self-reflection! Mike cannot even acknowledge or even begin to deal with Neil's reasonable interpretation of the passage. Instead he ironically retreats back to his own "hyperbolic exaggeration" and misrepresentation, discussed further below.
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Jim Nugent is following the same type of reasoning than Mike. They both seem to think that if they can come up with any sort of interpretation with any plausibility whatsoever, then they can treat their interpretation as the correct and only interpretation. This involves ignoring the overall context and focusing on particular potential ambiguities (real or perceived) to find the meaning they are determined to find. It essentially calls for what might be termed
"a bad faith reading" where instead of trying in good faith to understand what the author meant, they try in bad faith to distort the facts to suit their purposes.
That is how Mike goes from an article where Whigham portrayed NGLA was an seminal and inspirational course, to his bizarre rantings about how Whigham was
"crediting his Father-in-Law with every good thing that happened in architecture in the US from 1910-1940." And it is the exact same sort of reasoning that Jim Nugent has used to support his bizarre beliefs about how Obama may be a non-American and an extremist Muslim terrorist.
Both require a interpretive methodology set up to skew toward their underlying beliefs, and one which ignores a fundamental precept of reasonable good faith interpretation. In the face of vagueness or ambiguity, one must give
the author the benefit of the doubt and, where possible, avoid interpreting the document in a manner which renders it nonsensical, absurd, and/or self-contradictory on its face.
Here we have a situation where Whigham compressed a number of years of CBM's and Raynor's working relationship into a couple of sentences, and because he wasn't writing a treatise on the history of their relationship or even a history of Raynor's development, he didn't cover every intricacy of how that relationship evolved and changed from Raynor the "surveyor" who "knew nothing about golf and had never hit a ball on any links" to Raynor the "golf architect" who could take the holes at NGLA "and adapt them to almost any topography." Given the context, there is reason to expect Whigham to have gone into it in any more detail than he did.
And Whigham's points regarding Raynor were clear. He was not only of great help to CBM in doing the field work, he also eventually became a tremendous architect himself, and one who was building
courses modeled after NGLA whether CBM was involved or not! That is what he means by "Macdonald-Raynor courses." Courses modeled after NGLA. It shouldn't be so complicated, given it is the same thing we mean when we lump Macdonald and Raynor together --courses modeled after NGLA are Macdonald-Raynor courses, or as some say, "MacRaynor courses." Makes no difference whether both were involved in their creation or just one.
If this were not what Whigham meant, then why would have listed
"the two beautiful courses at White Sulphur?" CBM was not involved in the design of the second course at White Sulphur, was he? The second course at White Sulphur was NOT designed and built by Raynor and Macdonald, it was designed and built by Raynor alone, wasn't it? Yet it was
Macdonald-Raynor course in Whigham's eyes. Likewise, Whigham mentions "the Merion Cricket Club at Philadelphia" even though Raynor at this time there is no direct evidence linking Raynor to the design or construction of the course. Yet again, it was a Macdonald-Raynor course even though Whigham knew the extent of CBM's involvement because he was there.
Jim Nugent's and Mike Cirba's reading is untenable because it is directly contradicted by the very examples of Mac-Raynor courses provided by Whigham. In other words, the reading unnecessarily renders the passage nonsensical, absurd, and contradictory on its face. While this may serve their purposes, to read it as though it was absurd, nonsensical, and self-contradictory is entirely unreasonable. Whigham wasn't a fool and he shouldn't be protrayed as such because these guys can't come to grips with the extent of CBM's involvement at Merion!