[Ronald Montesano]

A friend is doing a piece on the 1912 US Open at Country Club of Buffalo (now Grover Cleveland municipal) and was told by a former denizen of this august forum that touches of AW Tillinghast are evident at the course. He has no hard evidence. We know that Travis was brought in to shore it up for the 1912 US Open and that DJ Ross did more work after 1912, before being retained to build the current CCB in Williamsville, NY.

Anyone out there have any thoughts on this matter? Time is of the essence.

Mil gracias.

Ronaldo

[Ed Homsey]

Ron--

On page 213 of the July 1912 "The American Golfer", there is a news item that states:  "The Country Club of Buffalo, over which links the Open Championship of the United States is to be played, Thursday and Friday, August 1 and 2, 1912, is located just beyond the end of Main Street, Buffalo,N.Y., and about five miles from the business section of the city..............Although the Country Club is over thirty years old, it has been in its present location but ten years.  The present links are eighteen holes and during the past two years have been considerably changed and brought up to date in bunkering and in length by Mr. Ganson Depew, Chairman of the Golf Committee, assisted by D. H. Findley, Professional at the club.  In changing the links, Mr. Depew followed many suggestions very kindly offered by Mr. Walter J. Travis, in regard to the location of the bunkers, and the club feels a deep obligation to Mr. Travis for his ever ready willingness to improve the course.  Its championship length is 6,326 yards, with a part of 74...............Although unfortunately flat, it requires very accurate play and furnishes a high test of golf.  The fair greens are abundantly protected for sliced and hooked balls and the approaches to every green require very accurate play or the ball is in trouble."

Travis and his wife made fairly frequent trips to Buffalo, in those days, in order to visit his wife's sister and husband, Albert J. Wright.  Mr. Wright was one of the prominent founders of the CC of Buffalo, and his son, Parke, was the area's top golfer.  Parke, and his Uncle Walter, played many a round of golf together.  This family connection may have led to Travis's involvement at CC of Buffalo as well as to other Buffalo area courses, i.e. Orchard Park CC and Cherry Hill Club.  Speculation, of course, but in each case, there was a Wright family member involved in the early days of those golf courses.  TMI relative to your question.

I do not know, offhand, when CC of Buffalo left the Bailey/Main St site, but could it be that Tillinghast visited CC of Buffalo during the time when he was touring the country offering suggestions for "improvement" of golf courses.  I believe that took place in the mid-30s.  Phil Young's Tillinghast book would answer that question.

Ed Homsey
www.travissociety.com

[Jim_Kennedy]

The Tillinghast Society lists these Buffalo area courses as the ones AWT visited:

August 25-27, 1935 – Buffalo, NY
Niagara Falls CC – Tilly had added two holes 17 years earlier.
Niagara Falls Municipal – New 14th green, redesigned short 3rd hole, adjusted dog-leg of 11th (27 holes).
Orchard Park CC – Redesigned 5th hole; inspected new land.
The Park CC – Redesigned 1st & 2nd greens, new bunkers on 13th.
Tri-County CC – Complete hole rearrangement and selection of new green sites.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Here's Grover Cleveland Park GC in 1927:

[Ian Andrew]

Orchard Park CC – Redesigned 5th hole; inspected new land.

The current par four 12th hole is that hole - the original tee was where current 14th tee is - and it played as par five.
It had a Sahara complex in the middle of the current landing area
I have an aerial that clearly shows it. (the plan is to put it back - despite being a Tilly addition)

The Park CC – Redesigned 1st & 2nd greens, new bunkers on 13th.

Can't confirm or deny the greens being Tilly, but both hapen to have less contour than the others.
Don't have anything to prove it one way or another.

I have a great image of the 13th from that time (or potentially earlier).
Simple grass faced bunkers smaller in scale than Alison's other bunkers.
The river has always washed that set out - so I epect they have changed a lot over time.

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