[wsmorrison]

The members of the Glen View Club, in Golf, Illinois are very proud of the Flynn design work at their course.  They are hosting the inaugural William S. Flynn National Invitational on September 18-19.  Geoff Nixon, Adrian Kruse, and Scott Bates have been instrumental in organizing this brainchild of Geoff's.  

Teams from various Flynn courses will engage in friendly competition on the course and lend advise and share ideas on restoration and other issues off the course. There will be 2 days of golf, lunch, dinner, breakfast, and of course, cocktails.  Tom Paul and I will give a presentation on Flynn and our work to date.  David Esler, the restoration architect responsible for GVC, will also give a presentation, a sort of before and after slide show which should be interesting.  The winning team gets to keep for the year a beautiful trophy made in the same year of Flynn's redesign, 1922.

Originally there were going to be 10 clubs in this year's event with other clubs rotating in and out over the years.  Only 5 or so are now committed to playing.  Cherry Hills, Indian Creek, Rolling Green, Lehigh, and of course Glen View.  There's still a chance that a team from Huntingdon Valley (I thought they like to play these things as they always seem to win) and Philadelphia Country will be represented as well.

I just got back from a week at the Homestead Resort with my family.  We had a great vacation and I also did some research and work for our Flynn book.  Most people know that the Cascades course is a great work of Flynn, but he followed that with a wonderful redesign of Ross' Old Course (1913) in 1925.  The Resort is very proud of the Flynn heritage there.  Flynn continued to work on the courses through at least 1935.  Flynn's daughter, Connie Lagerman, told me that her father thought the Homestead the most romantic place he'd ever been and returned there often.  The resort has an Owner's Club with a membership and want very much to participate in the future and perhaps host the next event.  Too bad we didn't invite them this year.

I strongly encourage other Flynn clubs to participate and help grow this wonderful gathering.  If anyone wants to try and recruit a team for this year, there is room.  It doesn't have to be a formal group sponsored by your club.  Please contact me ASAP.  If not this year, let's work hard to make the successive Invitationals even better.

Wayne Morrison
wsmorrison@hotmail.com  

[T_MacWood]

Wayne
The Cascades is a wonderful course, but I've been curious about its bunkering. In comparison to Flynn's other courses the bunkering is a little less stylish, not typical would you agree...actually fairly plain (with the exception of perhaps one and twelve). Any idea why?

[BCrosby]

Wayne -

The Flynn Invitational should be lots of fun and a great way highlight Flynn's work.

I think that Flynn is the most under appreciated of the Golden Age architects. He deserves more attention. How many have a resume that includes courses like The Country Club, Shinnecock, Merion (w/Wilson), Huntingdon Valley, Rolling Green, Indian Creek, etc?

And as TEP has said before, even the least of his courses is very good.

Keep up the good work and update us as things develop.

Bob  

[TEPaul]

Tom MacW:

My take on what you call the style of Flynn bunkering is that sometimes (possibly depending on the project) Flynn may have approached the issue of bunkering, or at least the look of it, in a bit of a generic way--at least at first (at first being as the course opened or whatever).

We seem to be seeing that Flynn firstly seemed to look at bunkering, particularly fairway bunkering on some projects, as a bit of an architectural supplement--very much depending for its existence on whatever natural aspects of a property he may have felt he was NOT finding.

He mentioned this basic approach generally in one of his essays for the USGA Green Section on architeture and he mentioned it at other times in correspondence with clubs and clients. It's probably safe to say that to Flynn sites like Indian Creek, Boca Raton and some of the other flat site properties (Kittansett) he got more elaborate with bunkering for obvious reasons. The comparision (by such as Hugh Alison) of his use of bunkering in the flat areas of Shinnecock vs the topographical areas is also indicative of this thinking on the use of bunkering as an architectural supplement.

Flynn also menitoned (in writing) that ideally fairway bunkering was best done if it could be planned and placed sometime after play of a course had begun, maybe up to a year or two following opening. In a way this was probably no more than an on-site reality test as to proper placement and such. In a very direct way this idea melded into his very applied ideas on course "elasticity" (particularly tee wise).

This may seem a bit unusual to us today but it really isn't if one understands the era from which Flynn cut his teeth in architecture and how he did it--most primarily being with the very slowly evolving feature evolution and maturation process at Merion East (probably up to 20+ years) and also to a degree greater than previously known at PVGC.

Not only was that type of process a reality on some projects back then it was even considered to be an "Idieal" amongst the very founders of a centralized agronomy reaserch (and design) philosophy and program involving Hugh and Alan Wilson, Piper and Oakley and Flynn and Toomey that eventually morphed from their "National Green Section Reports" into the USGA Green Section itself.

It's very indicative today for us to understand that their compiled research efforts and reports that they dedicatedly disseminated to all desiring them was the very first of that kind. Previous everything else in golf agronomy had been basically single site OJT with very little or no collobaration or ability to do central research.

As such, it appears that Flynn's mentality on bunkering was to sometimes create generic shapes that would "grow-in" agronomically in interesting ways over time. He was also known to have been absolutely fascinated with all forms of grasses and owned a bit of an experimental farm with Toomey in Montgomery Co Pennsylvania for that purpose on which many of his local crews would hang out.

I don't believe Flynn had the luxury of performing this "modus operandi" on all his projects for obvious reasons but when he could do I believe he would do it that way. Again, Shinnecock very well may be the best example of this in that it was a course highly designed to plan but possibly with bunkering (fairway particularly) that was intended to grow-in and mature to a more natural state over some time. This can be seen by tracking some of the early aerials against his actual plans (again highly detailed).

On some of Flynn's plans his actual bunker "construction instructions" are extremely detailed with instructions and drawings on how to construct to exact feet and inches in various parts of the bunkering. His amazingly sophisticated drawings (for that time) also supports and clarifies this. However, even with that it seems the agronomy of his bunkering was expected to take some time to mature, perhaps years.

And in this latter technique it very well could be that a particular Flynn style bunkering could have evolved into almost anything from on-going maintenance practices both back then and today.

Again, back to Shinnecock--it's my distinct belief that Flynn's highly unusual "undulated sandy waste areas" particularly on holes #5 and #6 and a few of the other flat land holes may have been always misunderstood (by the club) as to how they should be maintained on an on-going basis. It's my belief that unquestionably, at some point, the club forgot about how these areas were intended to be maintained and what the intention of them was--as they were allowed to grow back into rough and basically disappear over the decades. This is something the club very well may be in the process of picking back up on and restoring. There's no question that the "look" of these massive "designed and constructed" sandy waste area bunkering features are visually stunning as well as visually intimidating to a golfer!

The look of it is fantastic and there's no question in my mind it's very much the influence of Pine Valley and Flynn's collaboration there and that course's influence on him.

All this on Flynn bunkering, again particularly fairway bunkering, may be a bit rambling but I (we, Wayne and I) feel it's important to know--certainly in an historic perspective as well as very much in a restoration perspective too. It was basically not looked at and produced in the same manner of say Alister MacKenzie and Cypress Point that was completely constructed and basically matured before he and his construction crew pulled out of town!

Toomey and Flynn could do this of course--eg the matured look at construction, but in most cases I don't believe they did as they seemed to prefer not to for the "ideal" reasons given above.

Another thing to consider with the technique Toomey and Flynn apparently followed with bunkering (all of it--including green surrounds) may be looked at in a "form follows function" sense but in this case the form and function very much followed construction efficiency as much as actual playability. By this I mean that over and over again we can see from his bunker drawings the use of mounding (or mounding flowing into natural contours) that was probably not much more than the immediate use of the fill created by cutting basic bunkering shapes being used architecturally (the mounding) at that very spot--instead of carting it away and disposing of it somewhere else. The reasons for that type of architecture (bunkering and mounding) serves various purposes--again, construction efficiency, drainage solutions, visiblity for golf (is this Fynn's use of applied "framing" in architecture? Yes definitely it was understood by him as that too!) as well as interesting applications of playability!

There's another little vignette recently related to me by Richie Valentine about Flynn's thoughts on actual bunkering construction. Apparently Flynn menitoned to Joe Valentine a number of times that when it came to the actual construction techniques of his bunkering there was nobody as good at it as the EYE-talians that comprised the ongoing labor force at Merion in those days of both immediate and evolutionary creation.

There's more but this is getting too long again....

[T_MacWood]

TE
Regarding Cascades was Toomey on board at the time? Do you consider the course early Flynn, and are there other courses that had a similar appearance. I recall Ran commenting that it had an almost Raynor quality in places....and I'd have to agree, especially some of the par-3s.

[TEPaul]

Tom:

It's hard for me to answer that because I've not been to the Cascades (yet)--I didn't go with Wayne last weekend. But just thinking about a piece of property like that it seems to me that the look of a Raynor--eg a fairly engineered style may be almost a necessity on a piece of property like that. I can't recall the date of the construction of Cascades--Wayne has all Flynn's plans at his house but Toomey probably formally combined with Toomey in the early 1920s although some evidence is indicating they may have worked together as early as 1911 (informally).

And I've not looked closely at the topo of Cascades but on a site apparently that complex and topopgraphical a certain amount of an "engineered" look would seem to be inevitable if for no other reason than the necessities of golf require a certain amount of "levelling off".

I believe Cascades is the site Flynn looked at and told the owner that he couldn't afford to build a course there. At which point the owner said to him; "Don't worry about what you think I can afford, just do it and I'll pay for it!."

[wsmorrison]

Tom MacWood,

I'll try to post some of the hole drawings of the Cascade and changes proposed over time--I may need Craig Disher's help.  Tom Paul's explanation above regarding Flynn's method of incorporating bunkers and adding bunkers over time is very well stated.  At the Cascades, Flynn went back nearly every year from 1923 to at least 1935 and made changes to the course, especially the bunkering.  Most of the changes in 1935 were to lengthen the course.  

While lost now, Flynn proposed in 1931 (Flynn was also working at Shinnecock at the time) to alter the look of the 14th hole considerably.  He wanted to create fields of bunkers and mounds and undulating sandy waste areas very much like those at Shinnecock.  I'm not sure if they were ever put in although there appear to be remnants of it in a 1940 aerial I have given to me by Dan Wexler.  In fact, the bunkering shown in that aerial is more dramatic in scale and number than appears today (I'll get Craig to post the aerial if possible--maybe I should learn how to do it myself).

The bunkering today is flashed up beautifully but there are problems.  Small rocks are everywhere in the bunkers and evidence that they are not draining well.  With water freezing and thawing the rocks are pushed to the surface.

Flynn also proposed from the very start interrupted fairways on most of the holes, a design element clearly drawn from his work at Pine Valley.  This is only evident today on the 13th hole with the cross bunkers 70 yards short of the green.  In the aerial photo (taken at a very high elevation) it is not clear, but there may be evidence that they existed for a time.

When RTJones was building the Lower Cascades course, he eliminated the Flynn green on 14 and moved it further down in the general direction of the clubhouse (former Rubino mansion).  This necessitated moving the tee for 15 as well which created an awkward approach into the green closer parallel to the first fairway.  The club is very respectful of the Flynn heritage and I believe they will revert back to the original plans at some point(maybe they'll put back the bunker/hazard scheme Flynn proposed).

The March, 1927 USGA Greensection Bulletin details the engineering feats necessary to construct the Cascades Course.  This article was written by RH Patterson, the chief engineer at the Homestead after the course was completed.  He wrote this article after studying the archival materials at the Resort.  It was a vast engineering project performed by locals in the valley yet is very natural in appearance, except of course many of the tees and greens.  I don't think there is much of a Raynor appearance, maybe the 11th hole, a par 3 built up and surrounded by bunkers front and right.

[wsmorrison]

Tom,

As to why the bunkering looks rather plain, I am not sure there is the same effect on the ground even though the bunkering seems reduced over time.  Remember, this is a site with a lot of movement and topographical changes, there is no need to have complex bunkering on most of the site.  Flynn often wrote that when the ground is so good, there is usually little need for hazards.  The area of 12-17 is flat but the stream and other features that are lacking on 12-14 call for more complex man-made hazards and these holes would benefit from them--yet not too out of character for the rest of the course.  

Not to be ignored is the loss of many interesting features on a number of courses over the years.  A drive to lower costs for maintenance probably causes this more than any other single factor.  

Likewise green outlines tend to become more simplified, not only because of cautious mowing but with machine mowing, the crew probably doesn't want to deal with complex green shapes.  Flynn's shapes tended to be pretty wild in the drawings but mostly ovalized today.  It is apparent from careful on-site study where greenspace has been lost.  The original greens usually brought the greenside bunkers more into play, allowed for false fronts, and for a greater variety of pin positions and levels of difficulty.

[T_MacWood]

Wayne
I was thinking of #11 as well as #8 and #4. And to lesser degree #18 and #3. When I was there a few years back a number of the holes had segmented fairways...has that changed? I've seen a few old photos of the course (20's and 30's) and the bunkers appeared to be of a similar simple outline. I was wondering if they had issues getting experienced contructors up into those hills....the course is in the boondocks.

[Patrick Hitt]

I am tempted to put together a team of Rock Creek Park irregulars  
It would be nice to meet up with you gents if you are in town for more than a night. It would be interesting to hear your take on the only Chicago Flynn (?).

[wsmorrison]

Patrick,

Alas, only in town for one evening.  I have some drawings by William Gordon on some changes proposed for East Potomac due to highway construction, but nothing on any Flynn connection to it or Rock Creek Park.  There is a reference to Flynn visiting RCP and getting paid a small some of money but we don't know for what and it was after the course had been built.  Do you have any information or could steer us in a direction to find out any Flynn connections at either course?

Glen View Club is the only surviving Chicago area Flynn course.  One of his most challenging courses, clearly in the championship mold of the Philadelphia School that Tom Paul has written so well on, was the estate course, Mill Road Farm, for Albert Lasker.  Here are the yardages:

1   438 par4
2   447 4
3   218 3
4   400 4
5   372 4
6   560 5
7   385 4
8   460 5
9   435 4
3715! par 37 (tough starting stretch)

10  198 par3
11  392 4
12  414 5
13  237 3
14  460 5
15  385 4
16  374 4
17  160 3
18  580 5
3200 par 35

From what I understand, at various times the 8th and 14th played as par 4s.  This was a 6900 yard course in 1926.  I don't believe there were any courses this long at that time.  The routing map indicates that this was quite a severe test.

Dan Wexler has written about this course in his Missing Links book (he got the routing progression a bit wrong, but with little to go on at the time he did an outstanding job, very accurate otherwise).  We've since worked together to obtain additional significant information and it will be quite an interesting section in the Flynn book.

[T_MacWood]

When Flynn redesigned Glen View how much of the original course did he retain?

[wsmorrison]

Tom,

I am not certain what the original Tweedie course looked like.  From materials sent to me by Adrian Kruse, it would appear that that Flynn kept the general routing intact and made considerable changes within the holes.  The course was lengthened from 6215 to 6589.  It would seem that the proposed significant changes for holes 5,9,11,12,15, and 16 were not implemented.

The changes were as follows:

Hole 1:
An alternate West tee and 2 fairway bunkers were added, a cross bunker reduced.  The green was enlarged and changed to a L to R slope.  Deep bunkers were added L and R greenside.
Hole 2:
Hole was shortened from 235 to 195.  Original green site is now a hollow in the 3rd fairway.  Green was moved closer and L onto higher ground with a large B to F slope surrounded by bunkers.
Hole 3:
Hole was lengthened from 390 to 435 by moving the teeing ground back creating an uphill blind tee shot.  The green was moved back to higher ground and sloped L to R.  2 bunkers 40 yards short L and R were added as well as 2 L greenside bunkers.
Hole 4:
Flynn moved the tee back to add 25 yards (370 to 395).  This created a semi-blind tee shot with an added bunker set into the hillside.  Green was enlarged with a gentle slope in the back and a long bunker R and 2 bunkers L.
Hole 5:
375y.  Fairway contour lines changed.  Crossbunker 60y short of green was removed.  Green was increased in size and shape (no longer square) with a front wrap around bunker and bunker L.
Hole 6:
548y.  L fairway bunkes were put in to create a "cape-type" tee shot.  "Hell's 1/2 acre" bunker 140y short of green was built.  Rectangular shape green was reshaped and reduced in size with a false front added.  Three greenside bunkers added.
Hole 7:
177y.  Cross bunker along with 2 hidden rear bunkers were removed.  Green shape changed and a knoll added in front.  Deep L and R bunkers reshaped.
Hole 8:
470y.  Double dog-leg.  Flynn added crossbunkers but they were later removed.  Green moved 30y L to accomodate a new tee for #9.  Green increased in size and made less rectangular.
Hole 9:
350y.  Flynn wanted to turn this into a par 3 of 150y with an island green surrounded by sand (conceptually like the longer 3rd at  Pine Valley and like 3rd at Kittansett).  Hole was subsequently changed.
Hole 10:
455y.  Fairway reshaped to create a slight dog-leg R.  Green moved 40y and R to a hillside.  Green reshaped and a bunker R built into hillside.
Hole 11:
Teeing ground moved to accomodate change to #10 green.  Flynn proposed moving the green along the river.  Green was expanded and reshaped with B to F slope and 3 deep bunkers surrounding.
Hole 12:
Tee moved back to increase length by 30y (295 to 325).  Flynn wanted to move the green towards the river, this was not done and green was enlarged and reshaped with deep R and L bunkers added greenside.
Hole 13:
535y.  2 R fairway bunkers added and green expanded and reshaped with increased B to F slope.
Hole 14:
169y.  Green expanded and sloped B to F, reshaped to kidney shape surrounded by bunkers.
Hole 15:
505y.  Flynn wanted to move the tee forward and move the fairway R along property line, reducing yardage to 433 and par from 5 to 4.  A dry ditch was filled and grassed.  Green was moved to the R 30y and with R and L bunkers added.  Green was later moved back and made into a double dog-leg.
Hole 16:
386y.  Flynn proposed moving tee and fairway to L to eliminate slight dog-leg R.  Dry ditch was filled and turfed.  R and L bunkers short of green were added.  Green made into a punchbowl type with 3 greenside bunkers L, Front, R added.
Hole 17:
340y.  Fairway bunker set into R hillside built, dry ditch filled.  Green moved 40y R up a hill.  Green steeply sloped R to L with 2 bunkers into hillside.
Hole 18:
340y.  Tee was moved R and back 30y.  Fairway was moved R to line up with new tees.  Green changed from the typical rectangular with 2 tiers sloping B to F with L, Front, and R bunkers added.

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