Mark, JC (and Ally) - yes, thanks, that is the main point I was asking about. With good points made by you and others, though, I'm still wondering about it. Mark very nicely and subtly posits/describes the supposed difference, i.e. the reality vs the shadow, with the Old the manifestation of a (largely unconscious/random) process that might have -- and then did -- lead to the course we know, while the New was the product of specific and conscious and time-bound decisions. And yet: man did have a hand in The Old -- e.g. widening fairways, tweaking greens -- and (I am presuming) those hands consciously recognized the wonderfully unstructured/un-proscribed quality and ethos of The Old. Okay, as Ally suggests, no one would've tried to recreate the Old's greens (a key aspect), but those responsible for the New could have recreated the unstructured qualities, no? Of course, maybe I'm presuming too much, and the 'unstructured' quality that we praise today was not all that noticed/praised back then.
Peter