The Low Down on John Low (and the effects of one beautiful bunker)

[Jim_Kennedy]

These two links represent what 14 pages of a well researched, clearly written, and highly informative essay that chronicles the history of GCA, and the people who made it, should look like. I don't think anyone will be surprised at who authored them.
 
Part 1
http://www.golfcollectors.co.uk/u/cms/TTG_90_2009September.pdf#page=34
Part 2
http://www.golfcollectors.co.uk/u/cms/TTG_93_2010June.pdf#page=10

[Peter Pallotta]

Jim - thanks much for linking this. I had the pleasure of reading it before it was published. We're lucky to have here many very solid researchers, several very good thinkers, and some very clear writers -- but for my tastes no one combines thorough research, insightful thinking, and elegant writing as well as Bob Crosby does. And when the subject is someone like John Low, the reading just can't be beat.

Peter

[Bret Lawrence]

Jim,

Thanks for posting the link to this great essay.  I never knew the low down on John Low.  It was a great read from start to finish!  Bob Crosby's research and writing is very impressive.

Bret

[Adam Lawrence]

Those two articles of Bob's in TTG are outstanding, I have quoted him extensively in a couple of reports I have done for golf clubs.

I've been trying for ages to find an old photo showing what Low's bunker on Woking 17 looked like. It's hardly the outstanding hazard that it has been painted, nowadays.

[BCrosby]

I just saw this. Thanks for the kind words.

Low is an under-appreciated figure in gca. Even less appreciated is how important he was in drafting and defending the first uniform rules. Low spent 25 years on the R&A rules committee, serving as chair for eleven of them. Reading Low's essays on the rules, it is interesting how often rules issues and architecture issues merge, particularly over questions of equity or 'fairness'. Debates at the time about rules and golf design seemed to feed off each other. 

The deeper you dig into Edwardian golf in Britain, the more Low turns up.

Bob

P.S. Adam - I have asked around and, like you, have not be able to locate a circa 1903 picture of the 'Johnnie Low' bunker on the 17th at Woking. 

[Garland Bayley]

Fabulous Bob!

[Jim_Kennedy]

I can' t help thinking  "What were they thinking" when reading these snippets from Bob's essays. 

"As such, the ineffable, ‘divine’ origins of links courses signified to Victorian designers that importing their virtues into man-made layouts was a non-starter. A high wall was presumed to separate the two kinds of courses."

"But if links courses were useful models for improving the look of inland courses, what they had to say about the placement of hazards and other features was less clear. Given assumptions about the serendipitous origins of links courses, there was a sense that they had little to contribute to such questions."

It seems to me a most improbable way to proceed.

[Dave McCollum]

Thanks for sharing Bob’s essay.  Fine writing.  I remember reading about Low’s and Paton’s work at Woking in the Good Doctor’s Spirit of SA, one of the first architecture books I read.  I remember wondering something along the lines of “who are these guys” and thought it significant that MacKenzie looked forward to returning to Woking every summer to see what wonder was revealed after their winter work. 

Thanks to Bob for the rest of the story.

Sometimes I question my hobby (gca) when I talk golf with our customers.  Like every golf pro must learn, it is better to listen and offer positive support than to debate, however politely, the “Normal View” of a lot of golfers.  Many still don’t understand the concepts of strategic golf design.  I think part of learning the game involves learning a whole lot of clichés about the game, many of which completely miss the point.

[Garland Bayley]

I find it interesting that Egan is mentioned as an American architect that played against the Oxford and Cambridge Golfing Society, but it fails to mention Macan who would have played against or with them as a member of the Irish Bar Golfing Society.

The biography of Macan calls Low, Macan's mentor.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Garland,

Macan's entry into the golf world was almost a decade later then the OCGS matches mentioned in the second essay, correct?

[Garland Bayley]

Garland,

Macan's entry into the golf world was almost a decade later then the OCGS matches mentioned in the second essay, correct?

I assume you mean the matches in the U.S. in 1903. Macan first played the British Amateur in 1908. Although his biography does not specify dates when he might have played with or against OCGS, presumably it would be in the time frame of his playing in the British Amateur from 1908 through 1911. Almost a decade from 1903 would be when he moved from Ireland to British Columbia.

[Colin Macqueen]

Jim,
Thanks for these two links!  How came they are only seeing the light of day just now!! That Bob Crosby does hide his light under a bushel doesn't he!

Lovely essays Bob and a real joy to read.

Now I have a question. That wonderful word you used ..."fooferaw"!  I am going to guess what it means from the context ... how does brouhaha fit?

I had never heard the word before but am damn sure I will be using it at every opportunity!  I have searched high and low (so to speak!!) through my four dictionaries and on the web but to no avail.  Is it an "American" word.  Actually might it have come out of India and colonialism like tiffin etc?

Anyway great writing on a great subject. I am now stirred to go and find a copy of Low's "Concderning Golf" isn't it?

Cheers Colin

[Rich Goodale]

Colin

"Fooferaw" is how them good ole boys down in the Deep South pronounce "folderol."

[BCrosby]

Rich -

You are close. My mother used to shout at my brothers and me to "stop all the fooforall". I thought it was one of her many made-up words. It took me forty years to figure out that she was mispronouncing a real word.

Bob 

[Bill_McBride]

Rich -

You are close. My mother used to shout at my brothers and me to "stop all the fooforall". I thought it was one of her many made-up words. It took me forty years to figure out that she was mispronouncing a real word.

Bob 

Mrs. Malaprop?   My mother had a bunch of them, mostly because she was very hard of hearing.  She was well read, knew all the words, just couldn't pronounce them so well. 

[Jim_Kennedy]

Here's a link to Bob's companion piece, the "Rules, Architecture and John Low" essay:

http://www.golfcollectors.co.uk/u/cms/ttg_106_2013_september.pdf#page=41

I'm guessing that the 'southern golfers' that Low mentions all came from the other side of Hadrian's Wall.  

[Jeff_Mingay]

Bob,

These two articles are beyond great, and such an important chronicle. Great work, and thank you very much.

Consider who's in the so-called "World Golf Hall of Fame" and that John L. Low is not ...

[BCrosby]

Thanks Jeff.

Jim - Yes, English clubs in the 1890's started adopting local rules that broke with both the letter and spirit of the older St Andrews code, the code followed by most clubs in Scotland at the time. I talk about a couple of the funky English rules briefly in the piece. Many (not all) of those clubs thought they could simplify and improve the traditional St Andrews rules by adopting rules that were built on a few core equitable principles. (Some of the rules they came up with were odd but quite clever.)

Concerns over what the English clubs were doing was a main motivation in the R&A's issuance of uniform rules that, for the first time, were to be followed wherever the game was played in Britain. As soon as the new rules were published, however, there was a lot of complaining. Without the flexibility of tinkering with them by using your own club rules, the St Andrews code came under closer scrutiny. Criticisms ensued, particularly by English golfers. Their main complaint was that the new rules (which were really the old St Andrews rules) were 'unfair', in the sense that punishments did not fit the crime.

What I thought was interesting about all that was, first, about half of the R&A rules committee were active golf architects or commentators (Low, Colt, Fowler, Hutchinson, Darwin, Paton, Ferguson and others I can't remember after two post-work drinks), and, second, the basic issues being debated in the context of the rules were the same basic issues being debated in the context of golf architecture at the same time (1900 to 1910 or so). In both contexts, the question was what obligations did rules and architectural features have to be 'fair'.

Low came down squarely on the side that said that 'fairness' was not an important consideration in either context.

The other thing I thought interesting about those long ago debates is how much they anticipate (and are still relevant to) modern debates about rules changes and golf course design.  

Bob