The Original Evangelist of Golf

[Ed Homsey]

Mike--


Thank you for your detailed and well-documented study of the NGLA's development, the role that Travis played, and the significant results from the "falling out" between Travis and Macdonald.  I have always felt that the caustic criticism that Travis leveled against Macdonald in the Schenectady affair served as the death-knell to the long-time relationship between the two men, and resulted in Macdonald's action to "drop" Travis from the NGLA story.  I do not know of any instance where Travis exaggerated his role in the design or construction of a golf course.  Thus, I believe his accounts of his involvement at NGLA.


Re the Emmet/Travis "breakup", I think that Travis's changes at GCGC and later criticisms of the course, were the cause.  A well-documented timeline of those events would be necessary to confirm my thinking about the matter.  Something I should get to.


Thanks again for the information you have provided about NGLA.  Your evidence certainly goes against the popular opinion, eh?


 

[MCirba]

Ed,


Thanks for your feedback...it is gratifying to hear that you enjoyed it and found it informational.


I'm thinking of summarizing and cleaning it up a bit for an In My Opinion piece here for Ran so it survives the vagaries of the Discussion Group over time and is better archived.


As far as being a minority opinion, that's ok too.  It never made sense to me that Travis was "dropped" by CBM as the latter claimed as Travis in 1906-10 had as much architectural experience as anyone in America, having just completed his first round of extemsive changes at Garden City GC, where both he and Macdonald (and Emmet) were members.  Further, once Joe Bausch unearthed a whole series of contemporaneous articles about the creation of NGLA, there was no evidence at all that Travis was dropped but instead he seems on the job through the period where the property was found, purchased, designed, and constructed. 

[Ed Homsey]

The Travis/Macdonald relationship began at least as early as 1900.  I recently found a Barre Evening Telegram item, dated August 8, 1900, that reported a fourball match, at Ekwanok CC, in which Travis and partner, C.C. Macdonald, of Chicago, lost to Ekwanok pro George Low and William H. Davis of Lakewood CC.  And, wasn't Travis the one to whom Macdonald sent information about significant golf holes he found in the UK?


But, along the way, I think that Travis became something of a gadfly for the USGA with his criticisms of tournament formats, rules, etc. That could not have set well for Macdonald.


Your idea of creating a "My Opinion" for the GCA site is a great one.

[MCirba]

Happy New Year, Everyone.

Resurrecting this thread from early 2017, Bret Lawrence asked and we both found it curious that Walter Travis wasn't one of the Founding Members of NGLA as evidenced by the fact that Travis was not listed among those members in CBM's 1912 letter to the Founders, nor in his adaptation of that letter in his 1928 book, "Scotland's Gift".

However, in July of 1910, the same month that NGLA informally opened for a small Invitational Tournament, and nearly 3 years after the project was initiated Walter J. Travis was indeed still a Founding Member as seen in the following NY Sun article.   

[MCirba]

I just compared the listing of the 67 Founders from the July, 1910 article to CBM's 1912 "Founders Letter" sent to the 70 Founders at that time.

A few, like Joseph P. Knapp were added during that interim, but only one Founder listed in the July, 1910 "soft opening" article had suddenly disappeared by 1912.

Walter J. Travis.