Pine Valley Aerials

[Jim_Coleman]

  If being on the right offers a better angle with more risk, that, it would seem to me, weighs in favor of leaving it. Offer the choice, no?

[Charlie Goerges]

  If being on the right offers a better angle with more risk, that, it would seem to me, weighs in favor of leaving it. Offer the choice, no?

I agree. Therefore I'd be curious what arguments can be made for getting rid of it. Archie posited one possible option, it made the hole too easy. I'm curious what other possibilities people can think of.

[Charlie Goerges]

maybe too hard to maintain, or simply too out of place compared to the rest of the design?

More possibilities to consider

[Mark Fedeli]

maybe too hard to maintain, or simply too out of place compared to the rest of the design?

More possibilities to consider

Considering how many architects provided their input when the course was being built, a few awkward elements are to be expected. I might be projecting, but an alternate fairway that can also work to nearly double the effective size of the landing zone does not feel totally in keeping with the rest of the design.

[Kalen Braley]

I went to the Historical Aerials Viewer site to look at 17.  https://www.historicaerials.com/viewer

As best as I can tell:

- In 1940 it looked like the right side was at its biggest.
- By 1957 it was noticeably smaller
- In 1963 it looks like it was abandoned or at least maintained as rough
- But by 1965 it appears to be back as fairway
- Then sometime between 1970 and 1984 it was abandoned for good.
- By ~2017 the trees and foliage eventually had retaken it all back.

[archie_struthers]

 


My first  look 1975, no sign of the old fairway.  The more I look at the pictures the more I like it.


Talked to a few of the cognoscenti . Some interesting takes on the missing fairway. Perhaps they were concerned about people building something  close to the grounds and wanted a barrier. They didn't own that property til much later , hence the border fence
next to the train tracks. The club was always steeped in secrecy , it was part of the allure and continued for decades.


Occasionally we would walk in with the bags from the 14th or 16th if a match ended early or we had some weather issues. Invariably we would walk down the dirt road  along the border fence ...the railroad tracks were right over the fence. The road ran parallel to #17 and eventually dumped where the lake on the right side of 18 . Most of you probably didn't know there was a lake there but a few of my golfers and yours truly hit one in there on rare occasions.

I think the "lost fairway"  was fabulous if pictures tell the story. Wish they would rebuild it!

[Mark Fedeli]

I went to the Historical Aerials Viewer site to look at 17.  https://www.historicaerials.com/viewer

As best as I can tell:

- In 1940 it looked like the right side was at its biggest.
- By 1957 it was noticeably smaller
- In 1963 it looks like it was abandoned or at least maintained as rough
- But by 1965 it appears to be back as fairway
- Then sometime between 1970 and 1984 it was abandoned for good.
- By ~2017 the trees and foliage eventually had retaken it all back.

I think it’s quite clearly rough on the right in every year you cite. You can see the mowing lines that separate the two sides and how the darker color of the right side matches the rough in other parts of the course. Surprisingly, the only year both sides appear the same is 1970, but that’s also the aerial where it’s hard to tell the difference between fairway and rough throughout the course.


The 1935 photo in this thread shows very clear mowing lines with fairway left and rough right. The 1931 photo does not have a clear mowing line, and the grass heights seem similar, but the right side does have a slight inconsistency to it that looks similar to other places in that photo with rough. So even 1931 is a bit questionable.


Another thing to note is that they definitely widened the current left fairway into where the old right fairway was by quite a bit between the 1930s and today.

[Tim_Weiman]

Tim, TEP and I had the greatest chats about PVGC !  We both shared a great affinity for the history and the architectural evolution. Charlie's pictures are incredible and the 17th hole alone should spark a great discussion on site. Why did they remove the fairway?

Mark Fedeli , I'm Brooklyn to the SJ shore ...reverse trip. I think the tee shot would have been easier to the right fairway for most players , and the angle in deserves discussion . Not so sure it's a harder shot though long left is more in play.

Hopefully our resident sleuths will get on board and figure this one out.

Archie,


I have never seen any account of how George Crump did the routing, other than noting he died before it was completed.


To your knowledge, does such an account exist?

[archie_struthers]

 


Tim I don’t know how Crump found the routing. I’m pretty comfortable I know the idiosyncrasies of all the holes as built
but how they ended up where they are is beyond me. 

[Tim_Weiman]

Tim I don’t know how Crump found the routing. I’m pretty comfortable I know the idiosyncrasies of all the holes as built
but how they ended up where they are is beyond me.

Archie,


The woods seem so thick, it must have been a chore just to walk around it.


I do wonder if #2 green and #3 tee was maybe the only no brainer. Maybe #14 and #17 green/#18 tee as well.


FYI, I don’t remember us (GCA) ever having a discussion of Pine Valley’s routing. The same comment can probably also be made of most of the world’s best courses.

[Anthony Gholz]

Archie/Tim: 

Mutch's book Crump's Dream covers the routing from Crump and his architect pals, through Colt and the post war committee, and finally Alison's report.  Start there and then call Tom Paul for anything you don't understand.  When writing C&A in NA I found the Mutch book originally while researching in the USGA Library.  He was the USGA Librarian at one time. I now have a copy. 

There was so much discussion of PV in the newspapers of the time, the several books the club put out, the popular mag articles, and then Mutch's efforts; that I finally decided to put a couple pics in the book that hadn't been published before and then referred the reader to Crump's Dream.  My concern was only to confirm the C&A connection. 

Still can't get over these aerials.  Great fun.Anthony

[archie_struthers]

 


Tim says "the woods seem so thick , it must have been a chore just  to walk round them".


Actually Tim it was quite easy in that there is a road/ path right along what was the southeastern corner of the property in the late 70's to 2000 at least. I assume it still exists. It skirts right around what would have been the farthest edge of the now fallow fairway. You could hop right on it and walk in , and it loops right along the right side of 18 dumping off on the far right cart path (sand of course) .   


I did have a nice conversation with Tom Paul Friday, and what Tim says might lend credence to Toms' supposition that the club elders desire that no one see in , that privacy was incredibly important to them as reason to let the foliage build up . Remember the railroad ran really close to that fairway also. You wouldn't realize this unless you had walked along that trail as a way back into the club house from either the back of 14 green or the right of the 17th tee. 


Interesting that this fairway seems so perfect to me that it would be nice to have it return. Pretty sure that the club now owns all the adjoining property save the RR easement so it wouldn't be the same issue. I just know someone is going to find another reason , but for now it''s the best I've heard!


By the way Tom was in great spirits and doing well , always makes me happy to hear from him. I know many feel the same. The legendary debates between TEP . Pat Mucci and Mr Moriarity were so interesting not just for the banter but for all the nuggets of serious golf course architectural debate littered thru the pages.


Bless them all!

[Josh Bills]

Here is a link to a viewer to see an aerial from the 1930s.  You can pan in and out and move it around. 


https://newjersey.maps.arcgis.com/home/webscene/viewer.html?layers=4e7de8d868c248f99c3fddc5bf8c0386

You will have to know where to find Pine Valley...

Here is what that 1930s aerial looks like in that viewer, though you can make it higher quality on the viewer.

[Charlie Goerges]

I was just looking at the modern aerials. I noticed that there is a little building or bit of infrastructure short/right of the old right-side fairway. It may be the case that this building had nothing to do with losing the fairway originally, but it may prevent opening it up now. Anyone know what that building is? The road Archie describes seems to run right past it.


I'm not able to upload new images at the moment, anyone able to capture a shot of it? It shows up best on the bing aerial I looked at.

[Mark Fedeli]

Found a great old thread that has the below explanation from Tom Paul. Here’s the thread: https://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,16096.msg278364.html#msg278364


I've put it on here a few times but here's the story on the old #17 right fairway. The point of the play up there was to get a look at the bottom of the flag on the front of the green. The idea was if you drove it up there you'd probably be playing second and if your opponent was close to a front pin you could see just how close his ball was! Of course back then the front of the green was probably 2-3 feet lower than it is now so visibility on the front of the green was possible then but now it really wouldn't be.

Mayor Ott went down and bought the Dallin aerials of PVGC (the Hagley has 21 PVGC aerials) and we started really analyzing it. We went out there and looked at it. There appears to have been a few little narrow river bunkers way over on the right side next to the steep bank down to the RR tracks and the old right fairway appears to have been a little over 30 yards wide.

The next question became what happened to it. Looking over the progression of aerials over the years it appeared the fairway went out of existence very slowly so we tried to figure out how to get to the bottom of that story. This was maybe three years ago or so and John told me that unbelievably Eb Steineger, the super who arrived at PVGC about 1925 and was the super for about 55 years (all through the John Arthur Brown years) was still alive and well and so John went down and asked Eb about that old fairway and unbelievably Eb said;

"We had to let that old right fairway go slowly because the hose didn't reach it very well!"

Unbelievable but true!

I'd love to see them restore it but to do so they'd have to start near the tee and take a ton of trees out all the way along the right side of the entire hole. They could leave enough up by the new back tee on #18 so that wouldn't be a problem, I think. But the thing about that old fairway's effective function and strategy is you couldn't see the base of the flag on the front of the green today like in the old days unless the front was lowered again and I doubt they want to do that.

The other problem with restoring the alternate is if you look carefully at the old aerial you'll see the right fairway ran out at the same length as the left fairway. With today's length there's no problem at all carrying the big right bunker that made the old right fairway an heroic drive in the old days and in my opinion if they restored it and really wanted to encourage players to use it more they should take fairway on the right about 25 or 30 yards beyond the end of the left fairway, and again I doubt they'd do that but who knows---it would be neat to restore it and it sure would take some divot pressure off of the left fairway (since it's so concave and bowl-shaped) which has been a problem for years.

[JMEvensky]

By the way Tom was in great spirits and doing well , always makes me happy to hear from him. I know many feel the same. The legendary debates between TEP . Pat Mucci and Mr Moriarity were so interesting not just for the banter but for all the nuggets of serious golf course architectural debate littered thru the pages.

Archie, weren't you caddying at PV in 1937?


You're absolutely right about those "discussions"--tell TEP hello for me next time.

[Tim_Weiman]

Tim says "the woods seem so thick , it must have been a chore just  to walk round them".


Actually Tim it was quite easy in that there is a road/ path right along what was the southeastern corner of the property in the late 70's to 2000 at least. I assume it still exists. It skirts right around what would have been the farthest edge of the now fallow fairway. You could hop right on it and walk in , and it loops right along the right side of 18 dumping off on the far right cart path (sand of course) .   


I did have a nice conversation with Tom Paul Friday, and what Tim says might lend credence to Toms' supposition that the club elders desire that no one see in , that privacy was incredibly important to them as reason to let the foliage build up . Remember the railroad ran really close to that fairway also. You wouldn't realize this unless you had walked along that trail as a way back into the club house from either the back of 14 green or the right of the 17th tee. 


Interesting that this fairway seems so perfect to me that it would be nice to have it return. Pretty sure that the club now owns all the adjoining property save the RR easement so it wouldn't be the same issue. I just know someone is going to find another reason , but for now it''s the best I've heard!


By the way Tom was in great spirits and doing well , always makes me happy to hear from him. I know many feel the same. The legendary debates between TEP . Pat Mucci and Mr Moriarity were so interesting not just for the banter but for all the nuggets of serious golf course architectural debate littered thru the pages.


Bless them all!

Archie,


Great post. It is nice to hear Tom Paul is doing well. Sure, Tom was involved with some legendary debates but my experience with (and Pat Mucci) was also very positive.


Now back to Pine Valley. The path that you mention along the railway doesn’t change my feeling that before any work was done - any clearing - what became the Pine Valley golf course must have been a tough walk through thick woods. More to point, there don’t seem to be that many tee or green locations that are obvious. As I previously mentioned, I think 2/green, 3/tee and green is the best (most obvious example).


So, I am just fascinated with how Crump did the routing and what he was not able to put together before his untimely death. Doesn’t that include #12-15?

[archie_struthers]

 


Charlie, Tim, Mark Josh et al this stuff you are posting is sensational , thanks so much ! 😘


The road I described is so vividly pictured dumping right on the elbow of the 18th , anyone who couldn’t picture it certainly can now. 


Mark ,   TEP remembered Mr Steiniger talking about the hoses Friday but we just laughed it off as nonsense . Tom said that he talked to him about it though , so it’s true!   I’m not buying it made the hole easier though as the further left the easier to use the sideboard in the right hall of the green to control your approach. I’m 🤔 a right
fairway would bring the back bunker left into play if you skilled it even a little as it often would skid on that shot .  The green is small by PV standards and while certainly a birdie possibly for the good player a miss long left or right is anathema to a good round !


Hey Evensky I intend to shoot my age this year and it still has to be a bit under
the eighty six you penned me at Ha ha

[MCirba]

"We're gonna need a bigger hose!"




Seriously, great stuff guys, thanks.   Years back Joe Bausch found a series of articles written by Tillinghast in one of the Philly papers that was all from late 1912, early 1913 prior to Colt's arrival and if memory serves he has already routed holes 1-4, and 17 and 18 with others drawn up as well that changed somewhat, such as 5 becoming a long par three instead of a short one over the water.   If memory also serves they provided some insight into the routing process.   Maybe Joe can find them and put them on his newer server and re-post once he gets back from Sand Valley.