Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1917-12-30
COURSE ARCHITECTS
A MODERN PRODUCT
In Making Links Real Test Of
Skill They Have Improved
Character of Golf.

/ Vial 0VIVI VI NOus
| How goes golf in this it's twenty
eighth year?
| Very well. indeed.
The month of November brought the
ltwenty-eighth year of American golf to
a close; for 1t is from that month, in
l1sSs, that the Scottish game dates its
formal importation and implantation
there. There are traditions of the game
having been played in a small. detached
way long before 1889 in the United
States. but there was no club organiza-
! ton. until the Yonkers On. W crowd
got together, built them a links and
went to it in the aforesaid 1889.
| Statisticians have during the past
year. or just before the war. made in
roads on the great army of golfers and
| called them to service, been using the
figures 100000 to indicate the mum
| Der of persons, of both sexes-and OF
ages running from nothing to ninety
who had taken up the game OF golf in
| this country. How they arrive at those
| figures is not exactly known. but the
count has never been attacked.
] And with the growth of the idea and
| the skill of the players there has been.
|
| courses
| Under the auspices of the United
States Golf Association. practically all
| the invitation and district association
| championship meetings have been
staged and turned into Red Cross or
similar benefits.
| Tournament play has Jagged some-
| what, but Individual day-in and day
out golf has suffered but slightly. One
| thing, however. that has not shown an
| appreciable falling off in respect to
| the game has been the laying out of
| new links. from the Atlantic to the
Pacific. Not goifing journal Is picked
| up these days without disclosing this
| or that new club organized. or this or
that old club acquiring additional acre
age or improving or charging the old
course.
Visiting Pros Helped Game.
In the Pacific northwest it has be-
| come quite an accepted fact that it was
| the tour of Harry vardon and Edward
| Ray in 1913 that gave real impetus
! to Improvement in the majority of the
golf courses. In other parts of the
country that they visited the two Eng
| lish golf masters are similarly credited
with having been of material benefit to
greens committees seeking the light.
In the east and middle west II is fact
| that real estate firms and promoters are
| the biggest factors at present In laying
out golf courses. They have realized
| that there is no quicker way to convert
suburban properties into sought-after
| villa sites than to start links that will
] serve as a loadstone.
Here is where the golf course archi-
| tect comes in Despite this time of strife,
there are such architects earning from
! IS, 600 to $4,000 annually. 1t is BUSH
ness that has grown like a gourd and is
without parallel in any other country.
In Great Britain many of the famous
1 1t1lye nj he cas- q hn q
| Of nature. and the duty Of man as
golf architect is to remodel and potter
with sods and lawn mowers about the
parks and inland links for small fees.
Even this occupation has vanished since
the war, while on the continent the game
! was too young to demand testing courses.
Pro Invasion Begins.
The early American golf professionals
laid out your golf course before break
fast. Nor was there any to dispute their
dictums. Willie Dunn. Scotchman., who
France, in 1894. was. the pioneer links
architect Of the east while Herbert
Tweedy. also Scotch. but an amateur
golfer, was the first to lay them out in
the middle west.
In this category might be included
Robert tombstone, the Seattle Golf Club
professional, who went to the Pacific coast
in 1900. and designed or improved the
best KNOWN OF the courses ABOUT San
Francisco, such as the Preside and In
gleside. work he followed up in the Pa
cific northwest, where a dozen golf links
bear his autograph"
The coming Of Willie Park, British
open champion in 1887 and 1889. to
this country in 1895 and. again in 1896
lent a great authority to what was said
about laying out golf links. He was
much in demand. Tom Bendelow--st.ll
in the game-arrived in Chicago In
1897. He was probably the first who
specialized in golf course making. rath-
er than in instructing in the game.
Those first lot of courses looked but
little like real testing link of today.
Bunkers run right across the fairway,
about the height Of the Jumps on
steeplechase course. with shallow
bitches in front of them, were the reg
ulation hazards Of the early golf ar
chitects; on long holes there would be
one to trap a poor drive: a second for
weak brassie. and, DerhaDs. third
or else merely the shallow ditch, before
the putting green's. to compel pitched
approach
The monotony of such courses began
to pail. This was intensified when the
rubber-cored ball came into general
use about fifteen years ago. The clubs
interesting in respect to hazards and to
place the bunkers or traps at longer
carries on account OF the greater dis
lance" obtained by the new ball over
Golf course architecture. a placing
of holes and of hazards. with natural
conditions availed. became q study The
alreadv celebrated Pine Valley course
near Phila delphia is tvpical Of what
! PROGRESS has been made in this di-
rertion As far as possible. old country
heias are ''urlicated--that is. some Of
the more famous ones--and IL is nos
sibIe "a pIav Pine Valley from the first
tee forward or from the eighteenth
green back to the first hole.
Improving on Nature
These architects. once they got to go
ing. where natural conditions were
lacking to make the proposed course
fit into some particular British or
Scotch hole. obtained engineers exact
measurements of the holes to be du-
piicated and built IN fairways and put
ting greens. undulations. mounds. etc.