Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today, I'm joined by golf course architect Tyler Ray. Tyler is one of the bright young architects in the golf industry. He has worked for Keith Fosser, Bill Cooorr and Ben Crenshaw and most recently Ron Pritchard. I joined Tyler to check out his work at Beverly Country Club in Chicago. Without further ado, here's Tyler Ray. I miss the green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
And when I find my ball in a brid egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, Fridagg frigg Frida Egg bride egg.
Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the golf course. How many Donald Ross courses have you seen?
I have about thirty thirty two left to see, So there's you know existing. If there's three hundred and forty two I think left existing, you know, about forty five of those have been altered, you know, beyond recognition. So there's two hundred and ninety seven left that are in the flesh. Yeah, I probably have thirty or so left.
How many of the say two hundred and ninety or that are in the flesh, are close to their original or you know, is there a percentage that you would say are close to what they originally were?
There are probably, gosh, probably sixty percent that are pretty solid that are you know, that haven't had all the greens blown up and routings altered. So we're saying probably maybe one hundred and eighty to two hundred, you know, are really good and solid still out there.
Ross is an architect that now I feel like almost every major city has like a public Donald Ross course. And whenever I somebody asked me for recommendations and different cities, I always say, I always look up like Ross courses in the area because it's usually a pretty sure bet that it's going to be decent, and you know, amazingly, it's always it always seems like those courses are also
the most affordable ones in different cities. What are some of your favorite public Ross courses that you've seen.
Oh, that's a good one. Triggs Memorial is really good in Providence. Wilmington Golf Club down in Wilmington, North Carolina. All the bones there are really good. Obviously, Newton up in Boston, and Commonwealth. Let's see rabis Low here in Chicago, I mean almost every town has something great, you know, something really good h Ross. Even if you go in Detroit, you know, rack them, oh you know, the highway kind of ruin, rack them a little bit, but rack them
has so many good bones. And then and then gosh, you know, even in North Carolina there's so many great obviously, you know, all the ones around Pinehurst, they're all you know, Southern Pines is so underrated. You know, there's so many good part fours at Southern Pines. And then obviously a bunch in Florida that don't get any love.
I'm going to Pinehurst soon and that's a definite stop is going to be at Southern Pines. That's I hear. Great Bones could be something really special.
Yeah that uh, I've been politicking, you know for that. And I know Kyle Franz is the man down there right now, and he's a good buddy. I'm but man Southern Pines. You know, when I go play golf trips with buddies and we go down Pinehurst, it's like, okay, number two Dormy, you know, Pine Needles, Midpines. But hey,
boys like come with me. I'm going to show you something in the afternoon that'll you know, rock your socks off for forty dollars and we can drink some beers and have fun and the architecture will really wow you. And then at the end of the trip they're always like, man, I think I had the most fun at Southern Pines
because it didn't beat me up. The greens are really really interesting, the routings on you know, the routing is unparalleled, and the land it really gets hilly back there, you know on six, seven, eight, nine, ten, I mean it's hilly for Pinehurst.
So it's funny that Zach Blair and I went on that that long San Francisco trip and the one that I mean San Francisco golf world class, cal club, world class, you know, Posa Tiempo, world class off course. But the one that sticks with us is like, just like, the one we talk about the most is Northwood.
Yeah, Northwood is really special. In twenty twelve, I took two months off and I did a California you know, just deep dive and I visited something like sixty seven clubs in two months, and Northwood up there, literally no one ever spoke about it, and the only reason I knew about it was because it was had Mackenzie's name attached. And I literally, I mean I get chills right now. The hair are standing up on the back of my neck.
How good Northwood is. And you know, and then there's like Etna springs up there, which is great.
What it closed though.
I know it or is closing or has closed. But that was really cool with Doak and George Waters and Kyle Franz did up there. That was really inspiring. And oh but yeah Northwood, who.
With those bunkers just sitting there. I mean, like, how much would it cost to put those bunkers back since they're just kind of grassed over? Like I always I always have wondered about that, like what, you know, being an architect, what do you think like just a general cost for putting that stuff back and time and materials so would be.
Yeah, you know, Andy, that's a great question. You know, there's so many courses like this. You know down here south of Chicago, Kankakey Elks, you know the same thing. There are almost trees, you know, sitting in existing bunkers and saying same with out there at Northwood and maybe Wakanda. You know in Iowa, you walk around Wakanda and you're like,
oh my gosh, this Langford and Moreau. I mean, the bunkers are sitting out there in the woods and it's just it's unbelievable, you know, all this stuff is sitting out there. Same with Northwood. You know those sequoias though,
are a little larger there. But cost I guess really you would just be probably taking out six to eight inches of top soil on the bottom of those bunkers, putting drainage in, and then putting five inches of compacted sandback sand is expensive depending on you know, what kind of scene and you're getting, but really, you know, the shaping would be very minimal, you know, just a little bit of regrassing, you know, drainage and sand.
So sixty seven clubs and courses in two months, what was your outside of Northwood? Your your best find in California that might not get talked about enough.
Pacific Grove is really really special. You know. Monterey sure gets a lot of love now, but maybe in twenty twelve when I was out there, I think a lot of guys didn't understand how great Mike strands you know, vision artistry was so when I was visiting the shore, I was really blown away by his artistry. Yes, San Francisco golf is really really good, so good. Gosh, col Club, though,
I was really just blown away. You know. Everybody's you know, talked about Kyle Club, but you know, like that seventh hole, I think it is the boomerang part four that they add, you know, that still felt really mackenzie esque. And the work by George Waters and Kyle on those bunkers, you know, for Kyle was really cool. But I think Cal Club blew me away. You know, it was so good and so you know, it was so close to the other ones.
I think all the little details at Cal Club let's make it so good, and just the way it plays, also getting the fescue in there and getting it playing bounty and firm and fast, which is so rare for that area.
Yeah, super firm, super firm, super fast. You know the land, the land has that charm back. You know, the ground is alive.
Bobby Jones played the am out in California and that's where he started ran into Mackenzie. And had it not been for that, it was believed that Ross was going to be the guy that did Augusta National. Correct.
Yes, he and Ross were buddies, you know, from his time at east Lake and all that. Ross was at east Lake in nineteen thirteen and Bobby Jones grew up on the course, so really all he knew was east Lake. And then Ross did in nineteen twenty six or seven he built Highlands Golf Club, which was Bobby Jones' is really like Mountain Golf Course and so, which still exists pretty much in its exact state. And so I think
Ross had it. You know, Ross probably had you know, Augusta was what nineteen thirty nineteen thirty one, and yeah, he fell in love with mackenzie out in Cyprus Point and all that.
What do you think a Ross designed how would it differ from the Mackenzie designed? I guess the National.
You know, they probably would have had some of the same routing. You know, the routing is so good at Augusta, the way he utilized those creeks and the you know, the ski slope on ten going down there and eleven and twelve, how twelve so underrated, and so the routing probably would have been pretty similar. But you know McKenzie's flair for the extravagant and you know the buried elephants at Augusta which have been softened over the years, which
is sad to see. But you know, I mean Mackenzie, those old Boomerang greens, like like, gosh, what is it? It was? I think nine, you know, nine was pretty much almost a boomerang green which been which has been totally changed. But you go at the Gusta like number one. Number one's green might be the best green out there, you know, and it's like beat you in the face when you when you show up, you know, you hit it out there, and then you get to one and you're like, holy smokes, what am I in for? And
so that hell and yeah, that Plateau green. But no, I think, uh, I think Ross would have really done well there. But it's pretty cool, you know Mackenzie. He was on such a run there. I mean, if you look at the top five in the world and you have you know, if you had you know, I've heard Doolks say in the past when I was at Royal Melbourne two years ago, I think that composite course might be the best course in the world. You know, pv
Okay Pine Valley. But the composite course at Royal Melbourne is so good when you take a couple of those holes from the East and put them in with the west down there, and then he has obviously at Cyper's point, which is you know, it's unbelievable. You know, the inland holes are so good there and that's what makes it so good.
Now I got to play the Jockey Club and Argentina years ago. Like I went to Argentina with my now wife and we were visiting her friend and it just happened her friend was dating a member of the Jockey Club and he's like, do you want to play him? Like, yeah, I want to, yeah, because like I was, I was thinking about it. I was like, I got to try and find a way onto this place and it just
turned out it worked out. But like you think about Mackenzie, and he designed arguably the greatest course on almost you could some of his courses in the UK four different continents. You know, he had a course that was in the conversation for the greatest golf course and on four continents, which is it's mind boggling, Yeah, and probably three for sure, exactly. So it's he's something that everybody kind of always says that he's the best, but it's it's tough to imagine,
especially given the time. And but he also had great associates.
It goes to show, Yeah, Mick Morecambe down and you know, down in Australia, he was really his right hand man. When when Mackenzie went down in Australia, you know, he obviously got together with those superintendents down there, Alex Russell and and Mick Morcomb, and he taught Mick everything, you know, and just a whirl win I think sixty days or so. And and Tom Doak would know better than I would
because he's consulting down there. But yeah, and then he kind of showed him his style down there and built the bunkers and this and that. Hey, this one looking for and then those guys ran with it and they really I mean, gosh, you go to you know, like Royal Adelaide and stuff like that. That place is divine. Kingston Heath, I mean that.
Stuff first out in Karen.
Yeah, oh that's really cool too. And nobody really makes that trek because it's eight hours from Melbourne, you know, and it's a brutal drive. But that's really really underrated nobody really sees that though.
With Ross, what would you consider as his most underappreciated skill.
Probably his most underrated skill. You know, everybody talks about his routings, and his routings are just so fundamentally strong, you know, his routings are just unbelievable. Is his skill probably was showing up, you know. And I've read so many of his site notes from Barton Hills and all over in America where he literally would would write to his daughter Lilian. Then it would be October first, they say, dearest Lillian, you know your birthday's October twenty sixth. I
will be back, you know, in Pinehurst for your birthday. Okay, October first, I'm going to take the train from Pinehurst to d C. And then I'm in DC for three days and I'm at Washington Golf and this and that, then Congressional and then I'm going in Chevy Chase. And then October second, Lillian, I'll be in Philadelphia and I'll be at loulu and Ironomank and then I'm going up
to New York. And he would literally write in this letter to her his travel you know, for the month of October, and say in nineteen twenty seven, and it would literally stop you know, d C Philly, New York, and then he'd go up to Boston and they'd take the train to the Rochester and visit Aronda Couiter Monroe, and then he'd go to Detroit and then over to Chicago and then in Minneapolis, and so then he'd come back and so in you know, twenty seven days, he'd
be back to Pinehurst and he'd visit forty six golf courses. You know, like in one day in Detroit, he was at Western Golf in the morning, and then he's he was on his way to Chicago and stopped in at Barton Hills because the train went right by Barton Hills and he just showed up at two pm and went around the golf course. And luckily the secretary took notes
from that day. It was like October, you know, twentieth, nineteen twenty five, and the have his site notes and it's like Donald Ross showed up and went around and wanted the four bunkers deeper, and you know, he was really happy with this and this, but he wanted to change one of the greens and then change the t's here, and it was just like so interesting to hear while you know, he just popped in on his way to Chicago. But long winded, you know, sorry to go on a
long diatribe. To get back to your question. What was maybe his most underrated skill was how did he keep all these golf courses in his brain and keep them all you know, I don't know alphabetized them or what, but how do you okay, how do you know like Barton Hill's this green is supposed to be over here and this and that when you just show up and then you're on your way to Chicago and you've just visited forty two golf courses in a month, and you've
gave directions to each one about what they should do with this, and you know, and he was so good with agronomy and grass types and soils, and he worked in so many different you know, like Northland up in Duluth as literally the worst red clay I've ever seen. And then conversely, you go out to Portland, Maine and it's beautiful sand and and you go down the Pinehurst
and it's totally different as well. And so he had to be so agronically, you know, agronomically sound, giving advice to all these different clubs in different climates and know all the seasons, and you should plant here at Monroe, he gave directions that you should plant by August first, so these greens are grown in by next spring and you can open up the golf course. And it's like, it's just that's just I think. You know his knowledge, his I you know, his itinerary, and the way he
travel was it's just mind boggling. Now where we fly from the you know, club, the club, and I might visit fifteen clubs in a month or twenty clubs in a month. But I get home and I'm like, Okay, what did I tell these guys? Okay this okay, boom boom. It's really tough. And he was doing that on a much larger scale.
He had to have a photographic memory and and you look past you know the architecture and the agronomy and knowledge. But he also was like a master club maker. He was a he had high finishes in the US opened, the British Open, or the Open Championship. It's uh and it's crazy to think, like this guy is probably the most well rounded, most versed man ever in the history of golf.
Yeah, and then Andy to even top that off. He was affluent and could mix, you know, with high society down in Pinehurst and shake hands and and speak eloquently, you know. And he only had a eighth grade education and he was you know, his father he was a carpenter and everything in Dornick. And you know where did he get you know, he must have been a genius. And so when Ron Pritchert and I have these discussions, we're like, this guy had to be his IQ had
to be through the roof. But to have all these all these assets, you know, and capabilities of being able to work with the foreman out out in the you know, out in the field and explain what he wanted and get what he wanted built, and then go in and speak with the gentleman, you know. Like one of his best friends was mister Ford. You know, he got all that work in Detroit because mister Ford would come down to Pinehurst and he was like, oh, you're the man
down a Pinehurst, you know, Donald, we need you. We need golf courses in Detroit. Same with the White Bear yacht family up in Minnesota. That's how he got all his Minnesota work. That was his connection. And so in nineteen you know, early nineteen twelve, thirteen, fourteen fifteen, he was going up there every summer to visit the family
from the White Bear Yacht Club. And that's how he got Cedar Rapids in nineteen fifteen, and that's how he went to Minnicotta, and then he got Woodhill and then he got Northland and interlocking, and so his connections were, you know, unbelievable. And so this gentleman was you know, just basic education, you know, and he comes over, he emigrates in eighteen ninety nine, and then somehow his brand,
you know, he built himself from zero. I mean I remember reading you know, he hardly had enough money to get out to Oakley Golf Club when he first arrived, and you know, off the ship he basically walked the seven miles because he couldn't take the train car because he didn't have enough money, you know. And then he built an empire where he at one point had two thousand guys employed, you know, in nineteen twenty eight before
the stock market crash. And I mean I just don't know how he had the capacity, you know, to to keep everything wrong.
Yeah, I can't imagine he slept that much.
No, No, but you know the only thing that I want to do. Want to say though, is when you're taking train, you know, when you're taking train travel, it's a lot different because what would happen is, you know, when he when his notes from clubs is you know, somebody would pick him up at the train stop and then they would take him directly to the golf course. And so he never really drove, and so that time he had all this time to you know, okay, what's
your land, like, what's this? Okay, this is where we're going, and then he would have dinner and everything like that, and he'd have his site notes from the day. Then he'd get on the train and he'd have an hour two, three, four five where he could write down all his site notes and do his whole by whole drawings he wanted to do. The master plans. He'd send them down to or send them up to Boston to Walter Irving Johnson, who would delicately, you know, handcraft these beautiful master plans
and ink them on linen. But Ross would send his whole by whole master plan or hole by whole you know, drawings with site notes and you know about the character of the topography, this and that, but he had all this time on the train to decipher that and knock
out all the work. You know, say he was at Hinsdale and you know, then going up to oak Park or Evanston, you know, that night he would just write everything down about Hinsdale and then clear that off his book, then go to oak Park, you know, and then knock out oak Park for the day and knock out all those drawings that night. And I think that was really really special.
That's with technology today. I think it almost makes it harder.
A lot of times, exactly all the emails and all the calls, you know, Like we were walking around earlier and I have nine missed calls and four emails and it's nine forty five this morning.
You know, it's like a lot of times the emails like they aren't like fast to get done. It takes a long time to answer a lot of these questions. It's not like, you know, it's like writing. Sometimes I feel like if I spend an afternoon writing emails back, it's like I've written like a whole article. It's like, I mean, and then one technology I'm excited for is a drivable car.
Yes, that'll be almost like we've just talked about where ross was being driven around everywhere and sitting in a you know, sitting in a train car. You know.
So, so what you've seen twenty five hundred golf courses to date, you've seen all these ross courses. What ross courses are you most excited to see that you haven't seen yet?
Wow, that's that's a tough one. Really. The ones I haven't seen are the tough ones. Just to get to, like BAMF. You know, there's not much ross left at BAMF, but I want to get up there anyway because he was there. Gosh, what do I have? I have the one in Missouri? Yeah, I have, like the one in Kansas called Shawnee. I have Hillcrest, French Lick. I haven't seen a bunch in Florida. You know. Florida is so tough to get down to because it's like in the wintertime,
everyone is down there. And that's my you know, from from Christmas until really February first or March first is my kind of time to get away. Go to California, go to Australia, New Zealand, go to Europe and see everything, But it's really hard to get to Florida because everyone's down there. And then the summer, I'm really busy, and so it's one hundred degrees down there, and nobody wants
to be down there. So I literally have, out of the thirty golf courses, you know, thirty more Ross I have to see, you know, probably twenty or in Florida. And then the other thing is, I'm not really excited to see this stuff in Florida because it's so flat. The land is devoid of so much character.
I think a lot of it's been killed too right over time with you know, so many architects work down in Florida.
Yeah, everything's you know, cyclical down there. It's like, oh, it's ten years later, we need to blow up our golf course. And so I've seen Seminole, and I've seen Sarah Bay and Tim Aquana and some of the good ones. But I just right now, I don't have the urge to see the rest of that, you know, I want to finish off the list. And I thought I was going to be the first guy to see every Donald Ross course, but obviously there's a guy from the Donald Ross Society beat me out. For that, and I sent
him a nice email. I was like, man, how did you get to all these? Like there's some that are brutal, you know, there are some uh, you know way out in Nova Scotia and Halifax and stuff, Brightwood and Liverpool, you know, White Point which is way down you know, Nova Scotia, And I've made the rise up there and tried to see him all but you know, and then I have a couple, you know, up in northern New Hampshire. After see, I've seen everyone in Maine, everyone in New York, everything in Pennsylvania.
What are the what's your top five?
Who? You know? Top five probably would be I mean it was that's really really hard. But Glenn's Falls is really really good up in New York. I mean it's it's really good. And then right down the road in Rome, New York, there is to Usica, which is literally like going back in time and seeing, you know, what Ross
would have done. He spent so much time there because he had a girlfriend there, Florence Blackinton, and it was after his first wife, Susie died in nineteen twenty one, so he was really up there in like twenty two twenty three. A lot and I think he had a really big hand there with the Walter p Hatch and Walter be Hatch was so so so talented hit one of his associates. Because Walter Behatch built Glenn's Falls, he built to Uzuka. You know some other ones that you
know something that's so underrated that nobody knows about. It's called Thendara. Thendara is up in the Adirondacks. It's like literally almost like a rainer golf course. It's so bold. You know, there's like a box car on the ninth green, buried in the green where it's literally raised four feet above the rest of the putting service. It's unbelievable. But no wanna moist it. The greens that want to moist it.
Every single one has character. There's not one flat green there and so wanta moist It is cool and small and the properties, you know, it's pretty tame, but wana moist of the greens are unparalleled for a ross golf course. And then you have Essex County, I mean the Crown Jewel. He spent so much time there. And then you know Ironomic is really special. You know that was JB McGovern's home course. He was the green chair there and built it.
And that's why the greens have so much character at ironom Ing, and Ironiming is like everything about is about scale Ironoming. You know, the property is big, the clubhouse is big. The bunkering was big on the master plan that Ross drew, you know, and JB McGovern had a proclivity to build small bunkers. And then that's what gil Han's just put back is all JB's one hundred and eighty eight bunkers or whatever that he split. He would
split Ross's big bunkers in the small bunkers. But you know in Oakland Hills, Oakland Hills is really great and Northland the one, you know, you said five, I probably listened six or seven because I can't stop.
That's fine, I've got I don't really like it.
We're just yeah, we're just gonna keep moving, you know. But Northland might be one of the better routings and we're I've been so fortunate to work with Ron Pritchard on that, you know, and I'm actually going back in a couple of weeks to you know, to restore some
more holes. But the it's sitting on Lake Superior, and it's on the side of this huge block, and Lake Superior literally looks like an ocean, and so it is an Minnesota golf course, but it feels like you're in California or on the Atlantic in Maine, and so literally you have cliffhanger greens that look like the waters right behind the green. And so Northland is unbelievably special and it's finally getting some recognition. And you know, that's one
golf course though. That Ron Pritchard, I feel like he's seen every ross court, you know, golf course there is. He has stated to the membership that he thinks that could be top forty in America and I'm I was even like, whoa, Ron, you never give praise? You know?
That is that's pretty cool? And he's like, yeah, you know, so when we talk about routings, that might be one of the best ross routings there is because it climbs this almost mountainlike terrain and then it loops all the way back down to eighteen at the clubhouse, and so nine is like the furthest part away. You know, it's
like a British Links kind of style routing. And so he really went outside the box there and then it took three years for that course to be built because it's on such hard that red clay and the seasons are so short, so they would build like six holes in nineteen twenty five, six holes in nineteen twenty six, and then six oles in nineteen twenty seven, and so it literally his master plan is from you know, I think it says nineteen twenty five on it, and it opened,
you know, like July fourth, nineteen twenty seven. You know, so it's pretty cool that it took that long. And then the last one I want to mention a homer for is mountain Ridge in New Jersey. Everyone talks about Plainfield, everyone talks about Ironomy, you know, everybody talks about all these other clubs in the Northeast, but nobody knows mountain Ridge. Mountain Ridge has greens that are even cooler than Plainfield and aronom and combined. Then it's a you know, it's
a smaller club, three inner members. They don't like their name getting out much. But if you go to mountain Ridge, it got golf digest restoration of the year I think in twenty eleven or twelve, and Ron I mean knocked out of the ballpark. It's so cool. But you could literally play golf at Somerset Hills with buddies and then go up the plain field and you're like, guys, I'm going to take you to Mountain Ridge and then you go play mountain Ridge and they're all like, I've never heard,
I've never seen this. This place is epic. It's like, you know, and I'm a softye for Somerset Hills. It's maybe my favorite. If I were to join anywhere but Bitterman, where I play in Wilmington, Delawroyd I joined, you know, if I ever had the privilege, you know, Somerset Hills has a sweet spot in my heart. But mountain Ridge is it's like this place that if you went and played Andy, you'd be like, why does anybody talk about this? But it is in the Golf Week top one hundred, so they do get it.
So that's the best is finding those places that nobody talks about you. So you grew up caddying at Ironomic. How much of you know walking around that golf course every day as a kid, do you think played a role in you becoming a golf course architect?
Yeah, one hundred percent. I grew up playing Gap Golf Association Philadelphia with their junior tournaments in the late nineties and early two thousands, and we would go play Huntington Valley, Maryon, Lancaster, Aronomy Manufacturers, Lulu. I mean, the list goes on, you know, Lehigh Saukin Valley, even Scrinton Country called the Scrintons unbelievable Travis, right, yeah, and it's the greens are like the moon. You know.
Travis so underrated with his green building. But you know, so I would play in Philly Cricket and Rolling Green and Plymouth and all these flints, and so I saw, you know, when I was eleven and twelve and thirteen, fourteen, fifteen eighteen, I saw all these great golf courses. And then I'd go back and play my municipal, you know, public golf course that I grew up on, and I'd say, well, this is very different. You know this, Why are my
greens so bland? And I go up to you know, Marion and I put it off the green and it's not because they're super fast, which they were, but the contours are incredible, you know, and there's you know, the routings are great. And so I had this great appreciation from age, you know, seventeen of I was in a special place. These are special golf courses, you know, catting at Ironom and cattying at Wilmington Country Club, you know,
seeing great golf. And so when I was at cattying at Ironomic, Ron Pritchard did the two thousand and two restoration there and I think, you know, I think that one golf digest restoration the year, I'm pretty sure. And that literally spun the golf world, you know, in Philly in the Northeast a little bit. I mean, Ron Pritcher's his phone run off the hook after that, and that led to him getting all these other unbelievable courses, you know, Charlotte Country Club and the and some of the bigger
name clubs that he and I have worked with. But yeah, I mean just caddying seeing how these guys were, you know, utilizing these slopes on the putt and greens, and it was just something different, you know. And Philly is such a hotbed. I've been super blessed.
Yeah, oh not last summer. The summer before I spent two weeks out there. I got I've played in the mid so I got to do a big tour and then my buddy got married out there, so I spent another week, and just two weeks was like just scratching the surface. It's I mean, there's so many, so many cool places to see, and it's it's definitely I think it's the clear number two city in America for golf.
Yeah, I know, I know number two is hard for me to say, but you know, New York Metro area and Long Island, it's it's pretty hard to beat that.
You know, it's a different conversation. If you split Long Island off.
And right, you delete Long Island out of seen Philly crushes you know, New York Metro I think, you know, New North New Jersey and New York I think it gets it. But then you get in Long Island and you got the Garden Cities and the Shinnies out there and the Atlantic and Maidstone and it can't compete.
You got like a place like Southampton, nobody mentioned, and it's right next to National and it's so good, it's so pure.
Yeah, and so yeah, Long Island itself has thirty on parallel golf and it's all sand, you know, the stuff on the sand, the ball, you know, the grounds alive that one, you know, the charm is back.
Yeah, it's that's the getting the ball bouncy again, the ball, the bounce.
In the ground, the British Isles ground game took golf.
It's so you you've mentioned you worked for Ron Pritchard a great deal. You've also worked for Keith Foster and then Bill Kore and Ben Crenshaw. What what is if you were going to say one thing that you've taken from each guy is what they are just so great at? What would it be?
So Keith taught me scale. You know, when I was with Keith, we were doing Colonial Baltimore, five farms. I was doing the plans for Philly cricket, plans for Moraine. We were doing fresh Meadow up in Lake Success, New York, up on Long Island, Orchard Lake. We were doing that. And so you would walk Orchard Lake with all these weeping willows and all these smallways, and He's say, Tyler, you need to get back to Allison scale. You know, big bunkers, big greens, big fairways, you know, big roles
of the land. The roles of the land at Orchard Lak are really incredible, you know, expose the depography. And so Keith taught me scale and you know, really how to run a business, how to be an architect, and how it's not just you're not just an artist. You know, you're not just some guy who shows up. You know.
Keith is so good at talking the membership, educating the membership, you know, sitting down and working through the worst parts of a restoration or renovation, you know, working with a contractor in the field, beating the best product out of that contractor. Every contractor wants to show up and they want to be in and out, you know, in three months and make a ton of money. And that's their goal.
And your goal as the architect and for the club and the honor of the club and honor of the client is to make enduring work, which Keith you know, talks about a lot. You want that work to last for fifty to one hundred year like Ross and all these great old clubs. You don't want to be some architect that comes in in the eighties and the next thing, you know, in twelve years, it's being blown up because that work didn't endure, you know, it wasn't great and lasting.
And so Keith taught me that, you know, to really take a critical eye. You know, Tyler, your eye. Your eye is the most valuable asset you have. And you can go around with that Green committee and the superintendent and the contractor and you can work out every fine detail. You know. Oh, you know this back corner of this putting service is just off a little bit. Let's beat
that down half an inch. Hey, this bunker, you know, I want this flashed a little more because I want to see a ribin of sand from two hundred yards away. You know, I don't want that high lip in front of the bunker to block the viewport into that sayand so Keith really taught me about you know that A couple of things here obviously, Bill Corr. Same thing at Dormy Club when I was living with Keith reb and working with jimbo Wright and Jeff Bradley, who are like
the most talented guys in the industry. You know, I work, I did all the bunker work with Jeff Bradley, and so I'd be in the bunkers every day. And then I did a lot of the peripheral work, and Keith red was doing the fairway grading and ts and and jimbo Wright did the bunkers and so I was mainly with Jeff Bradley every day, and Jeff Bradley taught me more about artistry and hey, like, look, it's got to
be in the right spot. The bunker's got to be located properly, but it's got to be aesthetically pleasing fit into the land naturally, almost like that mackenzie style, you know, bunkering. And so I was in there with a shovel every day with Jeff and he's still one of these one of my best buddies in the industry to this day.
And Bill cor would come out and say, Tyler, I don't want to see any beach balls over there, you know, And and you know, with his funny you know, his cool Texas twang a little bit, and and because I would, you know, I was such a novice in oh six oh seven, I guess twelve years.
Ago when one of the voicemails I'll never delete from my phone was Bill Corkan Andy, this is Bill Core. It's just the way his voice is.
It's great, but he's so you know, he's so mild tempered and ben and but they taught me about look the periphery, everything matters, you know, dormy. We worked so hard on the peripheral stuff. You know. It wasn't just about the greens and the tea's and the bunkers that get so much attention. It was about every fine detail. And Bill wanted you know, he beat me down about this bump, you know, and I thought I knocked it out of the ballpark, and he'd be like, make it
more weathered, make it more natural, you know. And then Bill also taught me that, you know, I was an abrasive twenty three year old working with them their first intern ever maybe you know, since you know, up until the new guys who have started working with them, but this was twelve years ago, and all the guys were like, how did you How did you get on this job with us? I wrote a letter to Bill core and
he actually called me. You know, I was like the first intern they had, you know, Jeff Bradley and those guys were like who are you and why are you here? And so they just kind of brought me under the wing. And but but Bill and Ben are so they're so just generous, kind, you know, mild tempered. I learned from them that you have to you know, like Bill Corer would would always say your name, Well, Tyler, I think we should do this. You know, hey, Andy, what do
you think about this? You know, he always used your name through your interjected your name to make you feel a part of the conversation. And that's one thing that's maybe way overlooked, but it's just, you know, it's like a life lesson really, you know, treat your client, treat your friends, treat everybody the same, you know, interject them into the conversation and you're you're all looking for the best product here. And so Bill Bill Cour's you know, unbelievable.
He's like the father of you know, architecture right now. And then lastly, uh Ron Pritchard is the consummate artist. And he taught me that look, you know, Ross never moved one tablespoon or teaspoon more than they had to. The economy of golf course can instruction was so tough, you know, in the twenties, with teams of horses and scoops. You know, everything was so so much more arduous than it is now. And he taught me that, look, look
they didn't put all that fat around that green. That green was perched up and it fell right off from the green putting surface. There wasn't all this blown up extra mass because they didn't have the you know, they didn't have the tools to move that dirt. And so Tyler, when you're moving this dirt, or when you're building a bunker or tee, think really really carefully about why you're putting the dirt there, or why you're stripping the dirt
away from there. You know, every piece matter, every little morsel. And so he really opened up my eyes to the phill pads being perched and you know, dirt movement through a sight, you know, horizon lines. You know, He's constantly still showing me, Tyler, look at Ross's notes. Here cut the bunker one and a half feet for the floor, and Phil three and a half feet for the shoulders. Aka, you're in the bunker, you're four and a half feet below those shoulders. Then you add in sand, so you're
four feet below those shoulders. You know, so that's something like the details and the Ross notes. You know that Ron just has beaten into my brain that so many guys don't, I don't think understand, you know, like it's supposed to be a hazard, it's supposed to be a half stroke penalty. You're not supposed to reach the green. Sometimes from one hundred and eighty yards inside his bunker. Ross had a four foot burm. You're four and a
half foot burm, you know, face bunker. So if you can't reach the green, you shouldn't have hit it in this hazard. So Ron is such a you know, historian, and such a guy who's you know, he's almost in the wrong era, you know, he deserves to be around in nineteen twenty and you're.
One of the younger architects. What's the biggest challenge.
Well, well, you know, exposure, you know one. I mean, I've never had the stomach for self promotion, you know, so I really have never had a website until this past year, or you know, Ron Pritcher's never had a website, and so exposure a lot, you know, a lot of the Ross guys know us, a lot of Ross clubs
know us or me. But I've kind of just taken this slow you know, slow stare, you know, stairways, you know, slow climb, you know, working with Keith for a couple of years back in the mid two thousands, working with Coren Crenshaw, working with Ron Pritchard, I've tried to slowly build my brand, you know, build who I am. You know, I'm like a design build guy, and I want to be, you know, and build my company like Gill Hants where I can come in and I can shape that green
for you. You know, I can shape the bunkers for you. And you know, I've been shaping twelve years now. And I feel really really confident that I can come into any club and tell them this is exactly what's going to cost, and I'm going to you know, I can point to everything. You know, I can really feel really confident about, you know, my abilities and all that. And but to answer your question, I think, you know, I'll continue to get more visibility and higher you know, bigger projects,
you know, the one like you know. The one thing that's tough right now is I've interviewed at Sciota and some big, big time clubs, and I've just come up short because I'm thirty two, thirty three, Whereas somebody who's in their mid forties or fifties, you know, appeases to them a little bit more because that's what the committee, that's what their age is.
And it's a fascinating thing to me, is how golf course architects rarely retire.
Right, right, you know we hit our stride from you know, thirty or thirty five or forty to sixty five to seventy to seventy five and so into their eighties, right Peter Die you know, gosh, I think he's ninety two now, yeah, you know, And but no, it's really just it's really tough going up against a fifty nine year old, you know, Like if I go up against Gill at Aeronomy, you know, it's like, how am I supposed to retain Ironomic? It's
pretty impossible, you know. So you know, but I've been fortunate to get some top one hunder clubs like Monroe. You know, they're a new client of mine. Cedar Rapids just got in the top one hundred and ninety two. You know, Northland hopefully will be in the top one hundred soon.
Skokey Beverly, that's uh so we're we're sitting here in Beverly in the clubhouse Great Chicago down Ross Course, and you've been doing work with x More and Skokee and Evanston in the area, and we talked a little bit about golf scenes, like how do you feel Chicago stacks up with Philly and New York and Long Island and San Francisco. You know, we'd kind of been touching the major metro areas.
Right, No One. The one thing that you need for great golf is land, you know. And the unfortunate part with Chicago is it's so flat in so many areas. And then you know the golf courses that stick out in Chicago obviously that we talked about earlier, Chicago Golf, Shore Acres, all down, Beverly and Skokee, all five of those courses have really great land in some part of
their proper. And even though you know, people may say, oh, Shoreykers is pretty darn flat with one nine eighteen, but the ravines are so on god, I mean there's so they come into play so well, like rain Or routed that thing so well. I think you ten eleven, twelve twelve is epic. Thirteen fourteen.
The idea of him bypassing the lake, yea, going into those ravines, like everybody's like, how is it not on the lake is like, well, it's probably the one of the greatest routings of all.
Time exactly exactly, So Chicago, it's just in my opinion I've seen. I feel like every time I'm in Chicago, I try to walk another golf course. And so yesterday I went and saw three other golf courses, you know, and and I have just a couple more on my radar left to sea. But it's just you're just so disappointed when you go onto a golf course and you're like, oh, the land is so devoid a character. You know, I
wish there were there was more character. And one thing that I won't go too far down the rabbit hole though, is Chicago was early Ross, so from like Hinsdale in nineteen thirteen to Beverly in nineteen nineteen. The lagrange Lagrange was probably one of his last in nineteen twenty one. So in eight years there from nineteen thirteen and nineteen twenty one, Ross, did I think ten golf courses toned. Yeah. And the only one knock is that there's a lot of back to front greens, you know, not a lot
of them have supreme amounts of character. Because it was
early Ross. It was teens, you know, Ross really started interjecting a lot of character and heavily bunkering his golf courses more in the twenties because he was he was you know, changing his practices and theories because the ball was advancing and the you know, steel shafts were coming into fruition in the late twenties, and so then he started more heavily bunkering his fronts of greens and putting more bunkers out there, and then adding more character into
putting services. So unfortunately for Chicago is it's early ross. So a lot of them are pretty basic greens perched up, still really solid routings, but flat, you know, like oak parks, pretty flat, you know, but these they got these great perch screens, you know, and and h X more. You know, it has a role in the land. There a little bit, you know, a bluff where the clubhouse is, but it's pretty flat, you know, Indian Hill, you know, pretty flat.
They have drainage problems, it's so flat. And uh, you know, Hinsdale has some rolls out there. Lagrange has a few rolls. But to to finish off what I was, you know, getting at is, you know, Chicago is such a great city. It's one of my favorite cities, and I live here tomorrow. But it's just the golf is a little flat you know, it's a little boring. Whereas you go to Philly and it's like, you know, the stuff's in your face. You go to northern New Jersey, New York, it's in your face.
Boston really hilly. You know, California we just talked about even in La with bel Air and those great ravines and arroyos and you know, that thing's in on the side of a mountain almost you know, in Beverly Hills and and Riviera, you know with the golf you know, clubhouse way up on there, and you know, like l A CEC maybe one of the best restorations in the world. You know that guilded out there. It's great property, you know.
And that's I always say Chicago, we we lack like the star power of that. And really what it comes down to his land, like we have so many great like second tier golf courses, but we just don't have like a plethora of top tier courses where like a New York you know, you you go down the list and you get to ten and you're still like this world class golf course. We get to three two. But I mean, so we're at Beverly and it's one of the core it's obviously constricted by by being inside Chicago proper.
I mean, you're in the hub. I always joke it's the loudest golf course in the world. You got planes flying over you. But it's also one of the most unique in the sense of its history, the history of the land. How do you approach a project like Beverly where you have a rich championship history, Like, you know, what are you looking at when you start to develop a master plan?
What we look at, you know, is I came into the clubhouse and I got together with Kirkspeth, the superintendent, and I said, look, I need to get up in the attic, you know, I need to get in the clubhouse and find anything I can, you know, And like Ron Pritchard, he's found old Ross master plans, Like he found an old Ross plane at Country cub of Buffalo that they never knew existed. And so he's found I think four or five original Ross plans tucked away in
the attics and in old lockers. And so we first tried to do that and try to find stuff that maybe isn't around or even known, you know, like at Mountain Lake, I found a nineteen thirty seven aerial on the Florida University of Florida's historical database and they they never had any aerials before nineteen fifty. And so it's things like that where we really make our you know, value, We bring our value where we try to find and research all the old aerials, any photography, all the old
news clippings. And I have a couple of guys who I work with who do a lot of research with me, who helped me out. So we first tried to do a research period and say, okay, what did it look like, and then we try to get a timeline of you know, okay, Beverly. Beverly was a Georgia O'Neil from nineteen oh eight, and it's almost identically routed. Now, you know, Ross came in and just changed a few holes on the front nine. The back nine is pretty much almost O'Neil from nineteen
oh eight. So when you see the nineteen oh eight on logo, it's pretty much in nineteen oh eight golf course. Ross came in nineteen eighteen, nineteen nineteen, and I have all the newspaper clippings, and so we show the club the George O'Neil routing, and we show them the Ross you know, changes in nineteen eighteen, nineteen nineteen. It opened in nineteen nineteen, and there's all these great newspaper articles
about those changes. He filled in a pond on fifteen or on sixteen, and then he lowered the ridge on eleven that we looked at this morning. He rebuilt a couple you know, he rebuilt every green site. The George O'Neal greens were very flat right on the ground, and so Ross perched all the greens, and so he was not very heavy handed in a routing sense, but in an architectural sense, with adding the bunkers, perching the greens, putting the character in the greens. So then we go
through and we try to unmask the layers. Okay, what okay, nineteen oh eight we have that. Nineteen eighteen we have what Ross did pretty much, you know, from the newspaper articles and everything. Then we see, okay, nineteen thirty one, we have all these great photos because they had the US amateur that Francis. We went one and Bobby Jones was here, everybody was here. We have all these incredible photos from nineteen thirty one. But we do know from
nineteen eighteen to nineteen thirty one, some things changed. Chick Evans was local great golfer, and he came in and he had a proclivity where, you know, he loved tinkering with bunkers and putting these little noses on all these bunkers. So we see in the nineteen thirty one aerial that they're start to become these noses in you know, ten to fourteen of the bunkers where chick Evans was kind of tinkering out here. So then we kind of okay, we know what chick did. Then we see aerials from
nineteen thirty nine. We have forty nine, fifty nine, seventy one, you know, all the way up to eighty five. And then now then the trees started, you know, encroaching. All the trees were planted in the fifties sixty seventies. Then
the fairway line shrunk, then the green shrunk. Then they brought in Bob Lohman and a couple other guys in the eighties and they rebuilt Green number seven, number eight, and they moved to Green number nine because of the green irre because of the expansion of yeah, of I call it highway eighty seven because it's like a highway, but eighty seven street. And so we know that those
three greens were rebuilt. And then we do know that Green six was rebuilt, but we think by Ross because we have an aerial that shows it mid movement when they pushed back seventy for the old lake Miss Chicken Bluff to come into play. So we basically know what greens were rebuilt, how the routing was and so then we begin to build our master plan with all that,
you know, the foundation of all that stuff. We say, wow, well we got to do a lot of tree removal, you know, because we're going to try to open up the playing corridors. We're going to open up the widen out the fairways, put the bunkers back to where Ross had them, you know, rebuild the t's, lowered them a little bit. You know, in the eighties they brought in all this fill, you know, a contractor somebody did. All
the t's are five feet in the air. They're all perched, and so we're going to try to beat down the t's you know, to six or six inches to a foot above grade, widen them out.
Better workout.
You walk up the help right right, every tea bucks five feet in the air. You know, it's like where did the caddies stand?
It's funny, I came. I've played here in twenty ten for the stadium and yeah, I for I didn't even think about the tea boxes. But then we come out here and like it's like one of the first things that you notice, Like when you come with a different you're looking at it, of course from a different lens and different perspective. Now it's but god, it looks so
much better with it with the tree removal. I mean, the corridors, being able to uncover all the different green sites and seeing them close together, and the layers and you know, having bunkers on other greens that deceptively look like they're on on other holes. I mean the routing was really good for O'Neill. I mean he, I mean he did a great job.
Unbelievable. I mean the routing at Beverly, the back nine is I don't know how you can do any better. I've tried to think about it, but yeah, it's it's unbelievable. And yeah, I mean so now we're just detriating the property, trying to expose the topography because what you know, what we talked about earlier is why Chicago golf you know, why is it just lacking and why is it a little you know behind other metro areas because of the topography. Well,
what is Beverly blessed with unbelievab topography. I mean, it is a roller coaster out here. It is like being in Philly or New York, or it's like being in San fran you know, and it has these big valleys and big high points, and so we want the topography to be the star here and the show, you know, expose that and we're going to add you know, light fescue throughout the golf course, so we have that aesthetic.
So we have that pleasing you know, those different colors out here in the summer, and you know, just really expose its assets and get the golf course back and you know, and hopefully bring it back in the really top five conversation as you know, Chicago Golf Club.
Yeah, I think it's there. I I mean, I'm I'm biased. I'm I'm a classic golf course lover, and my my top five is different than a lot of the magazines. So it's but this is this has always been a place that ever since I played here that back then. I just love this place. It's it's got so much and it is it's a aspect of the land. I mean, it's it's got some really interesting holes and it it it's got fairway slopes, it's got you know you have
to hit over, it's got some blindness to it. It's got really unique green positions where they're perched on up on like little knoles where you you know, as what we've seen with the tree removal out here is it's bringing back these infinity style greens that you know, really mess with your eye and then mess with your mind when you're standing over a shot.
Yeah, that's that's the best thing I learned from Mike Strands growing up and traveling with my father to go see you know, World New Ken and Caledonia and True Blue was Mike Strands would beat you off the tee before you even hit your first shot at Tobacco Road. You're like, oh my gosh, the fairway looks like it's
it's non existent. And so the mental part of golf, you know, that is so underrated, where you're you know, interjecting that doubt before you even hit the golf ball on Beverly has that in so many locations where you're on seven and you're like, how far is how far is it to clear that bluff? You know, we're on eleven. Where is the fair way out there? You know you're hitting a blind t shot. And so it's these little things that golfers you know, take for granted or don't
really even you know, have interjected into the game. You know, the doubt, the blindness, the the little you know, the scariness off the tee of Wow, the punkers look scary out there, like I better avoid these hazards.
Who's your mount Rushmore of golf course architects.
Well, I'm a Flynn homer, which is funny because I work so much. I work so much on ross.
But I think Flynn's super underrated.
Yeah, I mean you take his top five. I mean you got Shinna Cock and you know Huntington Valley and Lancaster. You know, Lancaster Country Club has maybe the best routing in America, you know, and Tom Doak I think has hit on that, but Lancaster is unparalleled and routing. I think it's the best routing in the world actually, And so Flynn growing up in Philly, playing Hunton Valley, playing Philly Country. I'm in Flynn, Homer. You know Marion Marion
is a Flynn golf course. I mean Flynn. Flynn redid Marion for nineteen eighteen, nineteen twenty four AM, nineteen twenty AM, nineteen thirty open. You know, he tinkered with that all the way up until thirty two, and so he almost pretty much rebuilt Marion three times.
It drives me nuts because here in Chicago there was an estate course called mill Road Farm that was a flynn.
That the longest flynn ever. They called it.
The Oakeman of the Midwest. And he had a running bet with professionals that nobody could break par and I think only Tommy Armor broke Parr, like one guy of hundreds, if not thousands of pros that came through broke Parr. And then he also did Pine Meadow, which is a public course here. Unbelieve it is a great piece of land, and unfortunately Joe Lee got his hands on it and now there's a bunch of lakes and a bunch of it. But that would be a really cool place to see
go back because it's owned by a bunch of nuns. Whoa, Yeah, it's pretty neat. It's I think the Jemsick family owns the property, so yeah, or it has the long term lease on it.
Yeah. But wow. Well to answer your question though, you know the Mountain Rushmore Flynn would be my number one. You know, I wish he just didn't live that long. You know, he died and I think in nineteen forty or thirty nine, and it was just a pretty you know, or maybe it was forty four, I think, but it was it was before the depression ended. And but it Flynn.
And then you know, I love Walter Travis because his greens are so you know, I'm throwing a wild card out there, and Walter Travis because he.
Got two wild Yeah.
But you go of the Cape Rundle. I did that project for Bruce Hepner and Doak and bro Cape runnal of greens. It's like many Augusta greens. And then you go to a country club a trolly and and I mean, gosh, there you know country Clovis Scranton that I mentioned earlier. I mean the you know, Travis had such a great mind for greens. He was such a great putter. So Flynn Travis. You know, I gotta go with Ross obviously, you know for routings and just you know, the guy
was a genius. I just don't know how he did it, you know, and and and then Mackenzie, you know, because McKenzie had that flare, you know, that sexiness. You know, he was just man, he was a wild drinker and partier. I've heard all the stories down in Australia, you know, like he would he would knock off work at two and man he'd be in the bar told midnight, you know, with his bottle of I think of a Scotch or whatever he drank, you know, whiskey. But uh, but so
those five how many are my Rushan were four? Though? Yeah, so I gotta leave.
You got you got four Ross, Flynn, Travis and Mackenzie.
Boom, there we go.
Gotta I gotta gotta leave a lot.
Of Sorry Rainer, Sorry, I love those guys, and but man, when you knock them down to Ford stuff.
Yeah it is. It's there's so many good ones out there and you're not even including any of the modern guys.
You sorry, Martin, I'm sorry modern guys. I'm a homer for the old stuff.
I am too. Yeah, there's nothing, nothing better than that. I think I've part of the best part of the why they're so popular now is that they were designed for championship golf now and it's perfect for every day golf now exactly. So it's all right, well, uh, we're gonna do some overrated, underrateds. So let's start with template holes.
Overrated. Sorry, Yeah, they're there's a place for them. But you know, I've seen them all. They work, they're great.
Old McDonald's really cool. But when you find that one golf hole, like you go to Woodhill and you're on the second hole and it's literally a two or twenty hole where if you hit the green you might make it two, but if you miss the green, you might make a twenty, like an engineer's you know, one of those two or twenty holes, and you're like, I've never seen a ross hole like this, you know, out of
all the golf courses I've seen. So I like the ones where it's you know, the land is dictated the hole and it's like a one off and you're like, oh my gosh, how cool is this hole? You know, Like yesterday I was down at how you met in the sixteenth hole. There it's like this volcano par three. This green's way up on this bluff. It's the highest one on the golf course. It's like, WHOA, how cool is that? Part three? And I know they've messed around with that green and knocked it down a little bit.
But now, I think when you utilize the land and you have a really unique hole, you know, like a seed of rabids. The ninth hole is five hundred and sixty yards, but it gently climbs all the way up this big valley to a punch bowl green and you're like, wait a second, you have a blind punch bowl green, like an alps hole at the end of this unbelievably big valley hole that's reminiscs in an eighteen green and you're like, I've never seen anything like this in golf
and wow, You're just like this is cedar rabbits. And then like another hole of cedar rabbits. There's a they call an old burial Indian mound. There's a mound that's fifty two feet in the air on the fourteenth hole and you hit a drive out to this flat fairway and then this green's fifty two feet in the air or forty eight feet in the air that goes away from you, and you're like, this is so cool because
it's unlike anything I've seen. And so yeah, the templates have their spot and they're great and they were Dans so great. And then you know beer ritz you know, but like how about the beerrits at Somerset Hills that you know, it's what ten eleven, twelve thirteen, you know that that Tilly put in there. It's like it's a par four burrits, you know, and that was nineteen fourteen. That was pretty freaking early for you know, burrits. Really cool.
It's a lot of the best architecture breaks rules, right, you know, like nobody would build a green on a fifty two f foot mound that runs away now a blind running away at green. But it's so neat that there's a lot of like, you know, the most interesting routings are the ones that are very extreme, like you talked about with Northwood climbing up and then the ninth hole is all the way far away from the Northland,
far away from the clubhouse. Like that's not an American golf traditional sense, and it's a different So yeah, and then you see with Rayner and McDonald, a lot of the greatest holes are non template holes.
Yeah, they're one offs.
Yeah, like a Yamen's Hall and eleven at Shore Acres.
Yeah, yeah, exactly what we talked about earlier.
Yeah, fifteen at Short Acres. Yeah, like probably the two best holes.
On the golf two favorite probably, yeah, are.
Non template holes. So that's That's something that frustrates me sometimes with Rainer is that everybody says, like, oh, the templates, so he just had the same, but like the holes that he found on each property were exception.
He utilized the land so well with that surveying background of his. You know, he found he found the edens, you know, he found the dands, he found the burritz, he found you know, the prized dog leg and the road holes. He found them. So it took skill. Then Rainer was awesome.
It's amazing. He didn't know anything about golf until mind boggling McDonald hired him for that.
Yeah, it just blows your mind. But like Yale, Like how good is Yale? You know that's a great land, Yeah, really great land, like almost mountainous land, like going up ten. You know, it's a skyscraper in front of you you know, and left of two. You know, it's like a forty five foot drop into that bunker. Yeah, Like, well I better not hit it.
Left overrated, underrated professional golf.
There's a place for it. There's definitely a place for it. But to answer your question, overrated in this time period, I think it was underrated maybe back in the day, you know, professional golf. They weren't paid well, those guys were like grinding awesome. Now it's just irks me a little bit that these guys just line it up on
you know, and just bang it straight. I just I love the Bubba's and the guys who work the ball and the Freddy couples who hit the buttercut, you know, working the ball, I think.
As a lost art both doesn't spend it.
Yeah, the ball didn't spend and the grooves and all that, and there's just too much money, you know, involved, and there's there's just no you know, I'm a field player. I hit a cut fade, you know, I worked the ball around, and I just feel like there's there's none of that really left. There's just a couple guys.
Yeah, I think I hope there's a Hickory revolution. I played with hickories in northern California, and it's just that it brought a lot of artistry and mid irons and stuff back into play. And really, especially when after you walk around a golf course like Beverly and you think about playing it from fifty yards shorter off the tee. Oh yeah, it's like, oh, all of a sudden, like this is a lot. This is a very difficult shot. Yeah, and you have to be really good. It just would
bring so much balance back into it. But it's it is more structured now, and.
The wind would blow that ball, that ball would move and drop suddenly. You know, it's almost like a knuckleball how the ball used to fly and it would just like come out of the air and just stop and you're like what happened?
And then if you hit a really if you hit a bad one, it just it goes no.
Where this hits. We're just tailing, you know, zero right, you know, left or right.
Part of me though, thinks sometimes that that would be better for the higher handicap because they would go less off line. Like today, the ball just in the equipment. They high handicap players rarely hit the ball online and the ball just soars offline further.
Yeah, it goes further and further away from the line to play. Yeah, like wow, I really hit that one at that time. But whoa, look how far right it's going.
Like it's like I you know, growing up caddying for like really good women. They just kept the ball in front of the I'm like a lot of times they didn't get but you know, the end of the end of the day they shoot eighty two and it's like they did it by just keeping the ball in front, like keep it in playing. It's yeah, it's crazy, but everybody wants to hit it far. So last overrated, underrated nineteen twenties Donald Ross.
I would say, oh, well we're finally getting to where they're you know, back in the limelight. So I would say twenties are over or nineteen twenty will be overrated. His his real his his unbelievable era. I was like twenty four to twenty eight, twenty nine. You know he went on a run there when where Ross did a ron him. Then they went up the Mountain Ridge Plainfield, then down the Seminole. I mean they had a run there of like four years from twenty seven to thirty one.
Oh my gosh. You know, they were like on fire. This guy's his crew. Yeah, so late twenties underrated, early twenties. I think he was just coming into his real real you know.
How old would he have been then? He would have been about fifty years old.
Right, Yeah, he was Yeah, eighteen ninety nine when he emigrated, he was I think he was twenty seven. You know, he was born in eighteen seventy two, so he was twenty seven when he emigrated. So yeah, twenty nineteen twenty two, he was fifty, so he was forty eight in nineteen twenty. What happened is in nineteen twenty one he really spiked
up his work. But then that's also when his wife died, So I think he had a little he had, you know, from nineteen twenty to nineteen twenty three or four, he just wasn't focused, I don't think because his first wife died, you know, Susie or and she was or you know, I think that really took his his uh focus away.
But in nineteen twenty one, he had like thirty nine projects, So nineteen twenty one was his busiest year, but then his wife was dying, So I think kind of from nineteen nineteen to nineteen twenty three, it might be overrated, you know, and then he like got his focus back, and from twenty four to thirty one, when the you know, when the real effects of the Great Depression knocked his business,
you know, to zero. I think they had like three projects in nineteen thirty thirty one, you know, Jeffersonville and PA was one of them, and it was a public golf course. But in twenty nine, twenty eight, twenty seven, woo. I mean they were really really doing some incredible stuff.
So all right, Tyler, thanks for coming on. It was thanks fun talk. We'll have to do it another one for sure, you know, another subject. You got a lot of knowledge from those travels.
Yeah. Yeah, I love traveling. I mean that's all I do is go walk off course as much as I can, and I know it's addicting. I love it. It's my favorite thing to do. And thanks so much for having me on. And uh, you know, for the young guys in golf architecture, you know, the next wave, you know, thanks for exposing us a little bit. You know, I really appreciate it.
Yeah for sure, and uh yeah, we can follow you on Twitter.
You on Instagram too, I am, but you know social media, it's like I just don't have the time. And both at Tyler aid Design so people.
Can find you there and then they can they can go check out your site too, So it's all right. Thanks again and we'll talk soon.
Great, thanks Andy, but you've been listening to the fried Egg podcast. We do the digging for you.