Merion, to all true
golfers, the name conjures up stirring images. Merion's East Course,
always on everyone's list of favorites, is a traditional golf club where
history has been made time and time again.
There's no doubt that the
gods of golf have smiled on Merion. The Club was founded at just the
right moment in time, when the game was in its infancy in this country.
It was founded in a marvelously right location, where sports minded men
and women have always abounded. And it had the right golf course
architect, Hugh Wilson, a gifted amateur whose maiden effort, according
to USGA president Richard S. Tufts, was a "model test of golfing skill
and judgement for future architects to "copy".
In 1910, the committee to
lay out the new course decided to send Hugh Wilson to Scotland and
England to study their best courses and develop ideas for Merion. He
spent about seven months abroad, playing and studying courses and
sketching the features that struck him most favorably. One mystery
which still surrounds Wilson's trip to Britain is the origin of the
wicker flagsticks, and it is still part of Merion's mystique. The
layout that Wilson fashioned at Merion was masterly. He fitted the
holes onto the land as compactly as a jigsaw puzzle. As a result,
players only had to step a few yards from each green to the next tee.
The trip to the Old Country had certainly paid off.
Wilson admitted that his
concepts sprang from the holes he'd seen in Scotland and England.
The 3rd hole was inspired by North Berwick's 15th hole (the Redan) and
the 17th, with its swale fronting the green, is reminiscent of the famed
Valley of Sin at St. Andrew's 18th hole.
On September 12, 1912, the
old course at Haverford was closed, and on the 14th, the new course and
the clubhouse were opened to members. A report of the opening said the
course was "among experts, considered the finest inland links in the
country". This was an assessment that has been echoed down through the
years.
If someone were to ask what
ingredients make up Merion today, the recipe would include the
following: One great golf course, another sporty golf course (the
West), a tradition of great championships, a membership mindful of
Merion's place in history and a dedicated staff.
The current condition of
the course is constantly compared to early photographs and every effort
is made to insure that people playing the course today compete on the
same course as did the champions of old. For that reason, also, the
course if maintained as though to hold championships daily. There is
always an intermediate rough. The Dunes Grass and Scotch Broom are
other Merion traditions, as is the way that bunkers are maintained with
peninsulas, island of grass and "eyebrows."
Traditions at Merion are
concerned with the playing of the game. No mulligans are permitted at
the first tee. Players and caddies alike are expected to respect the
course and others on the course by leaving each hole better than the way
they found it-replacing divots, raking bunkers, and fixing pitch marks
and by leaving it quickly. Slow play earns a reprimand at Merion.
Traditionally, the East
Course is a walking course. The only people allowed to use golf carts
are those with a medical necessity. Merion is committed to its caddie
program. Caddies are trained and are expected to be able to tell
players the exact yardage on any shot. There are no yardage markers
anywhere on the course. In appreciation, Merion members are always
around the leaders in contributions to the J. Wood Platt Caddie
Scholarship Fund.
All in all, Merion is about golf. It honors history and the continuing values of the game.
The grand old course made
its debut in national competition when it hosted the 1916 U.S. Amateur.
The 1916 championship also marked the first national appearance of
Robert T. "Bobby" Jones, Jr., then 14 years old, who went on to win his
first National Amateur in 1924. Jones closed his international career
winning the 1930 U.S. Amateur on Merion's eleventh hole in the same
year.
Merion continues to make
golf history to the present day. Sam Snead, Ben Hogan, Lloyd Mangrum,
Cary Middlecoff, Jimmy Demaret, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Jack
Nicklaus, Lee Trevino, Tom Watson, David Graham, Johnny Miller -- Merion
has known them all.
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