A. W. Tillinghast
Albert Warren Tillinghast ( born May 7, 1874 in Philadelphia, † May 19, 1942 in Toledo, Ohio) was an American golf architect. He is considered one of the main representatives of the golden age of golf architecture.
Life and work
As Charles Blair Macdonald in front of him was the coming of a wealthy family AW Tillinghast, called Tillie, a disciple of Old Tom Morris. From 1896 to 1901 he made several study trips to St Andrews and regularly participated in high-profile amateur tournaments. In 1909 he got the job of friends in Shawnee -on-the - Delaware to build a place, which meant that he worked full time as a golf architect from now on.
A high level of recognition in the golf scene he reached through his journalistic work. He wrote no later than 1899 regularly for various magazines such as instructions issued by Walter Travis American golfers, there often under the pseudonym Hazard, or even newspapers such as the Philadelphia Record. Many of his essays published later collected in book form, he also published a series of stories that dealt with the subject of golf.
As a golf architect, he was good, especially in the 1920s in the business so that he could maintain a luxurious lifestyle. After the world economic crisis of his career, however, was lack of orders virtually shut down and his health problems - he was an alcoholic - increased. First, he was still working as a mobile representative for the PGA of America, but he advised golf course operators in terms of cost-cutting measures. Ironically, suffered even some designed by himself golf courses among its recommendations and lost, for example, a series of bunkers.
Later he was able to hold for a while as an antique dealer in Hollywood on water because he had built in the time of his wealth a large collection. In addition, he had inherited from his father a successful company for rubber products, for which he indeed hardly cared, but still earned him a regular basic income. Eventually he succeeded even stop drinking, he reached his previous professional and financial status but no longer.
The total budget for the 70 Tillinghast designs and again so many redesigns to book. Among his most famous places include the San Francisco Golf Club ( 1915), Brackenridge (1916 ), Somerset Hills (1917 ), Essex County (New Jersey, 1918), Brook Hollow ( 1921), Baltusrol (1922 ), Philadelphia Cricket Club (1922 ), Winged Foot East & West ( 1923), Baltimore ( Five Farms East, 1926), Quaker Ridge ( 1926), Ridgewood (1929) and Bethpage Black ( 1936). Many of his places can still be used for major tournaments since Tillinghast technological development that led to ever greater lengths shock foresaw. He respected from the outset that its fairways to apply so that they could later be extended easily.
His working methods were unusual for the golden age, which yielded a total yes professionalization of the profession. Tillinghast, however, made no overly elaborate plans, but rather sat on spontaneous inspiration during construction. This informal way of working meant that its golf courses were not formulaischen character, but individually turned out very different. In San Francisco, for example, he emphasized the expansive nature of the terrain by appropriately expansive fairways, bunkers monumental ( up to 2.50 meters deep) and large greens. Winged Foot, however, has small greens, steep bunkers and undulating fairways fragmented. In his publications Tillinghast repeatedly emphasized how important it was that a hole is not only strategically interesting, but also visually attractive.