The Links

By Robert Hunter

A masterpiece of architectural literature, "The Links" is the first book that fully addresses the complexities of the golf course in terms of design, construction, and definition of the game. Written in 1926, Robert Hunter conceptualized "The Links" as a complete study, a manual for golf course architects and design enthusiasts, specifically written to advance the field of study in a way that had never been tried before.

Although Hunter was not a golf course architect by trade, or even a golfing professional, his background as a dedicated socialist reformer led to his unique understanding of the relationship between golf and its greater contribution to society. The challenges posed by golf, as well as the beauty produced by the singular nature of the world’s most famous links, led Hunter to conclude that diversity is what makes golf the cherished game that it is. In "The Links," he postulates, “It is not the love of something easy which has drawn men like a magnet for hundreds of years to this royal and ancient pastime; on the contrary, it is the maddening difficulty of it.”

Supported by over fifty photographs and original drawings, "The Links" details the essential features of an ideal golf course and provides insight into the strategies and methods used to design the world’s most renowned courses. As acclaimed architect Dr. Alister MacKenzie wrote, “I have read "The Links" with the greatest interest. Mr. Hunter is familiar with all the great courses in the world and he has written a most entertaining book, which I am sure every golfer will read with profit. I do not hesitate to say that it is the classic of the subject.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: Coventry House Publishing
• Release date: Oct 12, 2018

Robert Hunter

The first President, Visionary and Co-Founder of Greenpeace. His highest achievement was spearheading a successful campaign to ban commercial whaling. He was a columnist, author, and lecturer. His career began at the Winnipeg Tribune and later he became a columnist for the Vancouver Sun. His columns were instrumental in developing environmental awareness in Canada. Later in Toronto he became a strong activist voice as an on-air personality for CityTV. An award-winning author receiving the Governor Generals Award for Occupied Canada. His books also include Erebus, The Enemies of Anarchy, The Stoning of the Mind, Time of the Clockmen, Greenpeace 111, the Journey into the Bomb, To Save the Whale, Warriors of the Rainbow, also called The Greenpeace Chronicle, Cry Wolf, On the Sky the Zen, Red Blood, 2030 also titled Thermaggedon and The Greenpeace to Amchitka He died in 2005 leaving behind his wife Bobbi and their two children Will and Emily and well as his two children from his first marriage Conan and Justine. He currently has eight grand children and one great grand child.

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Contents

Preface

Ante Scriptum - To Links-Land

Ante Scriptum - Shots―Old and New

I - Things of First Importance

II - Laying out the Course

III - The Climax of Golf―The Well-Placed and Well-Moulded Green

IV - The Purpose of Hazards―Their Inspiration to Good Play

V - Placing the Hazards

VI - Constructing the Hazards

VII - Other Things of Importance

LINKS-LAND

A View of the undulations and general character of that type of seacoast called the links.

Diagrams

The seventeenth hole at St. Andrews

The narrow green of this hole lies between the road and the small bunker at the left. Ridges at the entrance to the green force one usually to play a running shot. As the penalty for failure may often be severe, few players attempt to play pin high on their seconds. The ridge beyond Cheape’s bunker plays an important role in the tee shot, not to speak of the danger of going out of bounds if one plays to the right, while the road and the bunker at the green dominate the play from tee to pin.

A short hole built by Ross

We find here all the qualities sought for in a hole of this length. The alternate tees at a higher level than the green; the two entirely different shots called for; the several interesting places provided for cutting the hole; and the precision and carry required when playing from the long tee; these are notable features.

Drive-and-pitch hole with water hazards built by Ross

The most notable feature of this hole is the clever way in which Ross has used the water hazards. The confident will play on a direct line crossing twice the water while the nervous one with his usual slice will have an easier although longer route to the green. Even the long hitter may play out to the right but it is doubtful if a par will come to him as easily that way.

The tenth at Westward Ho!

Of the dog-leg holes this is one of the best. In front of the tee there is a sea of rushes which must be carried to reach a little valley running away to the left to the narrow swale where the flag flies guarded by a bunker. A missed tee shot is sure to bring disaster and as the green is small and well protected one is tempted to try the longest carry possible over this vicious-looking hazard. With a fine tee shot and a favorable wind we may hope to get home easily with an iron, but when two really full shots are needed, it is a hole for gods and heroes. (Darwin)

The eighth at St. Andrews

This hole of 140 yards presents a number of interesting problems. Any one of three fine shots well played may yield a par. The bunker at the left of the green and the inoffensive looking ridge about 100 yards from the tee, give real distinction to this hole. The man who has only one shot to the green will frequently find trouble here.

The eleventh at St. Andrews

Of all short one-shot holes this is perhaps the most interesting. Greens similar in character have been built at the National, Garden City, and Sunningdale. The Cockle, or Shelly, bunker runs in from the right, about 100 yards from the tee. At the left of the green lies Hill bunker and beyond the area of the green, on a line to its centre, yawns Strath―an abyss from two to eight feet deep.

The Redan at North Berwick

This famous hole is conceded to be the most interesting and exacting one-shot hole in the world. Many attempts have been made to reproduce it. The Redan at the National Golf Links is one of the best of these. The Gibraltar at Moortown calls for similar shots. Almost any green with a large bunker athwart its face and with an opening at the right for a pulled ball is now called a Redan.

An ideal two-shot hole designed by Mackenzie

In a competition among leading golf course architects this design won first prize as the best two-shot hole submitted. Later the hole was built at great expense at Lido, Long Beach, Long Island. The shots called for are similar to those required at the fourteenth at St. Andrews.

A two-shot hole built by Ross

This is one of the best creations of this great architect. The scratch player will find it thrilling to play while the indifferent may play it with much satisfaction by selecting a longer route to the green. Big problems are presented to the long hitter who must be both powerful and accurate to play the hole in par. The dip in the fairway, at about two hundred yards from the tee, is one of the best features.

The fourteenth at St. Andrews

The lines drawn on this sketch show the four usual routes to this remarkable three-shot hole. The line taken by D would seem to be the most direct and effective; but as the green is tilted and slopes sharply away from the third shot it is almost certain to finish in the small pots at the left of the green.

Preface

I do not suppose that any other game has taken a firmer hold upon such masses of people in so short a period of time as golf. When I began to play the game, nearly thirty years ago, even its name was almost unknown in this country outside the small circle of its devotees. It was, to be sure, an ancient game with an honorable history, and, at various periods in the several hundred years of its existence, it has risen with no little flurry to some degree of popularity and then in a few years for no accountable reason almost disappeared. It is said to have been played in the colonies in the early days of their settlement, but if it was it failed to attract for long any considerable number of sportsmen. No doubt golf would have become extinct had not the Scotch, century after century, fanned its flickering flame. Within the last few decades it began its tour round the world. At first it had rather hard going, but within the last decade the momentum of its popularity has been such that millions play the game today.

In all English-speaking countries the world over, golf is now played by innumerable enthusiasts, and almost every town has its course. About the larger cities there are scores of such playgrounds. Municipalities are taxing the people for the building of golf courses, and apparently the game has become so popular that most of these show a profit over the cost of their upkeep. There are twenty-five municipal courses in and around Chicago and a hundred others scattered about the country. In a crowded section in the middle of Chicago an area formerly abandoned to ash-heaps and tin cans has been reclaimed, and, to the immense improvement of the neighborhood, greens and fairways have taken the place of rubbish. The city of Davenport has utilized an island in the Mississippi for a municipal course. At Los Angeles an old riverbed has been put to the service of golf. Lake Worth has reclaimed a narrow strip of lake front for the use of golfers, and Key West finds that an island of coral is admirably fitted for the royal and ancient game. Private companies are going into the business of building courses―some for the purpose of land subdivision, and others merely for the profit realized from the green fees. Few resorts in the mountains and few hotels by the sea can remain solvent if there is no golf available in the vicinity. From the Carolinas to Florida scores of courses have been constructed to amuse those who can steal a few weeks out of the winter season for golf.

The furor which golf is creating at the moment among all classes seems all the more extraordinary when one recalls that less than thirty years ago the game was looked upon as something effeminate―an unmanly sport suited only to the pink-coated fops and dandies who played it. And what moral courage was required in those days to walk the town streets or board a train dressed in knickers and carrying a bag of clubs! What a complete change has occurred in the view of the public since those days! For the moment, at least, golf has been taken to the heart of Demos. Pink coats are no more, but knickers are universal and the time seems not far distant when every man, woman, and child will have a set of clubs.

When one sees today’s captains of industry and wizards of finance flattered to be asked to play a round of golf with some ex-caddy, or taking to their hearts some masterful product of the municipal links, one is reminded of those days long ago when the Stuart kings proudly played in partnership with local craftsmen. Knowing what occasionally happens today, I can imagine with what humility the King of Scotland took the reprimands of his partner Paterson, the shoemaker; and I can feel the envy which arose in his noble bosom when this same cobbler strode furiously into some bunker to retrieve with master-stroke the foozled shot of his royal playmate. Golf in those days, as in these, attracted equally those of high and those of low degree. Indeed, golf became so popular at one time in Scotland as to cause the more serious-minded to fear that it would demoralize the masses. Therefore the Scottish Parliament undertook to enact laws against the game and it was utterly cryit doun. The playing of the game on the Sabbath was prohibited unless one had been to church in the morning. But the King, as kings will do, evaded the law, and I look for similar evasions here among our distinguished legislators―most of whom love the game―when those who have given us prohibition and promise to abolish evolution turn their thought to the preservation of the Sabbath.

But this book, I should hasten to say, is not a treatise upon the morals of golf; nor upon its nature, truly democratic; nor yet upon its history, no less interesting than it is obscure. Its chief aim is to bring together and examine some of the more important principles of a practical nature for the guidance of those undertaking to construct a golf course. Many clubs start work with little or no information about the many difficult problems which they must face, and in book form little is now available. Seeking to build a house one may consult not only experts on every detail of its construction but also innumerable volumes upon almost every phase of the project. One may easily obtain diagrams and illustrations of nearly every type of dwelling. But one cannot readily get information about the many problems one faces in building a golf course. Very little has been written on the subject, and few diagrams and illustrations are available to assist one in laying out the course, in designing the holes, in moulding the greens, and in constructing the hazards. For those little circles starting out on their big adventure of constructing a golf course, a book containing illustrations of some of the best greens and hazards, and giving suggestions about the best methods to employ in the work, will, I hope, prove both timely and necessary.

I have no hesitation in stating my belief that for every dollar that has been wisely spent in construction another dollar has been wasted. In the past this has been almost unavoidable. There have been few experienced architects, and most of these have learned their trade at the expense of their employers. Nor have we had, under our eye, good models to work from. The best courses were abroad, and in order to make a beginning we had to depend largely upon the advice of Scotch and English professional golfers. While most of these were admirable players, few of them had had any previous experience in laying out good holes, in building the hazards and the greens, or even in the upkeep of the course. A few of the wealthier clubs were able to consult with British friends qualified to give advice, and