WEBVTT - Building a Career in Golf Architecture with Dan Hixson 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:02.840 I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When 0:00:02.880 --> 0:00:04.960 I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. 0:00:05.040 --> 0:00:05.920 And when I find my. 0:00:05.920 --> 0:00:09.000 Ball in a bride Egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:12.160 Frida Egg, Frida egg, brigg Frida Egg bride egg Lie. 0:00:11.960 --> 0:00:14.120 I'm about ready to run off the golf course. 0:00:34.800 --> 0:00:37.360 Welcome to the Frida Egg Golf Podcast. My name is 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:40.800 Garrett Morrison, and today we're talking about how to build 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:44.320 a career in golf architecture, or at least we're talking 0:00:44.400 --> 0:00:48.159 about how one person accomplished that feed. My guest is 0:00:48.240 --> 0:00:52.120 Dan Hickson. He's a Portland, Oregon based golf architect who's 0:00:52.159 --> 0:00:55.720 designed a number of courses in Oregon in Washington, including 0:00:56.200 --> 0:01:00.840 Bandoned Crossings, Wine Valley, the reversible course at Silva Valley Ranch, 0:01:01.160 --> 0:01:05.039 and the brand new Bar Run in Roseberg, Oregon. Dan's 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:09.200 career has really run the gamut from low budget renovations 0:01:09.280 --> 0:01:13.280 to ambitious and boundary pushing new builds. And while he's 0:01:13.319 --> 0:01:16.640 somewhat under the radar nationally, he is very well established 0:01:16.680 --> 0:01:20.399 and well respected in the Pacific Northwest. I've wanted to 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:22.800 have him on the podcast for a while and we 0:01:22.920 --> 0:01:25.600 finally found a good time when he was in town 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:30.039 and visiting his in progress renovation at the Lake Oswego 0:01:30.319 --> 0:01:33.559 Municipal Golf Course. So we'll open up by talking about 0:01:33.640 --> 0:01:36.280 that project, and then we'll dig into the way that 0:01:36.520 --> 0:01:39.920 Dan has built up his career from being a club 0:01:40.000 --> 0:01:44.080 pro at the Columbia Edgewater Country Club to a very 0:01:44.080 --> 0:01:48.160 prolific golf course designer. I think he's taken a really 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:51.760 interesting path and it probably has some lessons in it 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:53.400 for aspiring architects. 0:01:53.760 --> 0:01:56.880 All right, let's get to it. Here is Dan Hickson? 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:01.800 All right? 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:05.400 So, Dan Hickson, we were just out at the Lake 0:02:05.480 --> 0:02:10.680 Oswego Municipal Course a few minutes ago walking around that 0:02:10.760 --> 0:02:15.640 project that you're doing. You've just finished basically renovating it, 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:19.600 doing an ambitious renovation out there. It's grassed in but 0:02:19.720 --> 0:02:21.760 hasn't opened yet. There are some more things to do 0:02:21.840 --> 0:02:24.240 on the site. So could you just like take me 0:02:24.280 --> 0:02:26.680 through that project? What did you do there? 0:02:26.960 --> 0:02:30.919 Well, it was an eighteen hole par three course, very simple, 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:34.880 very rudimentary design, and the city of Lake os we 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:37.400 Go on to build a park and or excuse me, 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:40.639 a recreation center, an aquatic center, and so that took 0:02:40.680 --> 0:02:44.480 away the first three holes and we then had to 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:47.720 just basically start from scratch, and a lot of it 0:02:47.800 --> 0:02:50.040 was taken out trees and turned it into a nine 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:54.600 hole course with three par fours fairly short. That really 0:02:54.639 --> 0:02:57.360 opened up the site mostly with just tree removal of 0:02:57.480 --> 0:03:00.160 kind of poor species and poor planting. 0:03:00.919 --> 0:03:04.000 Okay, so yeah, a lot of trees came out there. 0:03:04.400 --> 0:03:08.520 It was pretty choked before, for sure, I've played it 0:03:08.560 --> 0:03:13.240 before and it's much more open now. But a big 0:03:13.280 --> 0:03:16.600 part of the move was going from eighteen part threes 0:03:17.240 --> 0:03:20.680 to what you have now. So you know, nine holes. 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:22.520 What's the nature of the course now. 0:03:22.680 --> 0:03:24.799 Well, the property has some tilt to it. It has 0:03:24.800 --> 0:03:27.200 a kind of a wetland down on the bottom. And 0:03:27.240 --> 0:03:29.800 the majority of the holes on the original course were 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:32.280 parallel to each other, just back and forth, like seven 0:03:32.280 --> 0:03:36.480 in a row and on each side, not just seven. 0:03:36.400 --> 0:03:38.200 You know, holes two through nine or anything. 0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:41.000 And so we were able to open up the gaps 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:45.240 between them and basically build one hole per where the 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:48.400 old ones were, and so again to gain some width. 0:03:48.960 --> 0:03:52.280 They had some incredibly narrow shots between the trees before. 0:03:53.160 --> 0:03:54.960 But really it was part of it was to build 0:03:54.960 --> 0:03:58.920 a you know, regulation type greens regulation type te's you know, 0:03:59.040 --> 0:04:02.520 built with California speck for the greens, and you know, 0:04:02.640 --> 0:04:04.800 capped teas and much bigger. 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:05.000 You know. 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:07.680 It was a typical Muni where you know, by May 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:10.280 first there was no grass left on the tees for 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:12.960 the whole season, and so we were able to really 0:04:13.000 --> 0:04:16.680 expand that part and hopefully the maintenance of it is 0:04:17.080 --> 0:04:18.200 kind of follows it. 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:19.080 Yeah. 0:04:19.200 --> 0:04:21.719 Yeah, and you have some interesting greens out there too. 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:24.919 I think that's a big deal here, right. The previous 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:29.200 course had these sort of circular push up greens a 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:32.360 little bit domed. Maybe they weren't designed that way, they 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:34.240 just kind of ended up that way, and it was 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:37.919 it was fairly repetitive what was going on. Now you 0:04:38.040 --> 0:04:41.040 have some creative shapes out there, some fun little shots, 0:04:41.440 --> 0:04:42.960 you know, what were some of the things that you. 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:47.560 Yeah, well, you know, it's an introduction course for a 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:49.120 lot of people, a lot of kids it'll be their 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:51.520 first round of golf. You know, parents and grandparents can 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:53.800 can take children out there and play the first time, 0:04:53.839 --> 0:04:57.640 and beginners of every age and so I thought, you know, 0:04:57.680 --> 0:05:00.679 as an introduction course that they should have some exciting stuff. 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:01.400 So we build a. 0:05:01.320 --> 0:05:04.240 Punch bowl green. We have kind of a partial redan, 0:05:04.360 --> 0:05:08.000 a little runaway downhill green on a par three. We 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:10.120 have a couple of swales that run through the greens. 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:13.560 But really just to make it more exciting golf. And 0:05:14.800 --> 0:05:17.240 I use the analogy. It wasn't my idea. Somebody else 0:05:17.240 --> 0:05:19.479 said this. I couldn't tell you who that if you 0:05:19.520 --> 0:05:23.320 were introducing somebody to the world of coffee, you wouldn't 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:25.160 take them to the service station to get it out 0:05:25.200 --> 0:05:27.200 of a you know, a little old pot that's been 0:05:27.240 --> 0:05:29.640 sitting on the burner for seven hours. You take them 0:05:29.640 --> 0:05:32.479 to a nice coffee shop. And I feel to introduce 0:05:32.480 --> 0:05:34.920 people into golf that they should have a little bit 0:05:34.920 --> 0:05:37.960 of creativity and imagination to see that a green, you know, 0:05:38.560 --> 0:05:40.680 isn't just flat or a dome, and you know, you 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:43.119 got to aim to the left to make it break 0:05:43.160 --> 0:05:45.440 in and stuff like that. And so I kind of 0:05:45.480 --> 0:05:48.359 think that's what we did pretty well, and you know, 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:52.720 still kept it very playable and safe for higher handicappers, 0:05:52.800 --> 0:05:55.200 but a little bit of excitement that you may see 0:05:55.240 --> 0:05:58.200 on a more of a major style course, not a 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:01.400 major tournament course, but you know, a more classic country 0:06:01.400 --> 0:06:02.080 club or something. 0:06:02.480 --> 0:06:04.760 I feel like, I've heard the coffee analogy from Andy 0:06:04.839 --> 0:06:08.360 Johnson before from there, Yeah, maybe from or maybe he 0:06:08.360 --> 0:06:10.440 heard it from the same person you did, but it 0:06:10.440 --> 0:06:12.840 definitely holds here where. Yeah, this is the first course 0:06:12.880 --> 0:06:15.919 that a lot of people will play, and so why 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:19.800 not make it as compelling as possible? Why does it 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:24.440 have to be a dumbed down or mundane version of 0:06:24.720 --> 0:06:28.719 the game. If it's really fun, then presumably you're more 0:06:28.800 --> 0:06:32.880 likely to appeal the peep exact way exactly. Yeah, all right, 0:06:32.960 --> 0:06:36.000 So you know, one one big aspect of this project, 0:06:36.000 --> 0:06:39.400 as I mentioned before, was the reduction of the footprint 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:42.760 of the golf course, going from eighteen to nine holes. Yep, right, 0:06:42.800 --> 0:06:45.800 this is something that a lot of golfers might have 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:49.120 a problem with that local golfers will will, you know, 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:53.680 usually object to projects like this. What do you think 0:06:53.720 --> 0:06:56.480 are some of the cons as well as some of 0:06:56.520 --> 0:07:02.320 the potential pros of municipality is doing this kind of 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:05.640 thing with their golf courses where they're reducing the footprint, 0:07:05.680 --> 0:07:08.560 reducing the number of holes, but trying to improve the 0:07:08.640 --> 0:07:09.520 quality of the golf. 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:11.840 Yeah, it's there's there is a lot of pros and 0:07:11.920 --> 0:07:14.360 cons to that, and the one of the quick con 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:16.760 to get it out of the way was some of 0:07:16.800 --> 0:07:19.920 the locals were worried that it would be too busy 0:07:20.360 --> 0:07:22.680 because they don't have front and back tee times on 0:07:22.760 --> 0:07:24.840 certain days of the week, and so everybody's just got 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:27.840 to go off on ten. And that's a that's true 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:30.240 that the city of Lake Oswego when they made the 0:07:30.280 --> 0:07:33.720 decision to build the rec center, they looked at everything 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:37.520 kind of more of a community aspect of it and 0:07:37.560 --> 0:07:43.040 trying to offer more on that site than just golf. 0:07:43.120 --> 0:07:45.480 And so they're building this beautiful aquatic center and all 0:07:45.480 --> 0:07:48.080 the rec facilities, and so it really becomes a hub 0:07:48.480 --> 0:07:52.200 for this community. That is a real pro to that 0:07:52.360 --> 0:07:54.440 is giving up part of this golf course. 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:56.720 For the good of the hole. 0:07:57.240 --> 0:07:59.280 And you know, I've said, hey, it's going to be 0:07:59.320 --> 0:08:01.400 a I live in the same city and I'll never 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:04.040 put my toe in that swimming pool, but I'm glad 0:08:04.080 --> 0:08:06.960 it's here because there's a real shortage for this area 0:08:07.240 --> 0:08:10.240 for swimming and for the high school kids and younger 0:08:10.280 --> 0:08:12.720 as well as adults. So that's really neat in the 0:08:12.760 --> 0:08:15.280 community aspect of it. But as far as the golf 0:08:15.280 --> 0:08:18.680 course goes, you know, the other one was really you 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:20.720 just basically teed off. You hit it in the trees, 0:08:20.760 --> 0:08:22.400 you chipped out, and then you hit it up to 0:08:22.440 --> 0:08:24.520 the green, and if you're not very good, you hit 0:08:24.520 --> 0:08:26.440 it in the trees again and you chipped out. So 0:08:26.560 --> 0:08:29.040 now we have you know, thirty yard to forty yard 0:08:29.040 --> 0:08:31.880 wide fair well not forty thirty yard wide fairways on 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:35.160 the on the par fours, as well as some space 0:08:35.200 --> 0:08:37.079 around the greens and stuff with a lot of short 0:08:37.120 --> 0:08:39.960 grass around it where people can put and bump the 0:08:39.960 --> 0:08:42.400 ball up onto the green and stuff. And so the 0:08:42.480 --> 0:08:44.800 real cons is it's what I like to think of. 0:08:44.920 --> 0:08:47.360 I mean, golf is golf, but this is kind of 0:08:47.360 --> 0:08:50.440 more like real golf in the sense that there's some 0:08:50.559 --> 0:08:52.880 room that you're not just hitting a tree every time 0:08:52.960 --> 0:08:55.880 and playing off the roots and the dirt underneath all 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:58.559 the trees. So yeah, I'm not sure if I explained 0:08:58.600 --> 0:08:59.800 you're answered your question. 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:02.640 Well, well, yeah, I mean you're saying that, you know, 0:09:02.640 --> 0:09:04.840 one of the cons would be, of course you can't 0:09:04.880 --> 0:09:06.800 fit as many people on a nine hole course as 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.960 you could for an eighteen whole course, but obviously have 0:09:10.040 --> 0:09:13.200 elevated the quality of the golf and also offered some 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:16.360 space for the rest of the community to use and 0:09:16.440 --> 0:09:20.200 to come on to a property near a golf course 0:09:20.400 --> 0:09:22.920 and be in the presence of the game, but also 0:09:23.000 --> 0:09:25.680 share space with it. You know, this is a discussion 0:09:25.720 --> 0:09:28.120 that a lot of communities are having, like should we 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:32.520 share the golf courses that we have in this way? 0:09:33.200 --> 0:09:35.679 And it feels like in this situation it was a 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:40.880 plus for the community. But that's an emotional decision for 0:09:41.160 --> 0:09:43.719 a lot of places, like we're going to chop off 0:09:43.760 --> 0:09:46.520 part of this golf course and give it over to 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:50.240 another activity, Like it's tough to do, but in a 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:53.760 lot of cases, it allows you to do something better 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:56.040 with the golf course that remains right. 0:09:56.080 --> 0:09:58.400 And I think, you know, I failed to mention it before. 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:01.920 We expanded the driving range greatly, which has been popular 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:04.400 in the past, but we've added fifty yards and better 0:10:04.480 --> 0:10:07.600 netting for safety, as well as build a They used 0:10:07.640 --> 0:10:10.280 to have two very small, like maybe two thousand square 0:10:10.280 --> 0:10:13.000 foot each putting greens that again we're just kind of 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:15.480 domes and you'd only have a two or three cups 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:17.920 on each one, and we built a little over ten 0:10:17.920 --> 0:10:21.320 thousand square foot putting green that happens to be at 0:10:21.760 --> 0:10:24.320 part of the facility by the swimming pools where I 0:10:24.360 --> 0:10:28.280 could easily see families coming putting the kids go swim 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:33.320 hang out. It'll really serve the community in that sense, 0:10:33.360 --> 0:10:35.439 and that putting Green can be a hangout as well 0:10:35.440 --> 0:10:37.960 as the driving range, which you know, I mean, I 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:39.839 love that part of golf when you just go out 0:10:39.840 --> 0:10:41.280 to the course and you're not quite sure what you're 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:43.319 gonna do, but you're gonna be immersed in. 0:10:43.280 --> 0:10:44.880 Golf, all right. 0:10:44.920 --> 0:10:47.920 So that's the Lake Oswego Municipal Course. This is one 0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:54.319 of your many kind of recent slash ongoing projects, and 0:10:54.559 --> 0:10:56.880 we're going to get to a lot of the interesting 0:10:56.880 --> 0:11:01.240 stuff that you're doing, which is mostly around the Pacific Northwest. 0:11:02.000 --> 0:11:03.199 But you've also. 0:11:03.160 --> 0:11:06.840 Had, I mean to me, one of the most interesting 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:11.760 careers in golf architecture because you didn't take the ordinary 0:11:11.880 --> 0:11:16.640 path into the profession. There have been a lot of 0:11:16.720 --> 0:11:20.520 golf architects obviously who had a competitive background, which you have, 0:11:21.320 --> 0:11:25.959 but not many of them did exactly what you did 0:11:26.400 --> 0:11:29.840 to break into this career. And so I want to 0:11:29.880 --> 0:11:32.880 rewind a little bit and maybe go back farther than 0:11:32.920 --> 0:11:37.760 that decision that you made to enter the profession, back 0:11:37.800 --> 0:11:41.920 to your childhood. Your dad was in golf as well, 0:11:41.960 --> 0:11:45.439 I believe, and so you know you were around golf 0:11:45.480 --> 0:11:49.840 as a kid. At what point did you notice that 0:11:49.960 --> 0:11:55.120 golf architecture was a thing and become interested in that 0:11:55.280 --> 0:11:56.040 side of the game. 0:11:56.520 --> 0:12:01.160 Yeah, youngest child with I have three older siblings, and 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:03.720 my dad was a golf pro. He's passed. But I 0:12:03.760 --> 0:12:07.000 also have an older brother that is a golf pro, Doug. 0:12:07.320 --> 0:12:11.199 And my other two siblings, my sister and other brother. 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:13.320 They probably love golf more than the rest of us 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:16.720 in the family did. But anyway, when I was seven 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:20.240 years old, my dad took me out to Eugene Country Club, 0:12:20.400 --> 0:12:25.200 which was being remodeled by Robert Trent Jones, Sr. And 0:12:25.240 --> 0:12:29.120 that golf course was being reversed. And at that point, 0:12:29.360 --> 0:12:31.760 I mean, I had already drawn a few courses, just 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:34.880 like the little stick figure courses on the back of 0:12:34.880 --> 0:12:38.679 a scorecard. And when I saw this construction and there 0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:41.319 was dozers and excavators and Dad was kind of pointing 0:12:41.360 --> 0:12:43.120 it out. I told him that day that that's what 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:46.080 I wanted to do. Once I discovered I kind of 0:12:46.160 --> 0:12:49.800 just thought golf courses were there as a seven year old, 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:52.000 you know, we played it. Dad worked at a golf course. 0:12:52.040 --> 0:12:56.240 We'd walk around. But you know, I was captivated right 0:12:56.280 --> 0:12:57.920 there at that age, and I told him that. 0:12:58.080 --> 0:12:59.360 And fortunately I. 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:02.360 Wasn't a great juden or anything, and so I wasn't 0:13:02.400 --> 0:13:06.479 smart enough to ever get a different goal. And eventually, 0:13:06.520 --> 0:13:09.520 you know, thirty years later, I made the change to it. 0:13:09.559 --> 0:13:13.160 But it was just I can remember seeing that golf 0:13:13.240 --> 0:13:16.480 course today and that point and him explaining that they 0:13:16.480 --> 0:13:18.960 were rebuilding it, and that somebody drew it and told 0:13:19.040 --> 0:13:22.120 him how to build it, and that's what I wanted 0:13:22.160 --> 0:13:25.400 to do. So I started drawing and thinking about it 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:29.120 right from then and just looking at courses that, oh yeah, 0:13:29.400 --> 0:13:31.959 and sort of self taught, just really from that one 0:13:32.040 --> 0:13:33.160 little moment in time. 0:13:34.280 --> 0:13:38.440 So Eugene Country Club was a Chandler Egan course. Right. 0:13:38.520 --> 0:13:41.599 Chandler Eagan, we might mention a good bit in this conversation. 0:13:41.720 --> 0:13:45.079 He's a Golden Age architect who worked a great deal 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:48.679 in the Pacific Northwest, lived in Medford, Oregon for a 0:13:48.720 --> 0:13:51.040 long time and worked with many of the courses and 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:54.960 clubs in this area. I had worked with Alistair McKenzie 0:13:55.000 --> 0:13:58.520 as well on the famous Pebble Beach renovation in the 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:02.360 late twenties, but he is a big presence in this area. 0:14:02.679 --> 0:14:06.120 He was the original architect at Eugene Country Club. Robert 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:08.760 Trent Jones Sr. Came in when you were a kid, 0:14:09.559 --> 0:14:13.000 made some changes, including reversing a lot of the holes 0:14:13.040 --> 0:14:17.160 and every things like that is what was every hole reversed? 0:14:17.160 --> 0:14:18.600 Every hole? That's so interesting. 0:14:18.679 --> 0:14:20.720 Yeah, the first he became the eighteenth green, and vice 0:14:20.800 --> 0:14:21.760 versa all the way through. 0:14:21.920 --> 0:14:25.080 Oh my god, so you did you do you remember 0:14:25.600 --> 0:14:29.640 noticing that aspect of the renovation, like some of the 0:14:29.640 --> 0:14:31.400 details of what he was doing, Like, oh my god, 0:14:31.440 --> 0:14:35.080 there's this guy coming in and he's reversing the golf course. 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:36.760 I didn't know how you could do that. 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:41.280 Yeah, for sure, But I mean, obviously, being that young, 0:14:41.400 --> 0:14:44.000 I'm not sure if I was comprehending everything. But I 0:14:44.040 --> 0:14:48.560 do remember for many years after that when when Dad 0:14:48.600 --> 0:14:51.000 said that to me, that they were reversing it. I'd 0:14:51.000 --> 0:14:53.880 never played the course, I think as an egan course, 0:14:53.960 --> 0:14:58.120 even though my grandparents were members there. But when he 0:14:58.200 --> 0:15:01.800 was saying they were reversing it is my train. My 0:15:02.360 --> 0:15:04.880 thoughts were when we'd play other courses, like we'd go 0:15:04.960 --> 0:15:07.200 down to our course and cottage grove, and I would 0:15:07.240 --> 0:15:09.240 look at every hole backwards, going would this hole be 0:15:09.240 --> 0:15:12.600 better going the other way, which you know, ultimately if 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:16.840 you jop forward Sylvie's Valley Ranch, I build a reversible course. 0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:20.120 But so many years of playing golf, I would just 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:22.280 do that. You know, if you're putting out and I'm 0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:24.040 waiting for you to put the flag in, I'm looking 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:26.040 back up the fairway thinking would this be a better 0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:28.240 hole if it went the other way? And would the 0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:29.720 rest of the course be better if it went the 0:15:29.760 --> 0:15:32.640 other way, not just this hole. And it's surprisingly it's 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:36.000 amazing how many projects remodels and stuff that I do 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:39.520 that I propose reversing holes that you know, these two 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:41.120 are right next to each other, and they'd be better 0:15:41.160 --> 0:15:43.200 the opposite direction for one reason or another. 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:44.840 And so I think that. 0:15:46.400 --> 0:15:50.200 Subconsciously carried into the idea of Sylvie's Value Ranch, which 0:15:51.600 --> 0:15:54.640 actually Wine Valley I'd proposed to be reversible before that, 0:15:54.680 --> 0:15:57.160 but the developers at the time thought I was crazy, 0:15:57.800 --> 0:16:01.840 which they probably weren't wrong. But so yeah, it was 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:04.880 again back to that one little half hour of time 0:16:05.000 --> 0:16:08.080 or whatever it was back in the late sixties that 0:16:08.600 --> 0:16:09.600 I made that decision. 0:16:10.160 --> 0:16:11.600 So huh. 0:16:11.760 --> 0:16:15.600 All right, So where did you play early on in 0:16:15.640 --> 0:16:17.640 your competitive career. 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:18.760 What did that look like? 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:22.360 Yeah, I played at Oregon State on the golf team 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:24.240 there for a couple of years. I played junior college 0:16:24.280 --> 0:16:28.160 before that and played basketball as well, and then immediately 0:16:28.160 --> 0:16:30.360 out of school I turned pro and went to Australia, 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:34.000 qualified for the Australian Tour and that was in the 0:16:34.360 --> 0:16:37.280 Greg Norman years. This was in the mid eighties. Greg 0:16:37.320 --> 0:16:39.920 Norman was playing. He was flying in a helicopter and 0:16:40.160 --> 0:16:43.040 four of us, would you know, jump in a very 0:16:43.040 --> 0:16:45.000 small compact car and drive to the course and he 0:16:45.040 --> 0:16:49.040 would fly in on a helicopter. But got to play 0:16:49.120 --> 0:16:52.120 quite I think I played seven Alistair McKenzie courses there 0:16:52.160 --> 0:16:54.440 and I somewhere I still have those drawings. I saw 0:16:54.520 --> 0:16:56.440 him three or four years ago that I would make 0:16:56.480 --> 0:16:58.440 sketches at night of his holes. 0:17:00.400 --> 0:17:00.680 Courses. 0:17:00.760 --> 0:17:03.240 Yeah, we played Rome Melbourne, we played the Composite course 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:07.480 there and played uh Titterengi and in Auckland, New Zealand, 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:13.919 we played Royal Adelaide and Metropolitan and ya Yarra and 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:15.280 a whole bunch of them. A lot of them were 0:17:15.400 --> 0:17:17.800 side that the tour didn't play on them, but we 0:17:17.840 --> 0:17:20.200 would we would sneak off on a Monday and try 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:21.520 to play a bunch of those and so. 0:17:22.960 --> 0:17:23.879 Great stuff. You know. 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:27.080 I probably should have focused more on my game than 0:17:27.119 --> 0:17:29.560 the courses, but I was just fascinated with that end 0:17:29.560 --> 0:17:32.359 of it. And then I took a year off, a 0:17:32.440 --> 0:17:34.080 couple of years off, worked as a club pro, and 0:17:34.119 --> 0:17:36.080 went back out and played the mini tours, played the 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:40.720 TPS Tour, which was the one or two years before 0:17:40.760 --> 0:17:43.639 the Ben Hogan Tour started, which it was it was 0:17:43.680 --> 0:17:45.480 not under the PGA in those days, and it was 0:17:45.520 --> 0:17:49.359 really through Texas, Florida up to North Carolina in the 0:17:49.440 --> 0:17:54.040 southeast mainly, and moderate success. Tried the tour one time, 0:17:54.560 --> 0:17:57.200 made it through stage one, lost in a playoff stage 0:17:57.200 --> 0:18:00.600 two to get to the finals, and and uh didn't 0:18:00.600 --> 0:18:04.399 really like the travel, and and you know it certainly 0:18:04.440 --> 0:18:07.160 didn't play as well as I had hoped to, and 0:18:07.960 --> 0:18:12.040 took a club pro job and then so played regional 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:15.479 events for another ten or twelve years and really enjoyed that. 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:18.960 But you know, fifth place in the Oregon Open didn't 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:21.560 have that big a charm to me anymore, you know, 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:22.600 so you. 0:18:22.600 --> 0:18:25.120 Kind of settled into the life as a club pro. 0:18:25.840 --> 0:18:29.840 Were you at Columbia Edgewater right away or is that 0:18:29.880 --> 0:18:31.080 just kind of where you ended up. 0:18:31.400 --> 0:18:35.440 Well, i'd worked in my years off between Australia and 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:38.760 going on the mini tours. I worked at place called 0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:42.320 Forest Hills here in town, great course west of Portland 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:43.040 and Cornelius. 0:18:43.119 --> 0:18:43.399 Yeah. 0:18:43.680 --> 0:18:45.520 Yeah, you know, this is a course that I often 0:18:45.880 --> 0:18:49.159 recommend to people. I think it is one of the 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:51.600 best public courses in the area, and I think probably 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:56.399 the best, in my opinion, affordable public course. It's a 0:18:56.440 --> 0:19:00.520 Billy Bell junior and senior collaboration and it's on a 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:02.080 really wonderful piece of land. 0:19:03.320 --> 0:19:05.440 It's a lovely course. 0:19:05.520 --> 0:19:08.359 The owner at the time his sons. He had twins boys, 0:19:08.359 --> 0:19:10.480 and one of them now runs it. That when I 0:19:10.560 --> 0:19:13.520 knew him, they these boys were three or four years old, 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:15.919 and you know, now there are young adult men and 0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:18.520 with families and everything, and I think I'm going to 0:19:18.920 --> 0:19:21.120 go look at it again. We've been talking a little 0:19:21.119 --> 0:19:23.639 bit about making a few changes out there. So I 0:19:23.720 --> 0:19:26.040 worked there and then when I came back from trying 0:19:26.080 --> 0:19:28.399 the tour school, I went to work right immediately at 0:19:28.400 --> 0:19:31.160 Columbia Edgewater and after about a year and a half. 0:19:31.200 --> 0:19:35.240 The head professional, Jerry Molds left to Pumpkin Ridge, and 0:19:35.400 --> 0:19:38.680 I took over his intern and interim and then eventually 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:40.520 they gave me the head job and so I stayed 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:43.879 there for I think all told eleven years nine as 0:19:43.920 --> 0:19:44.480 the head pro. 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:48.119 Okay, so this is a pretty plumb job for a 0:19:48.160 --> 0:19:50.840 club pro. This is one that a lot of pros 0:19:50.880 --> 0:19:54.400 would like to have. It's one of the great Portland 0:19:54.440 --> 0:19:59.919 area golf clubs. There's Columbia Edgewater, There's Waverley, There's Portland 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:03.119 Golf Club. As far as I'm concerned, those are kind 0:20:03.160 --> 0:20:07.000 of the top clubs in the city. And so what 0:20:07.280 --> 0:20:10.760 made you think while you were working this job that 0:20:11.280 --> 0:20:13.440 I'd like to go into golf architecture. 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:16.719 Well, I, you know, again going way back, it had 0:20:16.760 --> 0:20:19.639 always been there and it would never go away. And 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:23.679 you know, unfortunately, I went through a divorce at that point, 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:26.520 which kind of gave me, you know, a chance to 0:20:26.640 --> 0:20:30.000 sort of start over again. We didn't have children, and 0:20:30.080 --> 0:20:32.120 that was a big part of it where I don't 0:20:32.119 --> 0:20:35.000 think I would take the risk of starting a career 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:37.320 that I had zero experience and probably going to make 0:20:37.440 --> 0:20:40.840