WEBVTT - The Effort to Restore Cobbs Creek 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:03.200 Welcome back to the Friday Podcast. I am excited for 0:00:03.320 --> 0:00:07.040 today's podcast with Joe Bousch and Mike Serba. Think you 0:00:07.080 --> 0:00:09.960 guys are going to really enjoy it. We discuss these 0:00:10.000 --> 0:00:14.160 two guys that are just regular Joe's restoration efforts at 0:00:14.320 --> 0:00:19.279 Philadelphia Municipal Course Cobbs Creek. They set out eleven plus 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:24.880 years ago to restore Philadelphia this course to its original glory, 0:00:25.079 --> 0:00:28.280 which was considered one of the best municipal courses in 0:00:28.320 --> 0:00:33.200 the country at this point. Now they're finalizing. 0:00:32.560 --> 0:00:36.680 A long term land lease with the city which would 0:00:36.720 --> 0:00:40.800 be up to seventy years, and they would have the 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:44.720 intention to have a restoration led by Gil Hans. So 0:00:44.880 --> 0:00:48.160 this is really an exciting project and just a great 0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:51.479 project for the public golfer and golf in general, and 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:55.640 could be an awesome template for other communities to follow. 0:00:56.840 --> 0:01:00.400 A couple of quick housekeeping things. Brendan Pora and I 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:04.280 who's a regular on this podcast, start a new podcast 0:01:04.319 --> 0:01:08.520 called The Shotgun Start. This podcast will be a much quicker, 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:11.840 shorter format podcast and it will be on a regular 0:01:11.880 --> 0:01:16.440 schedule of every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning. This podcast 0:01:16.480 --> 0:01:20.480 will be geared towards more quick updates and commentary on 0:01:20.520 --> 0:01:23.800 the latest happenings in golf. There will be short interviews. 0:01:24.440 --> 0:01:27.440 Just last Friday, we had Gil Hands on the podcast 0:01:27.480 --> 0:01:30.800 for about twelve minutes to talk about around them ink 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:34.520 and a couple other things, you know, golf course architecture, base, 0:01:35.040 --> 0:01:37.760 as well as giving an update on the tournament. So 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.679 it's definitely worth giving it a try, give it a listen, 0:01:40.880 --> 0:01:44.959 and subscribe on iTunes. It's called The Shotgun Start and 0:01:45.680 --> 0:01:49.240 it's up on every other podcast platform. 0:01:48.840 --> 0:01:49.480 That I know of. 0:01:49.640 --> 0:01:49.960 Now. 0:01:50.800 --> 0:01:53.680 As a note, I got a lot of people asking, well, 0:01:53.960 --> 0:01:57.240 does this mean the Friday podcast is gone? Nothing will 0:01:57.320 --> 0:02:00.440 change with this podcast. We will continue to do dive 0:02:00.760 --> 0:02:06.400 interviews and discussions on all sorts of different golf topics. So, 0:02:06.600 --> 0:02:11.000 without further ado, here is Joe Bousch and Mike Serba 0:02:11.280 --> 0:02:14.919 talking about their restoration efforts at Cobbs Creek. 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:19.160 Enjoy the Frida egg requires a different technique. What you 0:02:19.240 --> 0:02:22.320 need to do is actually square the face, so they'll 0:02:22.320 --> 0:02:26.040 dig down underneath that bad lie and propel that ball 0:02:26.120 --> 0:02:26.959 right out onto the green. 0:02:27.960 --> 0:02:30.040 Here's the thing. Playing out of a buried lion of 0:02:30.080 --> 0:02:32.680 bunker is completely different than playing out of a nice 0:02:32.919 --> 0:02:36.600 clean lion of Greenside Bunker. You need to be aggressive 0:02:36.639 --> 0:02:39.880 on any show, whether it's sitting cleanly or its Friday Egg. 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:43.799 Well, we've all faced it, the dreaded Frida egg. It's 0:02:43.840 --> 0:02:45.840 not to be feared though. It's actually a pretty easy 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:46.440 shot to hit. 0:02:57.120 --> 0:03:00.440 Joe and Mike, welcome on, Thanks Andy, good to be 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:02.680 here and having us. 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:08.280 So, Mike, I think jumping off. I think the place 0:03:08.320 --> 0:03:11.200 we should start is kind of the history of Cobbs 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:16.200 Creek and it's significance in Philadelphia golf. So how did 0:03:16.320 --> 0:03:17.600 Cobbs Creek get started? 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:22.280 Sure, so, for about ten years, the Golf Association of 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:25.519 Philadelphia had been trying to work with the City of 0:03:25.560 --> 0:03:29.600 Philadelphia to allocate somewhere in the public park system for 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:34.040 a public golf course. And it was well behind other 0:03:34.160 --> 0:03:37.680 cities like New York and Chicago in terms of adapting 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:42.200 to a public golf course for a variety of reasons. 0:03:42.760 --> 0:03:49.000 And eventually the city acquired land in the northwest corner 0:03:49.040 --> 0:03:52.400 of the city that became the Cops Creek Park, and 0:03:53.040 --> 0:03:55.960 I guess the Golf Association of Philadelphia folks found an 0:03:56.000 --> 0:04:01.240 opportunity seeing the property and there was actually a scouting 0:04:01.400 --> 0:04:05.040 group of Golf Association of Philadelphia folks who included Hugh 0:04:05.080 --> 0:04:10.400 Wilson of Maryon Fame, and they identified this property as 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:13.840 something that they thought would be, in their words, ideal 0:04:13.960 --> 0:04:17.880 for a golf course. That was about nineteen thirteen. It 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:22.720 took another three years or two years actually of wrangling 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:28.760 to get the city to agree to utilize this property. 0:04:29.440 --> 0:04:32.159 So Robert Leslie, who was the president of the Golf 0:04:32.240 --> 0:04:35.920 Association of Philadelphia at the time, appointed a committee of 0:04:35.960 --> 0:04:39.359 a number of luminaries from the Philadelphia area. That included 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:43.120 Hugh Wilson, that included George Crump of Pine Valley, that 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:45.800 included ab Smith, who was at that time a two 0:04:45.839 --> 0:04:49.960 time Philadelphia Amateur champion, and two others. These were all 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:54.200 men who had experience in designing and construction and maintenance 0:04:54.200 --> 0:04:57.880 of golf courses at their own clubs. They set to 0:04:57.920 --> 0:05:01.960 work in early nineteen fifteen, had multiple layouts. They were 0:05:01.960 --> 0:05:04.760 confined with the fact that the city Philadelphia would not 0:05:04.839 --> 0:05:08.000 let them remove any trees, so they had to route 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:12.960 the golf course in an exceptionally creative way to derive what, 0:05:13.120 --> 0:05:15.560 at the time it was opened in nineteen sixteen was 0:05:15.640 --> 0:05:19.080 generally accepted as probably the best public golf course in 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:24.120 the country. That was evidenced as well very quickly by 0:05:24.200 --> 0:05:29.080 nineteen twenty eight when the US PUBLNX tournament was held here. 0:05:29.880 --> 0:05:33.320 Cops Creek was an exceptionally difficult golf course from the start. 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:36.440 It was built by the same men who designed Marion 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:39.680 East and Pine Valley, and they built it with the 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:43.960 idea that Philadelphia was really getting their butts kicked in 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:49.360 inner city championships both at Chicago and Boston and New York. 0:05:49.600 --> 0:05:52.719 There was that Leslie Cup which was named after mister 0:05:52.839 --> 0:05:55.280 Leslie that was involved in what was it? It was 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:59.440 Boston versus New York versus Philadelphia, and that was with 0:05:59.560 --> 0:06:03.800 Tilling played in it and not Flynn, but Hugh Wilson 0:06:03.839 --> 0:06:04.400 played in it. 0:06:04.520 --> 0:06:10.080 That's correct, right, And so the general idea in Philadelphia 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:13.799 spurred by men like Killing Hast writing about it and others. 0:06:14.000 --> 0:06:17.520 It was one of the major reasons Philadelphia did not 0:06:18.279 --> 0:06:20.960 compete well is they had no great golf course to 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:24.920 develop great players. So the idea became when they built 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:28.919 Cops Creek to build an exceptionally challenging golf course, and 0:06:29.000 --> 0:06:32.159 because of the natural advantages of the property itself, that 0:06:32.279 --> 0:06:35.800 was really not a very difficult thing to do. It's 0:06:36.160 --> 0:06:36.760 this place. 0:06:37.120 --> 0:06:40.440 Having we just walked it and walked around the original routing, 0:06:40.680 --> 0:06:43.680 it really embodied. It has a lot of the characteristics 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:47.360 of the great Philadelphia country clubs. This you know, rolling 0:06:47.880 --> 0:06:52.880 dramatic brawnie topography and some natural creeks and natural land 0:06:52.920 --> 0:06:55.920 movement that's used so well, and it's it's something that 0:06:56.320 --> 0:06:59.560 you know, in terms of public and municipal golf across 0:06:59.560 --> 0:07:02.520 the country, there aren't many places that have a great 0:07:02.600 --> 0:07:04.160 piece of property like this one. 0:07:05.000 --> 0:07:08.640 Yeah, and it's so well utilized. And one of the 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:12.000 things that is nice to know, given the original intent 0:07:12.080 --> 0:07:15.520 of the founders, is that it really did develop champions 0:07:15.560 --> 0:07:20.160 here over time. So in an Italian immigrant by the 0:07:20.200 --> 0:07:23.440 name of Joe Coble, this is the true Rocky story, 0:07:23.520 --> 0:07:26.040 only it happened in golf. He came and took a 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:29.280 job down by the sixty ninth Street station adjacent here 0:07:29.280 --> 0:07:32.200 in a restaurant and would work all night long so 0:07:32.240 --> 0:07:34.000 that he could come here first thing in the morning 0:07:34.040 --> 0:07:37.880 and practice. Cobol developed over time to become the US 0:07:37.960 --> 0:07:41.960 Publics champion in nineteen twenty four and then become a 0:07:42.000 --> 0:07:48.240 professional and won the Philadelphia the Philadelphia PGA basically a 0:07:48.240 --> 0:07:52.320 couple of years later. Also, one of the things that's 0:07:52.480 --> 0:07:56.200 very noteworthy about the golf course is, unlike most cities 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:59.200 in the country, Cub's Creek was inclusive from the very 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:04.520 beginning for all races, all genders, and that led to 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:08.240 the development of people like Charlie Sifford, who, when he 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:10.640 came here in the nineteen forties to live with his 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:14.440 uncle from North Carolina, was just shocked to find whites 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:17.960 and blacks playing together out here. So he naturally gravitated 0:08:18.000 --> 0:08:21.480 here and really learned the game here in his own words, 0:08:21.960 --> 0:08:25.760 and eventually became the Charlie Sifford, you know, we all 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:29.640 know who went on to be a successful tour player. 0:08:30.200 --> 0:08:34.079 So there's that kind of history here associated with the property. 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:38.920 The golf course itself hosted three or four what was 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:42.160 known National Negro opens because there were very limited places 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:44.720 for them to play, but Cobs Creek was always a 0:08:44.760 --> 0:08:47.840 place for that kind of inclusivity. 0:08:47.760 --> 0:08:51.920 The proximity to the metro area, to the city, and 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:57.040 it was wildly popular upon opening, correct and I imagine 0:08:57.040 --> 0:09:00.160 it had a profound effect on expanding the game and 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:02.360 the public game in the city. I mean, this is 0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:04.760 one of the greatest golf cities in the country and 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:09.240 the world. Did you know, beyond just the inclusivity, how 0:09:09.280 --> 0:09:10.160 popular was it. 0:09:10.679 --> 0:09:15.200 Absolutely what we've both found with this project when we 0:09:15.240 --> 0:09:18.720 go around and we meet particularly older people that are 0:09:18.720 --> 0:09:21.560 members of private clubs here, a number of them that 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:24.760 have come to us and said, we learned to play 0:09:24.800 --> 0:09:28.080 golf at Cobbs Creek. If we had a dollar for 0:09:28.200 --> 0:09:31.160 everyone that told us that, we'd have a couple thousand 0:09:31.200 --> 0:09:32.160 dollars easily. 0:09:33.320 --> 0:09:37.640 That's great. At its peak, this golf course was hosting 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:41.840 eighty five thousand people rounds a year. It was similar 0:09:41.880 --> 0:09:43.760 to what you hear the stories of bed Page of 0:09:43.800 --> 0:09:46.400 people parking their cars at three o'clock in the morning. 0:09:46.440 --> 0:09:49.240 People would begin lining up their bags here at three 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:53.560 o'clock in the morning to play on weekends. And just 0:09:53.640 --> 0:09:56.920 the amazing amount of traffic that came through this place 0:09:56.960 --> 0:09:59.720 over the years was pretty astounding as we learned about it. 0:10:00.320 --> 0:10:03.760 So the project, I mean, so the golf course is 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:07.280 this great golf course, and obviously a lot of golf 0:10:07.280 --> 0:10:11.680 courses had troubles when you know, the Great Depression hit 0:10:11.880 --> 0:10:14.440 and then later the World War two, was a really 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:16.720 tough time for all types of golf courses. 0:10:18.440 --> 0:10:22.240 The big change here happened, and Mike is I've dug 0:10:22.320 --> 0:10:24.520 up most of these facts. He's better at remembering all 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:27.240 the details. But the big change happened in the early 0:10:27.320 --> 0:10:30.880 fifties when, and we don't know exactly why this happened, 0:10:30.880 --> 0:10:34.440 but the city of Philadelphia allowed one of these US 0:10:34.640 --> 0:10:40.560 Army anti aircraft bases to move from the Upper Derby 0:10:40.600 --> 0:10:44.640 area and they moved it onto the golf course. And 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:48.199 by moving that onto the golf course, it changed one 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:50.720 of the golf holes dramatically, and they basically had to 0:10:50.840 --> 0:10:54.960 reconfigure the golf course as a result, and that changed 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:57.160 the golf course. It's still a very good golf course 0:10:57.200 --> 0:10:59.559 as it is, but as you've seen by walking it today, 0:10:59.600 --> 0:11:01.760 and we've only the way it used to be, the 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:04.520 original routing was superior. 0:11:05.679 --> 0:11:09.840 Yeah. It basically the Army ended up taking about fifteen 0:11:09.840 --> 0:11:12.920 percent of the property of the original golf course that 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:16.160 today and they occupied that land for about six years 0:11:16.200 --> 0:11:19.559 between nineteen fifty three and by nineteen fifty eight had 0:11:19.600 --> 0:11:22.480 moved out. But I think the city by that time 0:11:22.520 --> 0:11:26.360 had other priorities than restoring the original golf course, and 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:29.360 you know, it was cleverly reconfigured at the time, but 0:11:29.400 --> 0:11:32.640 it was significantly narrowed. So as you saw today, there's 0:11:32.679 --> 0:11:35.800 areas that were a single wide bold fairway that became 0:11:35.960 --> 0:11:38.440 two holes and got the course kind of got squeezed 0:11:38.480 --> 0:11:41.440 in over time, and six of the most dramatic holes 0:11:41.480 --> 0:11:45.720 were negatively affected. And as we started looking at this 0:11:46.640 --> 0:11:50.160 a few years ago, what really, what really triggered some 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:53.040 of our interests in this was we had always known 0:11:53.080 --> 0:11:55.400 that or heard that Hugh Wilson was involved in the 0:11:55.480 --> 0:12:01.440 design here, and given that his you know, being famous Philadelphians, 0:12:01.480 --> 0:12:04.600 the designer of Marion, and have designed very few golf 0:12:04.640 --> 0:12:09.320 courses in his life, the idea that understanding what the 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:12.960 original routing may have been was always a curiosity to me. 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:16.719 So at one point I sent a query to the 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:20.120 Hagley Museum in Delaware, and they have the Dalln Aerial 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:24.160 collection of photographs from the nineteen twenties and nineteen thirties, 0:12:24.520 --> 0:12:26.360 and I asked that this is back in the fall 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:27.920 of two thousand and seven, I asked them if they 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:30.880 had anything on Cobbs Creek, and I didn't get a 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:33.560 reply for about six weeks and I thought, well, you know, 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:36.240 maybe they're busy, or maybe there's another way I should 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:39.800 maybe go down there. And one day my email pops 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:45.720 up eight aerial photos from nineteen twenty seven, I think 0:12:45.760 --> 0:12:50.160 to nineteen thirty nine, and what was indicative in those 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:53.080 photographs was that all of the greens that exist today 0:12:53.240 --> 0:12:56.480 were in existence back then, even in nineteen twenty eight, 0:12:56.920 --> 0:13:01.720 but it was obvious that the holes were configured differently, 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:05.600 and today what is a driving range on CityLine Avenue 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:08.400 looked to be part of the original golf course. So 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:11.200 at the time I started a thread on golf club 0:13:11.200 --> 0:13:14.000 at lists just saying, hey, I have these photographs and 0:13:14.080 --> 0:13:16.920 this thing looks restorable if anybody ever wanted to do it, 0:13:16.960 --> 0:13:19.200 And we were kind of young and naive about what 0:13:19.240 --> 0:13:21.240 that would require or what that would take, and why 0:13:21.240 --> 0:13:22.920 wouldn't they do it? Because it makes sense it would 0:13:22.920 --> 0:13:25.720 be a better golf course, and a lot of people 0:13:25.760 --> 0:13:30.959 like Joe started jumping in and actually doing the legwork 0:13:31.000 --> 0:13:34.199 and the research associated. So Joe, maybe you want to 0:13:34.240 --> 0:13:36.560 talk about some of what you were able to dig 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:37.560 up over that time. 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:41.000 Yes, I think it would also be great. You guys 0:13:41.000 --> 0:13:44.720 are just you know two normal guys with regular jobs 0:13:44.720 --> 0:13:45.600 that love golf. 0:13:45.720 --> 0:13:49.760 Right, yes, yeah, it was that fall of two thousand 0:13:49.800 --> 0:13:52.520 and seven on golf Club at Lists. I had joined 0:13:52.600 --> 0:13:54.800 that site maybe a few months prior, and when I 0:13:54.840 --> 0:13:57.319 got onto the site and I said, yoh, I played 0:13:57.320 --> 0:13:59.720 Cops Creek and that's how a bunch of people from 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:01.520 that I then reach out to me and said we 0:14:01.640 --> 0:14:06.439 love that place. And this led to Mike ordering these 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:09.080 dollar areials and when he got those and we were 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:11.880 still wondering how did the course really run well? I 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:15.080 walked over to our library at Villanova spoke to one 0:14:15.120 --> 0:14:16.959 of the research people and said, helped me out here. 0:14:16.960 --> 0:14:19.320 I want to know when Cops Creak open and where 0:14:19.320 --> 0:14:22.360 can I learn more about it? Were at that time 0:14:23.120 --> 0:14:26.880 this America's Historical's new Papers had come on board, so 0:14:26.920 --> 0:14:30.160 they had select newspapers, particularly the Philadelphia Inquirer all the 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:34.760 way up to nineteen twenty two that I could search electronically. 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:37.080 And one night I start searching and there it is 0:14:37.120 --> 0:14:40.760 like nineteen fifteen Philadelphia Enquirer has got a picture showing 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:43.760 you what the original routing was. And we were able 0:14:43.800 --> 0:14:46.240 to connect the dots and then further research when I 0:14:46.280 --> 0:14:49.440 started doing it and learning who all these important people 0:14:49.480 --> 0:14:51.560 were that made this project happen. 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:55.920 Yeah, and it was. It was really a very neat 0:14:56.000 --> 0:14:59.200 iterative process because we watched this thing unfold in real 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:01.520 time kind of as the research was done and it 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:05.000 got posted to goth Clabalis, so one fact and overturning 0:15:05.040 --> 0:15:08.920 one stone, would you know, five other lizards would scurry out. 0:15:08.960 --> 0:15:11.960 That would be other trails to dig up, and you 0:15:12.000 --> 0:15:15.160 know the people involved. So really it was a design 0:15:15.200 --> 0:15:19.120 by committee is what we learned. And the committee was 0:15:19.280 --> 0:15:21.040 just so we kind of lay it out. It was 0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:24.400 Hugh Wilson, It was George Crump at Pine Valley. It 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:28.120 was Ab Smith, who was a two time Philadelphia amateur champion. 0:15:28.520 --> 0:15:30.360 It was George Clotter, who had done a lot of 0:15:30.400 --> 0:15:33.520 work with Tilling Has to ironom Ink. It was Franklin Mehan, 0:15:33.560 --> 0:15:37.480 whose family really was responsible for the Fairmount Park system 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:40.640 in the city of Philadelphia and who was an agronomy expert. 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:43.960 Tilling has kind of spurring this on in the newspaper, 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:46.800 and then while the course was being built, people like 0:15:46.880 --> 0:15:49.280 George Thomas later wrote that he learned a lot as 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:52.920 an architect from Hugh Wilson. Watching him build the city 0:15:52.960 --> 0:15:56.880 course at Philadelphia. People like Walter Travis came here because 0:15:56.880 --> 0:15:59.640 they were working with George Crump over at Pine Valley 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:02.520 and come here and offer suggestions. So it was really 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:06.000 this melting pot of ideas of all these people we 0:16:06.120 --> 0:16:09.640 now know as kind of giants in the architectural history 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:11.600 of the game in Philadelphia. 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:14.760 I think that's one of the most fascinating things about 0:16:14.800 --> 0:16:19.680 This is something in America that has often complained about 0:16:20.120 --> 0:16:23.440 with you know, the majority of golfers, is how inaccessible 0:16:23.520 --> 0:16:26.200 so much of the great architecture and how hard it 0:16:26.240 --> 0:16:29.200 is to see the great work from a Tilling hast 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:32.640 of Flynn or a you know Cromp or Hugh Wilson 0:16:33.120 --> 0:16:36.240 or Walter Travis. Most of their great golf courses are 0:16:36.400 --> 0:16:40.720 are exclusive and not available. And here at at Cobbs 0:16:40.760 --> 0:16:43.040 Creek is an example of a golf course where you 0:16:43.080 --> 0:16:46.960 can come see you know, the great architecture of the 0:16:47.080 --> 0:16:50.520 of that time and some of the greatest architecture architects 0:16:50.560 --> 0:16:51.320 I've ever lived. 0:16:51.560 --> 0:16:54.760 Sure, Andy, and you've referred to you know, William Flynn 0:16:54.920 --> 0:16:58.000 later and at the time Flynn was the superintendent at 0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:00.000 Mary And under you know Hugh Wilson is the green 0:17:00.440 --> 0:17:05.359 as the green chairman, and you will Joe's research also 0:17:05.400 --> 0:17:07.640 indicated that, you know, William Flynn is the one who 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:10.280 built out all the greens here. And you know you 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:12.679 had noted as we walked the golf course that his 0:17:12.840 --> 0:17:18.360 use of landforms in directing angles and creating interesting predicaments 0:17:18.840 --> 0:17:20.280 is really an evidence out there. 0:17:21.440 --> 0:17:24.119 So you guys have done all this fact finding. You know, 0:17:24.160 --> 0:17:29.080 you're uncovering all this information about the golf course. How 0:17:29.119 --> 0:17:32.960 did the restoration process work with starting to begin a 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:35.639 conversation with the city, What did you know kind of 0:17:35.680 --> 0:17:38.119 what were the first steps and the different things that 0:17:38.160 --> 0:17:40.480 went into that portion of the project. 0:17:40.520 --> 0:17:42.719 Oh, maybe begin this and then Mike can take it 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:47.520 from there. Basically not just doing some electronic searches from 0:17:47.520 --> 0:17:50.600 a database, but also at the Villanova Library they showed 0:17:50.640 --> 0:17:54.320 me all these microfilm reels for the Philadelphia Public Ledger, 0:17:54.400 --> 0:17:57.240 which was one of the biggest newspapers in the country, 0:17:57.560 --> 0:18:02.439 and I spent many weekends just going through issue after issue, 0:18:02.440 --> 0:18:05.880 finding anything I could on Cobbs Creek and learning about this. 0:18:05.920 --> 0:18:09.040 This then learn turned to going down to the Free 0:18:09.080 --> 0:18:12.919 Library of Philadelphia and spending many weekends there to where 0:18:13.880 --> 0:18:19.440 I gathered so much data on cobbs and little tentacles 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:22.640 that came from that sharing these with Mike and others. 0:18:23.040 --> 0:18:27.240 Mike then basically said, we need to put this together 0:18:28.040 --> 0:18:30.280 just in something that's organized and who knows what comes 0:18:30.320 --> 0:18:32.240 of it, and I'll let him go from there. 0:18:32.880 --> 0:18:38.600 Yeah. So my background is in journalism originally, and so 0:18:39.000 --> 0:18:43.160 I just looked at this, all these stories Joe was uncovering, 0:18:43.200 --> 0:18:45.160 and I thought, this really needs to be put together 0:18:45.160 --> 0:18:49.080 in some kind of narrative form that tells chronologically the history, 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:51.399 even going back to the late eighteen nineties at the 0:18:51.440 --> 0:18:55.320 first attempts of Golf Association Philadelphia to get the city 0:18:55.359 --> 0:18:59.440 to create or allocate land for a golf course. So 0:18:59.640 --> 0:19:02.880 there was all this The story really told itself through 0:19:02.880 --> 0:19:07.119 this series of articles going from say eighteen nineties to 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.679 the frustration of the early nineteen tens, where people like 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:14.000 tilling Has would say wrote, you know, let us let 0:19:14.119 --> 0:19:17.800 us be uh, I forget what the exact term was, 0:19:17.880 --> 0:19:21.040 but let us build of course for men of slender purses. 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:24.560 I think was his analogy, right, so that they can 0:19:24.600 --> 0:19:26.960 be men. Indeed was you know, he was a very 0:19:27.560 --> 0:19:28.480 florid writer and. 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:30.879 Some great way with words. 0:19:31.160 --> 0:19:35.439 Right, So I thought, if I can just put a 0:19:35.600 --> 0:19:39.320 narrative around all this stuff that Joe has found, and 0:19:39.359 --> 0:19:41.800 we can get this into the hands of some people, 0:19:41.920 --> 0:19:45.600 why wouldn't they do this? Was our somewhat naive thought, right, 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:49.280 because there's all of this is recoverable and it really 0:19:49.280 --> 0:19:52.320 shouldn't be a lot of money, and what year about 0:19:52.440 --> 0:19:55.399 is this? So when we started putting the book together, 0:19:55.720 --> 0:20:01.080 it was two thousand and seven, and then in two 0:20:01.160 --> 0:20:03.520 thousand and eight. In early two thousand and eight, a 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:07.240 local sports writer here, Joe Logan, was able to get 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:11.600 us an audience with the Fairmount Park Commission at the time, 0:20:11.680 --> 0:20:14.359 who was running the golf course, and we went and 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:20.080 we presented our ideas to them at that time, and 0:20:20.280 --> 0:20:22.880 Joe thought we'd be thrown out of the meeting room 0:20:22.880 --> 0:20:26.199 in about five minutes. And when that didn't happen, it 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:30.120 led to some encouragement of We were basically told, if 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:33.760 you guys raised the money to do it, we don't 0:20:33.800 --> 0:20:38.119 really have any specific objections to it at this time. Well, 0:20:39.280 --> 0:20:44.080 that was encouraging, but Joe and I are both public golfers. 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:46.919 We're both public gofers forever. We both have day jobs. 0:20:47.000 --> 0:20:50.480 This is not what we do, and we don't run 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:53.000 in the circles of people who have the investment money 0:20:53.000 --> 0:20:55.280 to do that kind of thing. So that's when I 0:20:55.280 --> 0:20:59.280 started putting together this book over that time period, and 0:20:59.720 --> 0:21:03.520 we ended up presenting to the golf course management company 0:21:03.720 --> 0:21:07.480 at that time our idea shortly after that, and we 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:10.280 also at the time I got I had Jim Wagner 0:21:10.560 --> 0:21:14.959 and Gil Hans both come out here, Jim first, because Jim, 0:21:15.080 --> 0:21:16.920 Jim I've known for a number of years in gill 0:21:17.000 --> 0:21:20.560 as well, and Jim is definitely a guy who will 0:21:20.560 --> 0:21:24.119 tell you if you're full of it, and and I 0:21:24.200 --> 0:21:27.160 had no qualm. I thought, all right, we all think 0:21:27.200 --> 0:21:29.719 we see the value here. Maybe I can have him 0:21:29.720 --> 0:21:32.040 meet us out here and we'll walk around and see 0:21:32.040 --> 0:21:36.920 what he thinks. And you know, Jim was real. He 0:21:37.000 --> 0:21:38.920 was a little hesitant off for an opinion as we're 0:21:38.960 --> 0:21:41.360 going and I'm get a little more nervous, and then 0:21:41.400 --> 0:21:43.840 we start walking up this hill of the original sixth 0:21:43.840 --> 0:21:47.560 hole and he utters kind of the first valuation of 0:21:47.600 --> 0:21:49.959 what he's seeing and he says it's a little like 0:21:50.000 --> 0:21:53.040 eighteen at Riviera. So I'm thinking at that point well, 0:21:53.080 --> 0:21:56.480 maybe you know we're okay. 0:21:56.480 --> 0:21:59.960 In eighteen at Riviera at Riviera designed by George Thomas, 0:22:00.480 --> 0:22:04.280 a guy that was involved with this project, which is fascinating, right. 0:22:04.760 --> 0:22:06.879 So we you know, we continue on through the course 0:22:06.920 --> 0:22:09.159 and later on I said we were walking up the 0:22:09.200 --> 0:22:12.359 original eleventh hole which is today fifteen or the latter 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:15.120 half of the hole is, and I said, Jim, are 0:22:15.119 --> 0:22:18.040 we are we nuts? And he said, nah, you guys 0:22:18.080 --> 0:22:20.359 aren't nuts. So I thought that was that was as 0:22:20.400 --> 0:22:22.000 good as it was going to get right with Jim. 0:22:22.040 --> 0:22:24.440 And we later brought Gill out here and he Gil 0:22:24.520 --> 0:22:28.600 had done work pro bono. You know, the courses had 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:33.080 a historic problem with some the Cops Creek running through here. 0:22:33.080 --> 0:22:36.320 It's led to some flooding issues over time, and parts 0:22:36.359 --> 0:22:39.040 of the third and fourth greens had washed away, and 0:22:39.080 --> 0:22:41.080 Gil would come out here on his tractor and just 0:22:41.240 --> 0:22:44.400 rebuild them without just simply for the good of the game. 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:47.600 So from our perspective, Gil and Jim always had write 0:22:47.600 --> 0:22:51.640 a first refusal on anything that was ever done here. 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:56.000 We we went to the management company and some of 0:22:56.040 --> 0:22:59.439 the executives of that company and presented this great history 0:22:59.480 --> 0:23:02.320 and did a point slide in the old Cops Creek 0:23:02.359 --> 0:23:04.760 clubhouse that sadly burned down about two winters ago, and 0:23:05.480 --> 0:23:08.040 and we thought, wow, we really nailed it. And we 0:23:08.119 --> 0:23:10.480