p12-18 Myopia v9_Pgs. 26

102nd MGA Amateur
July 12-16, 2010
His Hunt Carries On
The master opus of Herbert Leeds — his challenging,
championship Myopia Hunt Club layout — endures largely intact.
9th
Hole
136
Yards
Par 3
The 9th hole teeing ground; (top) Leeds in 1898.
P HOTOGRAPHS
wT
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M A S S G O L F E R e Summer 2010
EXT BY
BY
B RIAN S MITH
Pro Positions: Myopia’s
signature hole has been
rated by Golf Magazine
as one of the top 100
golf holes in America.
Depending on the wind,
players will hit 7-iron
to wedge over a pond
into a narrow green
that is surrounded by
menacing bunkers.
Pro Positions comments by
Myopia Hunt Club head
professional Bill Safrin.
M AXWELL M. C AREY
LE E DS: TH E COU NTRY CLU B
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Herbert Leeds:
His Hunt Carries On
American Original
in 1854, Herbert Leeds became a top competitive
golfer at The Country Club (see page 9). He also was a member of
Myopia Hunt Club where he became the first American-born citizen
to create an 18-hole championship layout in the United States.
In an era when most U.S. courses were being designed by Scottish
professionals (and five years before Donald Ross would emigrate to
Boston), Leeds — an amateur and a perfectionist — convinced Myopia’s
membership in 1895 to allow him to revise its existing nine-hole layout.
The work so impressed the USGA (newly-formed in 1894), that
Myopia was awarded the 1898 U.S. Open; it would be the event’s
first 72-hole format, with 36 holes played on each of the two days
of competition. Leeds finished tied for eighth and was low amateur.
The club then purchased an adjoining 51 acres upon which he laid
out a second nine over two years of extraordinarily deliberate work.
In the MGA’s centennial book, A Commonwealth of Golfers, golf
historian John English praised Leeds for his “...early landmark in the
development of thoughtful golf-course architecture in the United
States. He heaped stone walls into mounds, grassed them over, and
created the ‘Myopia chocolate drops.’ Bunkers were added only on
holes not otherwise sufficiently challenging. He took pains with the
location of putting greens and gave them undulating surfaces. His
product influenced the state of the art throughout North America.”
The revolutionary, finished 18 had no equal in the world and his
opus was awarded three more U.S. Opens... for 1901, ’05 and ’08.
BORN IN BOSTON
3rd
Hole
253
Yards
Par 3
4th
Hole
392
Yards
Par 4
Pro Positions: It has
been named as the
“...toughest, longest
par 3 in the state...”
in a poll by the
MGA. Depending
on wind direction,
players will hit driver
to 3-iron into the
small and narrow
two-tiered green.
Pro Positions: A dogleg left with
a lateral hazard on the left side,
this hole requires a drawn tee
shot with a driver or 3-wood to set
up a short iron into a punishing,
uphill sloped green. Missed irons
will feed into a gathering sand
bunker strategically placed in the
left front of the green. This is
rated by Golf Magazine as one
of the top 100 holes in America.
5th
Hole
417
Yards
Par 4
Pro Positions: This is
our longest hole — and
the #1 handicapped
hole on the front side.
A good drive sets up a
short iron into the
largest green on the
course. However, a drive
to the left is either out
of bounds or buried in
the deep fescue.
The 5th hole from behind the green.
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Herbert Leeds:
His Hunt Carries On (cont.)
A One-Man Show
12th
Hole
446
Yards
Par 4
13th
Hole
349
Yards
Par 4
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Walter Travis, the three-time U.S. Amateur champion and
British Amateur winner, called the layout, “the best in the country...
the creation largely of one man... with putting greens, mostly undulating, which are equal to the best anywhere in the world.”
As the first vice president of the f ledgling MGA, Leeds would
also influence the selection of Myopia as the site of the inaugural
1903 MGA Amateur. The 102nd chapter of the Amateur returns
this July, the fifth time Myopia has hosted the state’s premier event.
An avid student of course design, Leeds toured British Isles links
courses and constantly refined and fortified Myopia until his death
in 1930. MGA Amateur contestants will find that the present layout
— carefully restored from 1995-2005 — retains most of the original
look and ‘playing feel’ that Leeds created and nurtured.
Myopia continues to rank high on many notable golf listings,
including #32 on the 2010 Golfweek’s Best Classic Courses and
#78 on GOLF Magazine’s Top 100 Courses in the U.S. The layout
also lands on ‘toughest’ and ‘hardest’ lists (see Pro Positions copy).
No surprise there... Leeds was known to carry white chips with him
and, if a good player got away with a seeming miss, he would drop a
few chips in the area and a bunker would appear shortly thereafter.
Myopia historian Edward Weeks called Leeds “...a perfectionist,
a martinet who took sadistic pleasure in watching the duffer suffer.”
Leeds summed up his design philosophy in his own pen in one of
his scrapbooks: “To eliminate chance from any game is to spoil it.”
Pro Positions: High fescue on
the right and a lateral hazard
on the left protect a narrow
fairway for today’s long hitters.
The approach shot with a
5- to 7-iron is hit into a narrow,
crown-shaped green that will
only hold a well-struck ball.
The hole is included in golf
writer Chris Millard’s book,
Golf’s 100 Toughest Holes.
Pro Positions: This is
considered the thirdhardest hole on the
course. A 3-wood off
the tee leaves a 120yard approach shot
into a tiny landing
area. Landing either
long or short of the
green can easily result
in double bogey.
M A S S G O L F E R e Summer 2010
18th
Hole
404
Yards
Par 4
Pro Positions: Another
hole that demands a
straight tee ball, the landing area is protected by a
nasty pot bunker on the
right and bunkers on the
left. A 150-yard approach
into this green, guarded
by sand bunkers in front,
makes this a very good
finishing hole.
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