Aerials Galore

I love aerial photography and these being golf courses makes it that much sweeter.



Last winter I began a golf course archiving project that originated while I was trying to create a detailed image of the Yale course from the 1934 Connecticut statewide aerial survey. I was able to create a high-res file from images on the Connecticut state library’s website by stitching together 144 images into a .tif file that could print in a large poster size. I did the same for CC of Fairfield, where I spent most of middle to late teens caddying and working in the pro shop when I wasn’t mostly playing the course. (Unfortunately, the present course has lost much of the routing that appears in the 1934 photo.) And then I assembled one of Brooklawn CC where we played our high school matches for Fairfield High…and eventually I put together files for 23 courses from that one aerial survey. That 1934 April snap-shot reflects an impressive collection of work from Golden Age architects: Walter Travis, Donald Ross, Devereux Emmet, A.W. Tillinghast, Seth Raynor, C.B. Macdonald, Charles Banks, Robert White, Willie Park, Tom Bendelow, etc. In most cases, the aerials show these courses in their “as-built” conditions. By then, very few had been modified much from their original designs.

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