Jersey is Still the Best Exit for Golf
Over time reputations are usually earned and perceptions are usually distorted. People and places validate what we’ve heard about them with exposure to them. Affirmations are the bedrock of our beliefs. We arrive at the positions we hold through observation and experience which makes our evidence empirical. The contaminate at arriving at a sensible and objective position is of course, bias. Guess what, most of our thoughts and feelings are influenced by bias, to varying degrees. I know I’m biased but it won’t change what is empirically true about the state I grew up in. New Jersey’s roster of golf courses is in the heavyweight class. I just knew where I was lucky enough to learn to play, Ridgewood Country Club, was special but time and experience have only reaffirmed what I came to believe after seeing the country. Jersey is strong.
The perception of New Jersey has always been distorted by first impressions, most consistently and notably with an arrival into the Newark airport. It’s an industrial horror film, mixed with the anger and discontentment of virtually every person you may encounter between your arrival gate and baggage claim. If you can survive to venture in any direction 20 miles and beyond you will find some of the finest golf courses and bucolic towns in America. Returning to Jersey as a I did last week is and always will be nostalgic. I cherish my childhood memories and, although the overwhelming majority of my life has now been spent outside Bergen County, I will always be from there. The first major championship I attended was at Baltusrol in 1980 when Jack was back. Playing the state championships at Hominy Hill was the first real intense sense of team golf I ever experienced. Sneaking on the likes of White Beeches and Alpine Country Club with a side trip to drive by Brooke Shields house in Haworth were epic and dangerous days, by a golfer’s standard. And in 1984 I played Pine Valley for the first time, as a junior in high school. Here’s the thing, all giddiness and awe that I felt that rainy April day of ‘84 is precisely what I felt last week arriving in the municipality that is Pine Valley.
George Crump had a dream, and, in actuality, it was really a pipe dream. But his dream was one he would share not only with his sister, who helped him forge on with the construction of Pine Valley, but also with a roster of architectural golf minds led by Harry Colt as well as the pioneers of golf course design in America. At the time of the construction of Pine Valley the Cobbs Creek project in Philadelphia was also being executed. The men who were contributors to both included George Crump, Hugh Wilson, George Thomas, William Flynn, Walter Travis and A.W. Tillinghast. Coupled with the input and early feedback from the likes of Francis Quimet, Jerry Travers, Chick Evans, William Fownes and John G. Anderson, Pine Valley was an American golf marvel that garnered attention and adulation from every important figure in the infancy of the game in the United States. Famed writer Grantland Rice, a confidant of Bobby Jones, wrote in his “Evening Ledger” column after playing Pine Valley for the first time in 1916, “Pine Valley comes as close to being a flawless test of the ancient Scottish game as the imagination could devise”.
Returning to Pine Valley, as I have periodically through the years, I’m always struck by its unique rugged presentation. The imitation of PV has 
been going on for the last 100 years in golf design and with all the technological advancement you’d think the ability to replicate the crude edges and harsh angles of the bunkering at Pine Valley would have maybe even improved upon, but it hasn’t. The clubhouse is sturdy but doesn’t seek attention. It’s almost too practical in its usefulness as a domicile to preview and review your day of golf. History has a head start on everything and the profiles and portraits that adorn the walls of the clubhouse of the men who made Pine Valley fortify the facility’s sturdiness and its historical place in the game. One gaze at a life-size picture of George Crump validates your belief that he was a reflection of the course he created. Brawny, all grown up, and didn’t suffer fools.
The genius of the routing at Pine Valley was not predicated on returning to the clubhouse after nine holes. Whether it was by direct intent, you come back by the clubhouse after completing four holes maybe to allow those simply lacking in resolve to tuck tail and depart before further humiliation. More likely, the visionaries of Pine Valley were determined to build the best 18 holes without enormous regard for halfway houses. Thank you gentlemen for caring most about what matters most, the holes. In an era where tree excavation is a passionate principle of many of the most trusted restorers of great golf courses Pine Valley is an uninterrupted walk. Meaning, few holes are viewed from the hole you are playing. The dense woodlands that made up the original parcel of land used for the golf course remain dense. It’s almost not until you arrive at the next tee do you get to view the next hole. It’s not a question of identifying the weakest hole, but rather what is the toughest, most strategic, most beguiling, and most picturesque. The second tee is the first optical overload your mind must process. The fairway, bracketed by menacing minuscule bunkers, is amplified by the cascading array of bunkers that front the elevated green. It’s the first of many Pine Valley postcards. The roll of the land takes you down to the par 3 third green and then back up to the apex of the ridge that runs across the fourth fairway and down to the fourth green. The fifth is inarguably one of the finest and most punishing long par 3’s in the world. The remaining holes on the front nine are a glorious blend of abrupt angles, hells half acre, not one but two postage stamp greens on the eighth and the choices of two greens on the unrelenting ninth hole. I’m a huge fan of cozy and 10, 11 and 12 are the cozy corridors of PV. Only to transition to the broad and wide scale of 13, the real elevation change of 14 and then the grand tilt of the 15th hole. The closing holes at Pine Valley are not any departure from the previous 15, just a genius flow that takes you back to where you started with a rolodex of images and looks that you’ll hold onto upon departure. My favorite view on the property is standing on the back left portion of the 10th tee and looking back down the 18th fairway to the home green. It is right there that I marvel at the gravitas of the visionaries to see what they saw and have the temerity to pull it off. Standing on high pondering the modesty of the equipment at their disposal and realizing that their collective determination and creativity could produce a stand-alone golf experience.
Golf requires acceptance. Without it, the game will repel you out of it or you will meekly extricate yourself from the experience. Playing Pine Valley may demand the highest degree of acceptance because it is exacting and unforgiving. A solid start can be eviscerated by one horrifying lie. Putting from the wrong side of holes too often will likely strip you of conviction with the putter and the enormity of the experience takes a toll on your focus. It is overwhelming to experience to Pine Valley… snapper soup, the flex of the members only logo, the haunting cart rides from the practice tee back to the clubhouse, but most importantly the holes. It’s the most consistent and sturdiest 18 consecutive holes I’ve ever played in the United States. A reputation earned.