Like the two earlier books in this series -- The Course Beautiful (1995) and Reminiscence of the Links (1998) -- Gleanings from the Wayside displays Tillinghast’s journalistic skills as well as the magic of his course design. Themed around Tillie’s widespread travels in designing and building golf courses, the book takes the reader from "Texas Getting Bent-Minded" to "Out of the Adirondacks" to "Down to Old Mexico for Golf." Along the way, Tillie weaves many a humorous tale and "tells all" his secrets for creating great golf courses. He notes, "During forty years I have probably trod as many golf holes as any man in the world, many of my own creation and many, many more designed by others. I know a good hole when I see one and I think I know a bad one, too."
The 160 pages of Tillinghast essays, brought to life by the books editors with over 300 antique photographs, make for a fun and informative read. Geoffrey Cornish sets the stage with a foreword while the editors have penned a bonus – an afterword that recounts Tillie’s travels as a consultant for the P.G.A. of America during the Great Depression, a period of his life that hitherto has proved elusive to scholars of course design.
Though best known today as the architect of many famed courses including Baltusrol, Bethpage, Quaker Ridge and Winged Foot, Tillinghast also wrote prodigiously about golf. In Gleaning, editors Richard C. Wolffe, Jr., Robert S. Trebus and Stuart F. Wolffe offer forty-eight of this master golf architect’s essays. The titles of his essays capture the Tillinghast flair – The Gimmie Guys, The Ugly Duckling of the Course, A Hole is as Long as it Plays, An Exception to Rule, The Tiny Tims of Golf, Sans Sand Pits, Old Ananias Par and many more. The essays include Tillie’s own analysis of some of his greatest designs such as Winged Foot, Five Farms and others. He also analyzes masterworks by his good friend Donald Ross – Pinehurst Number 2 and Oakland Hills.
