D € V £ LO P M € H T BRIEFS Designer Crenshaw takes little time to savor his second Masters victory By MARK LESLIE USTIN,Texas — With his second Masters victory tucked snug in his bank of "memories to keep," the Aquestion in the development world is, what effect might it have on Ben Crenshaw's course design career? When won the U.S. Open in 1990, his course PinMAN/FLOYD PICKED design business soared. On the Wednesday after Crenshaw GREAT EXUMA ISLAND, Bahamas donned the Masters' green blazer, his design partner Bill — Bland Pittman and Coore reported that his Austin office had been deluged with will design an 18-hole as a congratulatory calls. cornerstone of a "It's reasonable to expect that some people who were 518-acre luxury considering us may be swayed now," Coore said, "but it's too resort community early to tell. We try to keep a separation between Ben's which will be built playing career and what we do. But, obviously, there's here beginning carryover." this summer. The That night, Coore and Crenshaw were on a plane enroute Bahama Club, to Tembagapoura, Indonesia, where they face some unique Ltd. of Coral "life situations." Gables, Fla., is de- Impressed by Crenshaw and Coore's golf course design at Raymond Floyd veloping the Barton Creek in Austin, Texas, as well as Crenshaw's victory project, which is being designed by at their own Freeport-McMoRan Classic last year, Freeport- Sandy & Babcock International and McMoRan officials hired the design team to craft an 18-hole master-planned by Pittman Poe & As- track for their mining crews in Tembagapoura. sociates. Ritz-Carlton oceanfront ho- With a complete community built around its copper and tel is also a centerpiece of the project. By HAL PHILLIPS gold mine, Freeport-McMoRan decided a golf course would CASTLE ROCK, Colo. — Instead of that Dye character, be fitting, as a respite for its employees and visitors from COUNTY, HICKMAN HILLS ENTER PACT perhaps American Express should have considered de- abroad, Crenshaw said. DUTCHESS COUNTY, N.Y. — The signer Jim Engh for its trademark "Do you know me?" "It will provide play for the miners and for the Americans, Duchess County Economic Develop- campaign. Australians and others who come from elsewhere who are ment Corp. (EDC) has entered into an Yet the window of opportunity may have passed. involved in the operation," Crenshaw said. The facility will be agreement with Hickman Hills Corp. After working under respected architects like Dick geared more toward being recreational than money-making, for construction of an 18-hole golf Nugent and Britain's Cotton Pennink, then designing he added. course to be financed with EDC bonds. courses on behalf of and Isao Aoki for Clearing of the site began last fall, and Crenshaw, taking a HJM Corp., active in the golf world for International Management Group (IMG), Engh is work- break from the PGA Tour, said, "We hope to start grassing in 30 years, advised Hickman and struc- ing under his own name as part of his new firm, Global the summer and try to have an opening in the fall." tured the bond financing. Designed Golf Design. Building the course in concert with Freeport-McMoRan's by , the course should be "I'll be honest: I got to some of the top projects around engineering team, Coore and Crenshaw will import their own under construction this spring and open Continued on next page shapers to fine-tune their design. "Their equipment is there for limited play in mid-season 1996. Continued on next page

GOLFDATA CREATES NEW SERVICES ROCKVILLE, Md. — GolfData Inter- national, Inc. has initiated a new high- Is this the Twilight Zone or the Third World? tech information retrieval service — a fax-back system that offers "instant ac- Reflections of a Vacationing' cess to key golf mar- super at the top of the world ket intelligence" it believes is crucial to By GORDON WITTEVEEN business planning KATMANDU, Nepal — My vacation in and development. Nepal was meant to be just that: a get- The service includes away-from-it-all month without golf golfer demographic courses or superintendents. The combi- profiles, consumer spending informa- nation of a radically different culture and tion, market data and financial statis- the clean mountain air would surely tics. CEO Scott Marlowe said the firm is cleanse my brain and remove the cob- also introducing GOLFax* letter, an on- webs. A fresh outlook and a deeper ap- line newsletter. More information is preciation full of life in general would available from GolfData at 15012 Red surely result. Clover Drive, Rockville, Md. 20853. The adventure had started with a trans- Atlantic flight to London and a continua- LAGREE JOINS BARBARON tion to New Delhi, the capital of India. CRYSTAL RIVER, Fla. — Black Dia- From there it was just an hour and a half mond Ranch General Manager and to the top of the world. We landed here in Vice President Terrill A. LaGree has exotic Katmandu. The name of Nepal's left to join golf course builder capital had intrigued me ever since my Barbaron, Inc. as vice president and first geography lesson on Asia. Actually, equal stockholder. LaGree is a graduate the place is a bit of a disappointment. "Doing it my way" takes on a whole new meaning in Nepal of the University of Wisconsin with a There are no cats in sight; instead, it is degree in landscape architecture. loaded with dogs. I suppose if it was called banished the words "golf course" from have a closer look at the grass. Imagine Dogmandu no one would go there. my mind. I had made a sacred vow to stay my surprise when the first green I came FOSTER PROMOTES SCHAUPETER On the way from the airport I got blurry- away from golf courses. to was not green at all, but black, since ST. LOUIS, Mo. — Arthur Schaupeter eyed from a speeding taxi view of a small Two days later, after visiting five the putting surface was made from used has been promoted to lead design asso- red flag in a vacant field but immediately temples and three museums, I snuck away oil and sand. Greens such as these I had ciate with Keith Foster Golf Course from the group, hired a rickshaw and not seen since the '60s in Saskatchewan. Design here. Jason Hollen, a landscape Gordon Witteveen is superintendent of five headed for the Royal Nepal Golf Club. It The tees were small, elevated and rectan- architecture graduate of West Virginia Metropolitan Toronto Board of Trade golf was noon time on a warm, sunny day in gular. They had recently been top- University, has joined the design staff. courses. November when I climbed a fence to Continued on page 48 GOLF COURSE NEWS May 1995 45