Pages 8-9 From Fall 2013 Florida Golf Magazine ©Copyright 2013, All Rights Reserved. Subscribe at floridagolfmagazine.com/subscribe
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  GOLF COURSE ARCHITECTURE

PETE DYE - DESIGNER  

Excerpted and re-published with permission from
“Bury Me In A Pot Bunker” by Pete Dye with Mark Shaw, Available at Amazon.com.


Pete and Alice Dye and their longtime friend, author, Mark Shaw.

Afterword by Mark Shaw

        There are special occasions in life that we all savor, that we never forget. They are magical, many times even mystical in nature.
        In late October 2012, my lovely wife Wen-ying Lu and I sat across the table from Pete and Alice Dye at their home in Delray Beach, Florida. For several hours over two days, we listened to the wisdom of the game of golf while preparing to revise this book (Bury Me In A Pot Bunker) for its third edition. I knew that thousands of golfers would have given anything to be in my shoes, to have the opportunity to spend time with the Dyes. I savored every moment we were with them; what a privilege to be in their company.
        Our mutual friend Bobby Weed, a protégé of Pete’s and a talented course designer in his own right, calls Pete and Alice “national treasures” and he is right on point. Young at heart in their mid-eighties, and cherished friends of mine for more than forty years, the loving couple are true living legends, throwbacks to the course designers of old who worshiped God’s green earth and made it better through the design of many of the world’s greatest golf venues.
        As Pete and Alice provided their views on the game they love, I recalled Lu and myself sitting at the World Golf Hall of Fame ceremony in 2008 when Pete was inducted. That evening he charmed the audience with stories, many of which were at least partially true. I knew then, as I did during our October chats, that I was in the midst of a true genius, a man whose insight into how the game of golf should be played is second to none. As I tell fellow golfers these days, many courses built now are either a Pete Dye course or some sort of copy of one since his innovations, his imagination, has spread to the four corners of the globe.
        My introduction to the Dyes began in 1969 when longtime friend Wayne Timberman invited me to play with Pete and Alice at Crooked Stick Golf Club. Any local sports fan unaware of the Dyes’ success as golf competitors had not read a newspaper in years. Alice had won the Indiana State Amateur nine times, the North and South Amateur, the Eastern Amateur, and competed in several United States Women’s Open Championships. Pete, an Indianapolis District and Indiana State Amateur Champion, had reached the third round of the British Amateur and qualified for five United States Amateur Championships.
        Those impressive credentials did not faze me a bit when I met Pete and Alice on the tee of the 458-yard 10th hole. I had been a member of a Big Ten Championship team at Purdue and was ready to take on anyone, anytime, anyplace. Besides, what I saw that morning was the slightly built Pete dressed in khaki pants, a white “no-logo” golf shirt that had not seen an iron, black socks, unlaced work boots, and a dumpy porkpie hat that seemed a size too small.
        Standing next to him was Alice, who looked more like my kindly mother than the razor-edged, tenacious championship golfer I had heard about. When the subject of wagering came up, I quickly accepted a twenty-five-cent bet with both Dyes. While my betting dead-even with a woman over forty seemed a bit unfair, who was I to take pity on the overmatched Alice?
        Pete began the match by hitting one of his patented hooks that started across a large lake and somehow made it back into the dead center of the fairway. I was next. Full of confidence, I came off both feet and ripped my ball, a Spalding Dot, 260 yards straight down the pike. I then tossed my Tony Penna driver to my bespectacled young caddie and turned around to hear the first of many Pete Dye witticisms that has driven me to rib-cracking laughter over the years. “Well,” Pete calmly told Wayne as he began the Pete Dye trot toward the women’s tee, “Shaw must not be able to chip and putt or I would have heard of him!”
        My huge ego deflated, I headed for the women’s tee, where for the first time I witnessed Alice’s textbook-perfect, rhythmic swing resulting in a beautifully positioned drive that catapulted by mine on the fly. As I watched from nearby, she lifted the ball toward the green where it hit ever so gently and then rolled, rolled, rolled until it abruptly disappeared into the hole for an eagle two. Her fine play continued and the big-time college boy never won a hole from the “over matched” Alice that sunny afternoon.
        This enduring friendship with Pete and Alice led to my being selected to collaborate with them on the first edition of this book in the mid-nineties. Since many more experienced and talented writers than I approached the Dyes, I was flattered that they chose me.
        This third edition is unlike either of the first two since during the years that have passed, Pete, with Alice always close by, has continued to design course after course. Many people retire at age 65, but not Pete, and the world of golf has been the better for it as such courses as Whistling Straits, an amazing golf adventure, have arrived on the scene.
        Alice Dye, who has a heart the size of a washtub, may be the most generous lady I have ever met. Throughout my research for this book, I have heard the words “wonderful,” “the best” and “quite a lady” used to describe Alice. Even those competitors who have witnessed firsthand Alice’s deadly golf game come away with more respect than sorrow. Many of her thoughts about the game including useful tips are included in From Birdies to Bunkers: Discover How Golf Can Bring Love, Humor, and Success into Your Life, a book I was blessed to co-author with her.
        Several times Pete has told me that the straight-shooting Alice is “the most honest woman on the face of the earth.” Others have echoed that thought and related countless stories in which Alice has corrected a wrong that disturbed her deep-rooted sense of fair play.
        Alice Dye’s alter ego is Pete, an unpretentious character whose down-home folksy ways are a fooler who greets people, friend or stranger, with “How y’all doin’?” or “What’s new in your world?” With a twinkle in his eye, Pete Dye will charm you with his wit and storytelling, but he is a focused, intense, imaginative visionary who is still twenty-five years ahead of his time.
        Pete’s protégés will tell you he’s the most energetic man they have ever known. Alice says Pete could outwork the Energizer Bunny, and exhausted workers many years younger than Pete are amazed that he is always the first one on the job site and the last one to go home even at his advanced age.
        Pete Dye is a humble, give-the-credit-to-someone-else gentleman whose sense of humor and optimism are legendary. He’s a creative artist and a wave-his-arms barker salesman rolled into one, and his imagination permits him to visualize a completed golf course when a normal person sees vast acres of nothing.
        Pete is also the only person who accepted an invitation to dine with Robert Redford but had no idea who he was. When it comes to movies, he never goes since he says they all wind up on television anyway.
        During the years that have passed since this book was first published, I’ve continued to enjoy my friendship with the Dyes. I was very pleased when the Dye family (Pete, Alice and sons Perry and P.B.) received the Golf Family of the Year Award from the National Golf Foundation in 1998. Alice became the first female president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects, continued her superb play on the course by overwhelming the field to win the Crooked Stick Ladies’ Club Championship, and most importantly, stood front and center with Pete as they co-designed more golf jewels across the country.
        When Purdue University awarded Pete an honorary doctorate in landscape engineering for his efforts in designing their new Kampen Course and in establishing a working laboratory for aspiring agronomy students, it was well deserved. Pete jokingly dubbed the affair “a coronation,” and demanded that he be known not simply as “Dr. Dirt,” his longtime nickname, but “Dr. Dye.”
        Through the years, I was honored whenever Pete telephoned me and asked that I accompany him to one of his new courses. Trips to the Ocean Course at Kiawah (I was responsible for making sure his dog Sixty had enough water), Park City, and Whistling Straits, among others permitted me to see firsthand how he approached course design. Many times, I watched in awe as he actually “felt” his way around the land using his feet to experience the varying contours. All the while, the “Pete Dye mind,” as I call it, was at work figuring how best to weave the holes into the land. Having traveled to Scotland before I assisted with the first edition of this book (When someone asks me if I was a good player at one time, I just tell them I parred the Road Hole at St. Andrews), I recognized that what Pete learned in the British Isles was still impacting every aspect of his innovative course design.
        This new special edition hopefully captures all the essence of the first two but is truly special because for the first time, in the Epilogue, readers learn many of Pete’s overall design philosophies. Students of the game, players who want to better understand how the game should be played strategically, and especially those who aspire to become golf course architects should read this book cover to cover.
        In a sport filled with nice people, Pete and Alice Dye, who genuinely love the game of golf, are at the top of the list. Collaborating with them on all three editions of this book has been an unforgettable experience, and my heartfelt thanks go to numerous people, including respected golf writer Ron Whitten, great friends Wayne Timberman, Bobby Weed, Tim Liddy, Gilles Gagnon, Jack Leer, former PGA Tour commissioner Deane Beman, among others. Jack Nicklaus, who took time to spend a never-to-be-forgotten lunch with Pete and me, and Greg Norman, who wrote the Foreword, deserve special thanks as well. To my wife Wen-ying Lu, my thanks for her support as always. To Alice Dye, thank you for working with me on the book and for your superb editing skills. To Theresa Moore and Ken E. May, my thanks for the book layout and photographs.
        Above all, I thank Pete and Alice for permitting me the honor to share a lifetime of memories with them. The intent of this book has been to shed light on where two of God’s most special children came from, how they got started as course designers, and by what means they have designed and built many of the finest golf courses in the world. More than that, I’m hopeful it captures the nevergive-up, zest-for-life spirit that is the true essence of Pete and Alice Dye.

- Mark Shaw

Pages 8-9 From Fall 2013 Florida Golf Magazine ©Copyright 2013, All Rights Reserved. Subscribe at floridagolfmagazine.com/subscribe
To advertise in Florida Golf Magazine in print and on-line, phone 863-227-2751 and/or email joestine@floridagolfmagazine.com