Harry Colt was the youngest of six children born to a solicitor father who died when he was only two years old. His mother then moved the family from London to Malvern, where he played golf at Worcestershire Golf Club’s original course on the common, becoming a proficient, plus-handicap player.

After attending Monkton Combe School in Bath, Colt studied law at Clare College, Cambridge. Twelve months after his 1887 enrolment, he joined the committee of the Cambridge University Golf Club and in 1889 became the club's first captain. After graduation he was admitted to the bar, becoming a solicitor and partner in the Hastings law firm of Sayer & Colt.

In 1894 he laid out the new course at Rye with Scottish professional Douglas Rolland and in 1895 was appointed Honorary Secretary of Rye Golf Club with Rolland becoming the club’s first professional. Between 1901 and 1913, Colt served as Sunningdale Golf Club’s first Secretary. Interestingly, when he first took up his appointment at Sunningdale his annual salary was £150.00, about a tenth of what he would have earned had he remained in the legal profession.

In 1907, twelve months after he reached the semi-final of the Amateur Championship, 

 (the first Honorary Secretary at Alwoodley Golf Club) called upon Colt to help him design a new course on the outskirts of Leeds, and the doctor later joined 

 becoming Colt’s second business partner. Two years later, Colt’s new course opened at Stoke Park, framed by the iconic backdrop of the 18th century mansion house, designed by James Wyatt, architect to King George III.

His “least bad course”, Swinley Forest, quietly opened for play in 1911. Authors Henry Lord and Peter Pugh, commented in 

Masters of Design – Great Courses of Colt, MacKenzie, Alison & Morrison

 as follows: “One of the most astonishing things about Colt’s routing was that it was mapped out in his mind’s eye before any of the thousands of pine trees covering the site were removed.”

Already within his portfolio were Blackmoor, St George’s Hill and Camberley Heath. Colt had also visited France and laid out Golf de Saint-Cloud in Paris. He had also sailed to North America and designed new courses for the Toronto Golf Club and the Country Club of Detroit. Additionally, Colt worked with 

 at Old Elm Club and routed Pine Valley with Philadelphian hotelier, George Crump.

In 1913, prior to the outbreak of the First World War, unable to remain committed to his duties at Sunningdale, Colt resigned as Secretary, having now established himself as one of the world’s leading golf course architects. He was now utilising the services of Suttons Seeds, along with George Franks and Claude Harris, who had formed the first golf construction firm, Franks Harris.

“When peace returned at the end of 1918”, remarked Henry Lord and Peter Pugh, “Colt wrote to all his old golfing contacts offering the services of Colt, Alison and MacKenzie… in 1920, [MacKenzie] was increasingly keen to branch out on his own, following Alison to North America and the prestigious commissions he so craved.” MacKenzie left the Colt and Alison partnership in 1923 so “Colt brought a new assistant, the 30-year-old 

, into the fold… In 1922 he began helping Colt with the building of Sunningdale’s New course… In 1928 Morrison was made an official partner and the new company of Colt, Alison & Morrison was formed.”

“Colt had really stopped designing courses in 1939, happy to let his two partners stand out on their own while he remained in the peaceful seclusion of East Hendred with his wife, Laura, until she passed away in 1948.” Henry Shapland "Harry" Colt died three years later in 1951.

 by Donald Steel: “He was the first captain of Rye in 1894, a mere five years after holding office as captain of Cambridge University. His is the first name to be shown on the Honours Board in the dining room at Worlington, although Colt’s Cambridge days preceded the club’s foundation in 1893.

Colt courses are always eminently playable, not heavily-bunkered and with no long carries. Denham is a good example of his handiwork; a stiff enough test to make good players think without posing too much of a handful for the rank and file.

Donald Ross may have had Colt in mind in his general reference to ‘golf as it was meant to be played’. Both were pioneers of a new art whereby great thoughts went into the process of providing a coherent sequence to the layout with interesting green design as a separate study.”

 by Cornish & Whitten: “Several firsts in golf course design are generally attributed to H.S. Colt. He was the first to consistently use a drawing board in preparing his course designs. He was the first to prepare tree-planting plans for his layouts.”

: “In Britain, Harry Colt was the first amateur golfer – rather than professional – to earn a reputation as an architect. Some say he is still the greatest of them all.”

“Colt had a few simple dictums. The early holes should ease you into the round; nothing too demanding at the start. Ideally, every club in the bag should be used, regardless of skill. The routing of the course would be determined by the land, and there would be no hard and fast rule about the numbers of par threes or fives on any given nine… Colt had no peer as a designer of short holes.”

 – such is the capricious nature of ceremonial awards Harry Colt is shamefully absent from the Hall of Fame despite the inclusion of a number of Colt’s contemporaries.


Creating Classics: The golf courses of Harry Colt 

Such is the capricious nature of ceremonial awards, Harry Colt is shamefully absent from the World Golf Hall of Fame despite the inclusion of a number of his contemporaries.

Harry Colt

Harry Colt studied law at Clare College, Cambridge. Twelve months after his 1887 enrolment, he joined the committee of the Cambridge University Golf Club and in 1889 became the club's first captain.

John Morrison was educated at Charterhouse School in Goldaming, Surrey from 1905 to 1911, during which time he captained the school’s cricket and football teams. He also captained the Public Schools Team against the MCC in his final year at Charterhouse before he went up to Trinity College, Cambridge to study history and law.

The Great War curtailed his university studies and he joined the Royal Flying Corps, where he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for flying torpedo bombers. It’s also thought he was one of the first pilots to land a plane on an aircraft carrier. After the war, Morrison returned to Trinity College, graduating in 1920.

His sporting achievements as an amateur during the 1920s were many, including a cap for England against Wales at football, and he captained Corinthians when they beat Blackburn Rovers 1-0 in the first round of the F.A. Cup at Crystal Palace in 1924. He also played cricket for both the Somerset and Northumberland county teams.

Morrison joined Harry Colt’s design partnership in 1923 (the same year 

 withdrew) and became a director of the company five years later. He was also a skilled practitioner on the golf course, winning the Worplesdon Foursomes (partnering Joyce Wethered) in 1928 then the Belgian Open Amateur Championship the following year.

During the 1930s, Morrison and Henry Longhurst were long-standing partners for Charterhouse in the Halford Hewitt early season match play competition for public schools, where each team fields five foursomes pairs. Over a six-year spell, the prodigious pairing of Morrison and Longhurst won all but one of 32 matches played.

Morrison was Captain of both Sunningdale (1933) and Royal Worlington & Newmarket (1936) and he teamed up with Joyce Wethered to win the Sunningdale Foursomes on a couple of occasions in the mid-1930s. When World War II broke out, Morrison enlisted in the RAF, serving first as a Wing Commander then Group Captain of a training facility.

He was a larger than life figure with an iron constitution, as remarked on by Henry Lord and Peter Pugh in 

 when they wrote: “Aside from being a consummate sportsman, he also proved his drinking prowess by winning a beer-drinking contest at Oktoberfest in Munich. To celebrate this, he reputedly drank a pint of sherry, which was his preferred tipple.”

 on numerous design projects in the United Kingdom and on the continent of Europe. Indeed, a large proportion of the overseas commissions for Colt Alison & Morrison Ltd were overseen by John Morrison but, like 

, his contribution is often overlooked in favour of headline partner Harry Colt, whose name and reputation is far more widely known.

Morrison worked extensively in The Netherlands, Germany and Spain before World War II then in France and Italy after the war. On the domestic front, he’s probably best known for remodelling the course at Prince’s along with 

 in the late 1940s and he remained active after the demise of Harry Colt in 1951 and Hugh Alison a year later, collaborating with J. Hamilton Stutt on projects until he passed away in 1961.

John Morrison was a larger than life figure with an iron constitution, remarked Henry Lord and Peter Pugh: “Aside from being a consummate sportsman, he also proved his drinking prowess by winning a beer-drinking contest at Oktoberfest in Munich. To celebrate this, he reputedly drank a pint of sherry, which was his preferred tipple.”

John Morrison

John Morrison joined Harry Colt’s design firm in 1923 and became a director of the company five years later. He was also a skilled practitioner on the golf course, winning prestigious amateur tournaments.

Christoph Städler

South West Germany

German Open

European Ladies' Team

Germany

Frankfurter Golf Club is located in a secluded forest setting within the Frankfurt city boundary. The gently undulating topography is in many ways reminiscent of the sand belt courses located to the west of London. Unfortunately, a century of unchecked tree growth is suffocating the fairways today and the turf quality is markedly affected by the lack of sun and wind. A number of holes have become straight, tree-lined affairs with little strategic interest.

The golf club itself is one of the oldest in Germany, founded in 1913. The original 9-hole course was the work of Charly Gardner and located on another site, whereas Harry Colt and John Morrison designed the current layout in the late 1920s in a traditional old English heathland style. Sadly, the heather is gone these days, with the exception of a small patch behind the fairway bunker on the 15th, which provides a glimpse as to how the course might have looked before the pines grew up.

The club used to be a regular German Open venue (most recently in 1989) and it was once one of the longest courses in Europe with par set at an incredible 78. Today’s par at Frankfurter is between 69 and 71 depending on which tees are selected. Their youth program is one of the foremost in Germany, so betting against a 14-year-old lad heading for the back tee is probably a bad idea.

Christoph Städler has been remodelling the bunkers and greens in 2007 to mixed reactions. In his own words: “For many years these old topsoil push-up greens have shown increasing problems with fungi and poa annua. They no longer measure up to modern playing standards. Thus the members have recently decided to renovate the greens. I have played about 20 Harry Colt courses and I’m a great admirer of his ingenious layouts, routings and undulated greens. Surprisingly the greens at Frankfurter Golf Club are relatively flat in comparison to his other courses and they have lost their challenge over the years when approach shot lengths have become shorter and shorter. A couple of greens are still appropriately contoured but we will provide the majority with bolder shaped surfaces and surrounds, very much in the typical Colt style.”

While the rebuild has certainly improved the quality of the putting surfaces, it didn't exactly promote the ground game. Some critics feel the bunkering and green surrounds show little sympathy for Colt and the elaborate mounding is more in tune with the modern American style made popular by Robert Trent Jones.

Frankfurter

Freiburger 

Continental Europe

Frankfurter Golf Club was a once a regular German Open venue and this historical layout was designed by Harry Colt and John Morrison in the 1920s.