The New Monster in the Catskills – a Little Less King Ghidorah, a Little More Mothra

Who doesn’t love a good monster fight? REEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

And the glory days are actually back! With modern technology the new Godzilla movies are totally worthy, and for once the inability to pick which monsters to showcase in any particular movie gave way to the most excellent solution of “Screw it. Let’s use ’em all!!!!” So after the initial disappointment of not seeing Rodan, King Ghidorah, or Mothra in the 2014 reboot of the Godzilla franchise, 2019’s Godzilla:  King of the Monsters gave us all three, including the most satisfying climax of the Big Guy ripping off one head of Ghidorah while stepping on his chest, lightning bolts flying everywhere.

It still doesn’t top when Godzilla finished off that big, ugly Muto by breathing his atomic breath down its neck, but it was sick.

Anyway, cut to present day, and another Godzilla-sized Monster is being reborn:  the Monster Golf Club, near Kiamesha Lake, New York, deep in the very epicenter of Catskills-area Vacationland. “The Monster” – a.k.a. Concord Golf Club as it was formally known was a legend. I choose that word with precision – a legend. Vacationing in the Catskills was a status symbol back in ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s Americana. Catskill hotels – many of which catered to a Jewish clientele from greater New York City – were the crown jewels of summer getaways. And king of them all was the Concord Hotel. All of Hollywood glitterati came to entertain there:  Tony Bennett, Jill St. John, Englebert Humperdink, Ben Vereen, Redd Foxx, Bobby Darin, Dean Martin, you name it; if they were an A-lister, they played the Concord’s famed, always packed Imperial Room on a Saturday night. And if you were successful at whatever you did in life, a week vacation at the Concord in the summer made you feel like a starlet. Stately and elegant, it was downright continental. And romantic…at any age.

But there was a second draw, of deservedly equal billing. The Monster Golf Club, a Joe Finger design, opened in 1963 as the second hardest golf course in America – a bloated 7,700 yards back the blue tees, 6,967 from the regulation/whites, and a whopping 6,000+ for ladies.

That’s it, kiddies. Back then we weren’t so soft so as to need seven sets of  tees.

It also boasted a ridiculous 76.9 course rating from the tips, and over 73 from the whites. There was water on 14 of the 18 holes, often requiring a long forced carry either off the tee, to the green, or both. The rough was deep and lush. Bunkers were oceanic and greens were gargantuan. The fourth hole alone was a Brobdingnagian 630 yards from the tips, 593 from the whites, with a center-line water hazard …back in 1963! Every par-4 except the 10th was over 400 yards, with most clocking in at 430-ish, water shimmering often from tee to green on one side or the other.

Of course, golfers of all stripes came from across the country to get their heads handed to them on platters by this unconquerable beast. To a man, they returned with just wild stories of bloodbath they endured.

But as the disco era faded, so did the fortunes of the Borscht Belt resorts. The Concord tried pro tennis, billiards, and boxing, but those fleeting successes were merely band-aids on more grave economic maladies. For close on two decades, the golf course limped on as everything around it shut down – the hotel, the second course (for overflow and , called “The International”), and the remaining attractions.

So the big question for decades for the golf world’s “The Monster” has been “When the hell is it gonna reopen?” After all, it’s been about 20 years that rumors have swirled, mostly with Rees Jones’s name as the lead designer. That sounded like a pretty smart move, if they could ever get everyone on the same page. After all, Rees is New York City’s favorite son of a golf architect. It was his vision that not only rescued mighty Bethpage Black from the sandy, stony waste of a golf course it was in the latter half of the 20th century, but he was a primary reason it catapulted to major championship glory. Rees may not design the toughest golf courses, nor the most interesting strategically, however he absolutely belongs in the Pantheon of New York Sports Immortals for turning Bethpage Black into Winged Foot for the Masses. Moreover, he’s designed close to 300 courses on every continent on the planet except…DUH!…Antarctica. And like his father before him, he’s renovated dozens of major championship venues.

Now we can’t leave out Bryce Swanson from the dramatis personae. As Rees’s long time second, (24 years!), Bryce has been invaluable at injecting Golden Age strategies into Rees’s work. The Iowa State grad also spent time with Hake Irwin Design. Irwin, you’ll recall won three different U.S. Opens in three different decades. A former football linebacker in college, Irwin won one U.S. Open in giant nerd eyeglasses and another with braces on his teeth.

So you have a winning combination in theory:  former 2nd toughest course in America-turned-white elephant gets spit-shine from quintessential American golf architect. But now the question is “What direction should we go for the design? Restore? Renovate? Complete Redesign? What kind of Monster would be reborn?

So let’s begin with what sort of monster the Monster was, using Godzilla movies as our metaphor.

GODZILLA – The Big Guy is what’s called “Chaotic Good” in the nerdgasm jargon. Godzilla, protector of balance (like Mothra), is a good guy, but he causes a lot of indiscriminate collateral damage. Kinda like the old Monster course did to your score card, but I digress.

KING GHIDORAH – Chaotic Evil – Ghidorah is the uber-villain. He’s Jason Voorhees. Kill everything and anything in a quest for domination over all. Pure evil and destruction for the sheer fun of it.

RODAN – Lawful Evil – If left to his own devices, Rodan would be a true villain, but he also knows his place and keeps it. Most of the time, he does what he has too. The rest of the time, he does what he wants. But he doesn’t push it either.

MOTHRA – Lawful Good – she’s the Protector, the Mother Goddess. Just don’t piss off her little friends that live in that sea shell or they’ll sic her on YOU.

So the old Monster – Concord Golf Club – was King Ghidorah. Blood and guts everywhere, at any time, for any reason. Balls in the water, balls in the woods, hacking out of the rough, try not to 4-putt those oceanic greens. But how about this new Monster…

It’s a little more Mothra, a little less King Ghidorah.

Short story long, there are three key differences. First, they dialed down the water. For example, the “new” 12th hole is really the old 12th hole with the green moved 50 yards closer so it’s a shorter carry over the lake to the green. Second, in a land swap, Rees and team lost the land that comprised holes 2-7 of the old Monster. However, by way of compensation, he gained a portion of the land of the former International course.  These now holes are, by and large, shorter, wider and feature less penal bunkering.

However, the new Monster is still a Kaiju, but for a different reason:  the thick fescue rough is ubiquitous. Perhaps too much so in some places. Lost balls in the rough are annoying, and any ball in the thick fescue is unplayable at best, but just as likely lost.

Still, much of the old course still remains, especially the playing corridors. It’s still a fun romp and a banner day for any golfer.