Mike,
To avoid upsetting others, its good that you labeled your comments as speculation or wonder.
I think you have mixed up May 19th and March 19th in your post.
And, while I didn't have waffles for breakfast, and did not stay at a Holiday Inn last night, to prove my open mindedness, I will say that I can see that TMac may be completely right. To be honest, if we put ourselves in the mindset of taking the opening day articles that WC laid out the course as gospel, I have no problem following out the DM/TMac logic to its conclusion.
On that March day they had the annual meeting in Boston, perhaps they did realize Campbell was coming within a month, and thought it likely they would hire him to lay out the golf course, as would Brookline, but knew much prepratory work needed to be done before that.
As such, perhaps the "footing the property" was only to figure out a general area that wouldn't upset the horsey set, as that was apparently a big issue. Thus, they started talking to Hopkins about whether he would lease his land, and that was decided by the May 19 article, as was the decision to import some more sheep. Perhaps sod suitable for greens was located and even trimmed down by existing sheep in preparing for cut based on Appleton's experience.
All would fall under the literal words in the report that they took actions in "preparation for golf" without actually having the course designed itself. In the Merion threads, the record shows that they waited until March for CBM to come out, which seemed very delayed for construction starting right about the same time, albeit, history shows they also did some prep work in routing, agronomy and the like before having CBM approve it. In my opinion, the record also shows that they selected the land pre-routing, although they had and used the right to tweak it. This process at Myopia could have been similar and as time consuming as what has been proven at Merion, a club with a similar amateur sportsman mindset.
When WC got here about April 1, and after a month to settle in, they brought him up for a day to lay out "18 stakes in an afternoon". While they may have taken stabs at routing, they did nothing until he approved it or had a chance to see the property. Maybe he laid out Appleton's course in early april, and came back to Myopia in May. He may have also designed the greens. One was said to be far too narrow, but hey, perhaps they told him to design them anyway he wanted, as long as he didn't exceed the 10,000 SF of sod that they had put aside based on the Appleton experience, and Willie decided to get jiggy with one green making it long and narrow.
Because of their earlier preparations, it may have been easier to get the course in rough shape for a June 18 opening tournament. Things do take time, but we also know they considered this an improvised course.
All of the above timeline is only loosely supported with facts, but it does seem plausible. Like you, I do have questions that could torpedo that time line. I also wonder why, if WC was planned to lay out the course in March, why the club, which supplied the info to the reporter, wouldn't have said "to be laid out by WC on land fully visible from the clubhouse". But, we don't know that for a fact, either. Perhaps they mentioned it and the reporter didn't understand the importance of the statement.
I also wonder how it was that WC was dismissed later in favor of club memeber Leeds. Logic says that either WC wasn't considered the designer, of if he was, when the real course got built, they decided he wasn't as good a fit as Leeds, perhaps because of that same amateur sportsman outlook. But, maybe the early guys didn't have that stern, Leeds outlook, and had no reservations about using Willie until Leeds came along and convinced them otherwise later in 1894. Nothing known necessarily precludes them from using Willie up front, or suggest that his work was inferior. It may also be a result purely of Leeds desire to design courses, and/or the club's respect for Leeds, or his attitude towards pros, which caused them to never mention Willie's original work again. Or maybe, once the final course was in play, as a result of Leeds, their mindset was that the actual creation of that improvised course simply wasn't important any more since it was bulldozed a year later (horse dozed?).
Thus, TMac is right that WC didn't get the proper notch in the bed post that he properly deserves by todays attribution standards.
It is all fascinating to me, but you know me, I just look at this stuff as a parlor game anyway! Like a good debater, I could probably take one side in the morning, and the other in the afternoon.