Most exclusive clubs in the world?

[Mark Brown]

Fishers Island,Chicago, Peachtree

[Mike_Sweeney]

On opposite end of the spectrum(s):

1. Nassau Players Club - A golf club without real estate - http://www.nassauplayers.org/index.htm - 100 members with certain priviledges to Bethpage. At the very least, you probably need to have served on 9/11 to get in.

2. The R&A, another golf club without real estate

3. Rye Golf Club, England - so I hear ?

[Top100Guru]

I would consider Myopia Hunt Club exclusive

[Doug Sobieski]

Imagine the places we would have to avoid if we swore off playing at clubs with more than 300 members (assuming that Klangone really said that he would quit the game if he had to stoop to such a thing). We couldn't play....

Pine Valley
Oakmont
Olympic
and many more........ Just to name a few (not to mention that these places have starting times, too).

What a shame.

Sobe

[mike_malone]

 I was watching " Treasure of Sierra Madre" the other night. Bogart's character was priceless. As he and one other guy were bringing the gold down the mountain, the other guy sugggested Bogie go first ---"no way" says Bogart's character--"you will shoot me in the back". So, the other guy says "go second then"--"no way, you will wait for me and get me."

    I had to laugh---sometimes there is just nothing you can say.

[David Panzarasa]

Since I am new here I am not sure how much my opinion counts...but I have played a ton of these nicer courses we all talk about and so many wish to play.
 I think to get into this you really need to say what is exclusive? I cant say that Fisher Island, Naples National, Metidiconk (?spelling sorry), Hamilton Farms are so exclusive. These courses are great, I have not played Hamilton Farms though, but becoming a member is not that hard if you have the funds. I mean, two of these at least advertise in magazines about membership! These extremely great courses in the world that we praise and write about, not all are exclusive by any means. And that really goes for a long list of the top private ones as well.
 If you look at some of the courses that have hardly any members, are the courses that good? Or is it just the thought of a few owners that own a course? If I bought a muni course in NJ today and did not let anyone play it at all, would that be considered a real exclusive course? I have played one of these courses that some have heard of (outside of tri-state area) and was not impressed at all.  
 And then you have some amazing courses that I am certainly not naming where we all know you can get it 9 times out of 10 if you are black, jewish, or anything that is not there ideal.  And that sadly consists of a very big number on the list of top 100.
  So, it is interesting when I am reading what is considered exlcusive and not. Just my opinion. and with that I would say Augusta and Pine Valley from what I am thinking off the top of my head are the "exclusive" courses of the world, or at least America.

[Sean_A]

Gib

Sorry to get off topic, but what is this Treehouse business?  I have seen several references, but I can find meaning.

Ciao

Sean

[THuckaby2]

Gib

Sorry to get off topic, but what is this Treehouse business?  I have seen several references, but I can find meaning.

Ciao

Sean

Sean - that's a name Gib and many others use for the group of regular posters here.  Hell I'm not 100% sure of the derivation of it myself, only it has been used for a long time.  I think it goes toward a group of nuts hanging out in a treehouse... a fairly apt description of the folks here.  

[michael j fay]

The Everglades Club in Palm Beach, Fl

[George Pazin]

Further to Huck's post, a good while ago it was customary to welcome new members to the Treehouse, once they had shown a true passion for the subject. This practice has more or less been abandoned, but it might be a good time to bring it back.

I'd welcome you to the Treehouse myself, Sean, but the practice was so long ago that I was never officially invited, so I don't know if I can.

I've always thought of the Treehouse as a gathering a friends who share a common passion - in this case, golf courses.

[Sean_A]

Tom

Cheers!  I thought it might be one of those BGSE or whatever deals.  A very good philosophy prof. once told me "Confusion eventually leads to apathy".  We don't want that now do we (spoken in the tone of a nurse)?

Ciao

Sean

[THuckaby2]

 
Love it.

And yeah, we do through acronyms and inside jokes around way too much in here, that's for sure.  That's another thing worth watching out for.  But heck, most of the time they aren't worth knowing really...  

[Robert Thompson]

So -- interesting list so far.

Defining exclusivity is interesting -- if you can get on a course with a rater's card, that might make it less exclusive. Even The Golf Club was accepting Digest raters last year.
How about having small memberships and low round counts? That seems to fit the bill to me.

Robert

[Scott Coan]

My definition of exclusive would be that if you can get on it without being a very close personal friend of a member then it just does not cut the mustard of being labelled exclusive.

[Lawrence Largent]

I would agree Seminole and Indian Creek are very exclusive. Burning Tree would be in this catagory also. Diamond Creek in Western NC is supposed to be exclusive but I really don't think a course built in the last few years can be exclusive. This deal where they just put up hundreds of thousands of dollars to be a member dosen't define exclusive to me. To me when your at a place you get a feeling about it like its a privilege to be there and that its something of a honor. I really feel like alot of guys just take it for granted that they want to play the course just to be there and tell there buddies that they played such and such course. I'm new to the forum and trying to learn the ropes. I also think its an honor and privilege to be a member of this group and take it very seriously.


Lawrence

[Scott Coan]

Lawrence,

Good point on the money part - having some dosh should in no way define exclusivity.  Just as it in no way reflects on the amount of class a person may have.  Exclusive clubs are by invitation only and I would think there are very, very few of them.  Just think of the Clubs "the Donald" would like to join...

[john_stiles]

Maybe not the most, but certainly exclusive because of location, is  Molten Mills  near  Yellow Knife, Northwest Territory.   It is near an old silver mine and overlooks the Great Slave Lake.

A friend is a member and we went up for the fishing plus the big American day golf event, thanks to my friendly Canuck.

It was a clear August day and this big snowstorm came upon us.  I took this clubhouse picture, and we just quit golfing and went flyfishing on the lake with his big snowstorm blowing in.

It is mostly a fishing club but they do have golf for over 5 months a year.  I think they only have about  50 members.

If you travel there,  you can play with a member's introduction so I guess it isn't too exclusive when you think about it.

The course was built in 1965 with great difficulty due to the short growing season.  However,  you can play a lot of golf with the long daylight hours.



Give me a call if you ever want to play this exclusive club. I can arrange an introduction even if you are klangone or shivas or whoever.

Golf season is from June 1 (with good weather) until September 1 (if winter is late).  I can hook you up with a great bushpilot / fishing guide also.

[Ben Cowan-Dewar]

John,
You are my kind of guy! Did you play the Yellowknife golf course with cement greens and astroturf? There is great fishing further north as well, where you can pull out 30 lb Artic Char all day long. That is one of the most beautiful spots in our country, I am glad you have been able to see it.

[Dick Kirkpatrick]

BTW a midnight tee time is available at Yellowknife.
Is that exclusive?

[TEPaul]

Brad Klein:

You may be right about Morefar G.C. It's so exclusive probably most have never even heard of it!

I think the old Links G.C. in Long Island (Macdonald) was pretty exclusive. They pretty much had the membership capped at 100 during it's existence and the members seemed to play the place so infrequently the course was generally used by local policeman and fireman but not if member was around!  

And then there was Bidermann G.C. in Wilmington when it was owned by the DuPonts. When Mrs DuPont was playing, it's said she had to have the course to herself!

It'd be pretty hard to top Pocantico Hills today, I guess. You sort of have to be a Rockefeller or one of their friends to play the place. Its not a traditional course, though, as I guess you could actually look out on it's 100 or so acres and hardly tell it's a course. It basically looks like acres and acres of lawn.

[Steve Lapper]

Shivas -- Well I appreciate your contribution, what difference does it make who klangone is? There are lots of successful people on the list and these kinds of comments don't serve any purpose other than to run people off this posting board.
I think we should encourage people to post, not disparage others.
At the very least, his comments were on point, unlike your post.

Robert, I thought of that before I said what I said.  I agree that we should encourage more participation here, from all types of people, yes -- including gazillionaires.  No issue there.  What difference does it make who he is?  Probably none.  I'd probably have the same issue either way.  Why?  Because he came here, made a big stink last time over a similar exclusivity issue, then split.  Now he's back, talking about the same thing.  I just wish he wouldn't be such a one-trick pony and actually talk about the golf courses themselves, not their exclusivity, pricetag or any of the other irrelevent money-related stuff that seems to be the topic that gets his attention.  If he's got an issue with me politely alluding to the fact that I would prefer not to be condescended to by the guy who got rich selling me duct tape and extension cords, I'm easy to find.  

This is pathetic!!!

Shivas,

    Where do you get the license to "judge" the content of any poster? Did you get announced the GCA Jurist panel by Ran? Did I miss the confirmation hearings? If Klangone posts about memberships or the state of several clubs and their courses, it is his right to comment on whatever facet of the thread he chooses. Should many of the diarrhea-ridden posters here be slandered or accused of being relevant or not?If so, then let's ban their verbosity as well.

   I don't get how you or anyone else can complain about condescending treatment by another. You live in a capitalist society that has subsidized the right of all to free and unadultered speech. If this guy made his dough selling duct tape and hammers, so what? His opinion, so long as it doesn't stray far from the topic of a thread is perfectly protected. Spend more time here criticizing the folks who use GCA to substitute for a teenage IM session and those who write simply and directly to annoy and aggravate others here.

  Many people here are very quick to imply their judgement is sacrosanct and their word final. Guess what. It isn't, has never been and never will be. I, for one, think Klangone is guilty of nothing other than trying to participate in discussions suggested by others. If his experiences at some of the rarer clubs were not allowed GCA as a venue, then wouldn't we all just be a bunch of reverse snobs?

[Doug Siebert]

Anyone ever fly over somewhere and see a golf course, wonder what it is and be totally unable to find out what it was or figure out what road you'd even take to get there?  There's probably at least one that is so exclusive in that way that no one here even knows of its existence or name to cite it in this thread.  The access road is just a dirt access road that looks like a private drive to a shack in the woods, or perhaps has some sort of batcave-like mechanism to operate a hidden entrance.

How do you achieve the ultimate exclusivity?  If you were an Egyptian pharoah, you had the people who built your tomb buried with you, so they couldn't tell anyone where it was.  So I guess if Dr. Evil wanted to spend One Meeellion Dollars creating an ultra exclusive course on his private volcanic island, he'd hire an architect, require him and his crew to live on site during construction, and then they'd end up as mounding along the first fairway!  If it weren't for that, some deceased architect would have been able to tell us all about his super-exclusive Shark's Head club.

[Greg Holland]

Read Michael Veron's "The Greatest Course That Never Was".  Its a very entertaining novel about a very exclusive club that no one knew about.  It would be fun to see the routing of the course -- I believe Mr. Veron had an architect draw a routing of Bragg' Point, but I don't believe it has been published.

[Jimmy Muratt]

Greg,

I was thinking of the same book while reading this thread.  It really fits perfectly.  A hidden course that hardly anyone knows even exists.  I couldn't put the book down, it's a must read for anyone on this site.  I would read Veron's first book beforehand however, "The Greatest Player who Never Lived".

Here is a link to J Michael Veron's website with a description of the book:  http://www.jmichaelveron.com/course.asp

[Gib_Papazian]

I see my train of thought spew has been deemed unacceptable by the powers that be.

Fine.

I was not trying to make an enemy. It is just that I KNOW Shivas, and the comments directed at him by the mystery man were inexcusable, indefensible, inflammatory and most importantly, not credible.

I stand by my words, whether the cyborg in the backround finds them too far afield of architecture or not.

You will note, I do not hide behind a phony name and own my words and opinions.

Any clown who crawls out from under a rock in cyberspace and starts dissing a good friend - and fine gentleman - in the Treehouse ought to expect to get his testicles removed by those who know better.

End of rant.