In praise of rural golf

[T_MacWood]

Watching Ben Curtis win the Open got me thinking about the phenomenon of the homemade golf course. Curtis learned and perfected his game on one of these courses that you'll find all over rural central Ohio—Mill Creek. I’ve played the course five or six times and always enjoyed it. I’m not sure if these courses are unique to our part of the world—probably not—but there are good number of them around here.

They are usually built on rolling farmland. Other common characteristics are small greens--normally reflecting the slopes and undulations of the ground they rest upon; relative short yardage; few man-made hazard--relying on the slope of the ground and natural hazards like streams, ponds, trees and pronounced contours; firm conditions and often times a little quirky. It is not surprising Curtis’ game developed as it has and that he would find success on the links.

In contrast this weekend I played two new fairly high profile public courses. Although solid courses with several imaginative holes—the totality was no better than the simple rural courses. They were obviously far more expensive and sadly nearly unwalkable—I’m not a fan of strolling through a residential neighborhood on the way to the next tee.

Looking back at Mill Creek also got me thinking of the homemade rural golf course Pete Dye grew up on, the 9-holer in Urbana his old man built. His best design (IMO) The Golf Club shares many similarities with these farmland courses. It is simply a higher expression—but still low profile, smallish lay-of-the-land greens, utilizing natural features and very walkable.

I suspect these homemade courses are not unlike the basic early courses built by men like Flynn, Thomas, Ross,  Macdonald and others. Based on the success of these old fellows and the success of Mr. Pete Dye, doesn’t it make sense that our next great golf architects are as likely to come from the farms of Ohio than the halls of Hariot Watt—in fact more likely?

[George Pazin]

We have plenty of these course in western PA.

One that I play frequently is just north of the Burgh called Rittswood. No bunkers, generally burned out conditions over the summer, minimal water in play (just a couple irrigation ponds), no one will ever confuse it with anything on any magazine's "best of" lists. But it's still a fun place to play and the firm conditions & unusual stances provide some challenge.

I think these courses are also very good for novice golfers, since they generally don't have lush thick rough or tons of opportunities to lose balls.

Tom, have you ever played Clearview in Canton?

[T_MacWood]

George
I haven't played Clearview...is that the course designed by a black golf architect?

[RJ_Daley]

Tom, we have a number of them in Wisconsin.  They tend to be lay of the land as you point out, and the bunkering tends to be simple ovals and troughs and not too deep.  Most of them don't exceed 6200-6400 from the tips.  There is one in particular here in Green Bay, that is quirky and has real potential with the right maintenance meld.  There are some very enjoyable and creative golf shots to be made and rolling challanging greens with better bunkers and placement than most one trick pony home made courses.  But, because it is cheap and over run with entry level golfers, and it opens anytime you can see turf  , it is usually badly beat-up.  It is an interesting phenomenon how individuals come along and design and sometimes supervise a local constructor to build a course of their own dreams and sometimes get alot of golf ideas right.

[Jason Hines]

Hi Tom,

Of course here in Nebraska, the majority of the courses are going to be rural and fall into your category.  Milford is one, just off of I-80 in west of Lincoln that has some tricky spots in it, but for a small town it has a tremendous amount of character.  Plus, most of these local communities take pride in there courses and you can tell by their condition.  

My favorite 9 holer in the state is the Fairbury Country Club down on the Kansas border.  http://www.saraspace.com/fcc/ They do a tremendous job on the course layout of their website, with some quite good photos.  The course is hilly and a bit of a walk, but that is the terrain in that part of the state.  

The course simply oozes character, especially when you consider it was founded and built in 1919. It posses interesting mounding, bunkers, sloped but fair greens and there is still plenty of challenge there even though it is only about 6300 yards from the tips.  I agree Tom, these places do not compare to a lot of places mentioned on this board, but there is something about these rural courses that is true and honest when you walk off the last hole.

Jason

[Mike_Young]

Out of 16000 course in this country about 12000 fit the mold of rural and play to the same characteristics.  Goes to show golf is a mom and pop operation.  Most of us will never hear of these places just like we don't know the local restaurants or pubs.  Probably the best way to be.  It also makes you wonder how good a course might be if they have to advertise to attract play.  The market will take it back to these.
Mike

[noonan]

Tom,

Is the 9 holer in Urbana part of the Woodland GC?

Woodland has some very unique holes and is a pleasure to play.

JK

[T_MacWood]

No, I believe Woodlands is a Jack Kidwell golf course. Although a professional golf designer Kidwell courses are very similar to these simple rural designs--probably because that was his background, that's how he got started. He designed a ton of simple, but solid golf courses all over the state. The first golf course I ever played was a course he designed called Bash (NLE), the 18th was a drop shot par-3 with a tree growing out of the middle of the green. Some times the tree was your friend, other times your enemy.

Urbana CC is the Paul Dye course, it has a second nine built by Pete's son PB.

[Scott_Burroughs]

As the crow flies, I live about 300-400 yards from the 18th tee of one of these.  Was a former dairy farm, until too many regulations made it too dificult to get by forced them to shut down operations.  The golf course was already in it's infancy, after taking two years to clear the rocks by hand (never dug it up with earthmovers to put down good soil/sand/etc.), it opened about 6 years ago.  I played that first spring, and I still have a nick in my 6-iron from hitting a rock buried underneath my ball!

Had no bunkers until recently when a few have been put in (actually a nicely placed crossbunker on a good straightaway reachable par 5 with blind approach.  Bunker looks nice and rustic, too!).  Man made pond on #9.  Some quirky holes, yes.  Wide open except for about 4 holes through some trees, of course there are several hundred saplings all over the wide open parts to have future tree-lined holes    (reminds me of my home course growing up in western NY).  Course is short, although new back tees have lenghtened it some.

The other thing wrong with it is something I lamented in the walking/carts thread: coupons.  The coupons and specials they advertise in the paper are for cartball rounds only on an extremely walkable course.  When the course opened, probably 80% of all rounds were walked.  With all the cartball specials, now 80% or more ride.  The place gets plenty of business, as it's dirt cheap to play and it fills a niche, making the more upscale places less crowded (and also less financially stable).

The course itself occupies maybe 35% of the total farmland available, and the topography and former fields look like a terrific place for a wide-open, top of the line course.

[George Pazin]

Tom -

Clearview is that course. I read the gentleman's biography - it's a short quick read & a pretty inspiring one at that.

The course itself looks pretty basic - no bunkers, relatively short holes. The challenge is said to be in the highly contoured greens.

One of these days I'm going to go check it out.