America’s 25 Most Historic Golf Courses Revealed
For many, golf is not just how well you play but where you’ve played. Talk to any avid golfer, and they’ll ask about the courses you’ve teed off at. There is certainly no shortage of excellent golf courses across the United States, but these courses steeped in the game’s history deserve a place on bucket lists.
You don’t need to make the record books at these historic golf courses; instead, just enjoy a golf getaway at one of these courses designed by some of the most legendary architects of the game.
How Was This List Made?
Historic Hotels of America, the official program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation for promoting and celebrating authentic historic hotels, curated this list. It features some of the most beautiful, prestigious, and iconic American golf courses that attract leisure and avid players. Many of these greens were designed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, often called the “Golden Age” of golf course architecture.
Land Sculpted by Golf Gods
Legendary golf course architects such as Donald Ross and Pete Dye designed and renovated these greens. In addition, each course has earned a reputation partly based on the many famous people who have played on their greens: U.S. Presidents, world leaders, golf champions, actors, celebrities, and other distinguished guests.
The Omni Homestead Resort (1766) Hot Springs, Virginia
Want to smash one at the first tee in continuous use in the United States? The Omni Homestead Resort in Hot Springs, Virginia can give you those bragging rights. But that’s not all.
The Old Course is long associated with U.S. presidents. William McKinley was the first U.S. President to play golf while in office, and he did so on the Old Course in 1899. Today, the presidential favorite is open to guests and members. Celebrating 100 years in 2023, The Cascades course offers challenging links against Virginia’s breathtaking Allegheny Mountains. Designed by legendary course architect William S. Flynn in 1923, its varied terrain influences play rather than dictate it.
Woodstock Inn & Resort (1793) Woodstock, Vermont
Golf here dates back to 1895 when a distinguished guest lamented to the general manager about the lack of a golf course, as he had brought his clubs from Boston. The inn obliged, and the first course was built that year: the resort’s currently in-use golf course, the oldest public course in Vermont, dates to 1906.
In the early 1960s, the course was redesigned by notable golf course architect Robert Trent Jones Sr., under the direction of the inn’s new owner, Laurence S. Rockefeller. Today, surrounded by the lush Kedron Valley and featuring stunning views of Mount Peg, the Woodstock, Vermont golf course is a picturesque venue set amidst an unspoiled landscape. The 18-hole course boasts a par-70 layout that offers an unforgettable experience for golfers of all abilities.
Omni Bedford Springs Resort (1806) Bedford, Pennsylvania
The Omni Bedford Springs Resort was established in 1806 and was an early adopter of golf in the United States. The resort is home to one of the nation’s first golf courses, with 18 holes—considered very large for a golf course at that time.
Overlooking breathtaking views of the Allegheny Mountains and Cumberland Valley, this remarkable course spans the work of three golf architectural masters. Preserved and updated, this remarkable palimpsest course can be enjoyed today by players eager to experience the game as it was designed by leading architects of the game’s Golden Age.
French Lick Springs Hotel (1845) French Lick Springs, Indiana and West Baden Springs Hotel (1902) West Baden, Indiana
Golf and history enthusiasts are in for a treat at French Lick Resort in French Lick, Indiana, which boasts three courses designed by three greats of 20th-century golf course design. Notably, the resort’s most historic one is The Donald Ross Course, designed by the icon himself, who is considered one of the greatest and most influential course architects of the game’s Golden Age.
Grand Hotel Golf Resort & Spa, Autograph Collection (1847) Point Clear, Alabama
Golf course architect Perry Maxwell designed an 18-hole championship golf course for the Grand Hotel Golf Resort & Spa in Point Clear, Alabama, in 1947. After World War II, a long-awaited retreat to the Mobile Bay resort offered weary Americans a chance to play Maxwell’s brand-new 7,104 yards of oak-lined links. It was a grand success.
Today, there are two 18-hole golf courses at the resort’s Lakewood Club: The Dogwood Course and the Azalea Course. Since 1947, the Lakewood Club has hosted former President Gerald Ford, European royalty, movie stars, and sports legends, along with legions of local and visiting golfers.
Mohonk Mountain House (1869) New Paltz, New York
Ninety miles north of New York City is a Victorian castle overlooking a lake inside 40,000 acres of protected forest. Beloved by families, couples, groups, and centuries of distinguished visitors, Mohonk Mountain House transports guests to a nature-filled oasis that feels worlds away—no wonder the Nature Conservancy called it one of Earth’s Last Great Places.
One of America’s first all-inclusive resorts was founded in 1869. The resort’s founder, Albert Smiley, laid out a nine-hole golf course (the Rest Course)in 1897 on an apple orchard. Scotsman Robert Pryde added Scottish golf course genius to the greens when he lengthened the course to 2,350 yards in 1911.
This Golf Is Included in the Nighly Rate
In 1925, the course doubled to 18 holes when a second nine-hole course (the Hillside Course) was added. Today, the Mohonk Golf Course features undulating fairways and protects itself with blind tee shots and uneven lies. Its 19th-century design challenges today’s players, making it a shot-makers’ paradise and one of the best nine-hole golf courses in New York.
The Sagamore Resort (1883) Bolton Landing, New York
The championship Sagamore Golf Course at The Sagamore Resort in Bolton Landing, New York, features lush, narrow fairways lined with hardwoodand deep bunkers surrounding undulating greens. The Sagamore Resort was established in 1883, and “Golden Age” architect Donald Ross designed a golf course adjacent to it in 1928. Thanks to Ross’s careful design, the course uses the natural environment to give each hole its challenge and beauty.
Its beloved, beautiful 18-hole, par-70 greens still astound. Contemporary players should look up when they reach the first hole, as Ross designed it with the view in mind. While the resort hotel is on an exclusive island on Lake George, the golf course is located directly across the water on the mainland. This location gives guests access to a championship course with stunning views of Lake George and the Adirondack mountains.
Jekyll Island Club Resort (1886) Jekyll Island, Georgia
The Jekyll Island Club Resort on Jekyll Island, Georgia, began as an exclusive Gilded Age private retreat for America’s wealthiest families in 1886. Today, the resort community is open to all and welcomes golfers to play on its four grassy, windswept courses.
The most historic golf course still in play on the island is the nine-hole, par-36 Great Dunes Course designed by Walter “Old Man” Travis in 1926. Travis created the best course money could buy. Will you give it a try?
Basin Harbor (1886) Vergennes, Vermont
The historic Basin Harbor golf course was created at the Basin Harbor resort in Vergennes, Vermont, in 1927, 40 years after its founding. Designed by Alex ‘Nipper’ Campbell, a Scottish player most famous for his five top-10 finishes in the United States Open in the early 20th century, the course is the only lakeside course in the Green Mountain State.
Its greens were redesigned twice after Campbell built the first nine holes: first by golf course architect William Mitchell in 1955, who expanded the course to 18 holes, and then again by world-renowned architect Geoffrey Cornish in the 1980s. Today, it retains a few of its original Campbell holes, and Basin Harbor’s 18-hole championship course is a delight for any golfer with its rolling terrain, well-placed bunkers, beautiful trees, and contoured fairways.
Grand Hotel (1887) Mackinac Island, Michigan
The Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island, Michigan, provides guests of “America’s Summer Place” with a stunning 18-hole golf course.
The Jewel, comprised of the Grand Nine and the Woods Nine, is the only course in the country with horse-drawn carriage rides between nines. The Grand Nine, located across from the hotel with views of the Straits of Mackinac, was designed in 1901 by golf links artist Tom Bendelow and then redesigned during Grand Hotel’s centennial in 1987 by golf course architect Jerry Matthews. In 1994, Matthews enlarged the golf course with the Woods Nine, located in the interior of Mackinac Island, with views of the Mackinac Bridge and the Upper Peninsula.
Pinehurst Resort (1895) Pinehurst, North Carolina
From humble beginnings as a pasture to one of the premier golf courses in the country, Pinehurst Resort is steeped in the sport’s history and tradition. Historians and golfers today celebrate Pinehurst Resort for its role in popularizing golf and providing blueprints for what a golf course should look like.
Ross went on to design four of Pinehurst Resort’s nine championship golf courses in play today, including its most famous course, Pinehurst No. 2, which was constructed in 1907. Pinehurst No. 2 has served as the site for more championship tournaments than any other golf course in the United States.
Omni Mount Washington (1902) Bretton Woods, New Hampshire
History can be found everywhere in the hotel and on the golf courses at Omni Mount Washington in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. The resort has offered luxury accommodation and golf adventures in the hills west of the magnificent Presidential Mountain Range for over 100 years.
The Mount Pleasant Course has nine holes—par 35 and just over 3,000 yards of green—played by guests and champions alike. In 1989, Cornish & Silva Golf Course Architects updated the course with advice from world-renowned golfers Gene Sarazen and Ken Venturi. The second historic course at Bretton Woods is the Mount Washington Course: an 18-hole, par 72, 7,004-yard coursedesigned by legendary golf course architect Donald Ross.
The Otesaga Resort Hotel (1909) Cooperstown, New York
Considered one of the region’s most scenic and challenging golf courses, the historic Leatherstocking Golf Course at The Otesaga Resort Hotel in Cooperstown, New York, sweeps along the southern shore of Lake Otsego. Designed by golf course architect Devereux Emmet, the Leatherstocking Course opened in 1909 and retains Emmet’s original design.
Among many standout features are two great finishing holes: hole 17 par 3, playing up to 195 yards over water, and hole 18 par 5, with an island tee and the fairway along the lake. What began as a nine-hole course was transformed in 1919 by legendary golf architect Devereux Emmet, who expanded the course to 18 holes across 90 acres. This classic, Northeast-style course has changed little since then, though the late 1990s brought some upgrades including expanded tee boxes, a state-of-the-art drainage system, restructured cart paths, and reshaped bunkers.
Omni Grove Park Inn (1913) Asheville, North Carolina
The historic Grove Park Golf Course at Omni Grove Park Inn in Asheville, North Carolina, has been described as the only rival to Pinehurst No. 2 in a ranking of the state’s Donald Ross courses.
The 18-hole, par 70, 6,400-yard course clears a bright green path through the rolling hills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Elevated points give players spectacular views of the mountains and the magnificent Arts and Crafts-style historic hotel. The Grove Park course was updated in 2001 and retains master designer Donald Ross’s vision.
The Broadmoor (1918) Colorado Springs, Colorado
The luxe Broadmoor opened in 1918, and golf was part of its glamour from the beginning. Known as the “Grand Dame of the Rockies,” it offers two historic and magnificent golf courses nestled in the Rocky Mountains:
The East Course and the West Course, designed by Donald Ross and Robert Trent Jones Sr., are Located in Colorado Springs, Colorado; golfers enjoy challenging terrain and amazing mountain vistas while surrounded by red rocks and white peaks in the Pike’s Peak region.
The American Club (1918) Kohler, Wisconsin
The American Club is a AAA Five Diamond destination with both classic luxury and history. Guests are invited to experience championship golf on any of the four Pete Dye-designed courses, rated among the world’s greatest. Suggestion slips from guests inspired the idea for developing the Blackwolf Run golf course upon opening The American Club resort hotel in 1981, which essentially stated, “Please build your own golf course.”
At Blackwolf Run, the original 18 holes featured two nine-hole layouts, River and Valleys. Each hole on both courses at Blackwolf Run is bestowed a name that reflects the natural features of the glacier carved land. Whistling Straits, added in 1998 is a wild, windswept coastal links-style course sculpted along the grass-topped dunes along the Wisconsin coastline.
Ojai Valley Inn (1923) Ojai, California
The Ojai Valley Inn, in Ojai, California, provides guests with the opportunity to play golf on a historic, award-winning, 18-hole par-70 championship golf course . Glass industrialist Edward Drummond Libbey began constructing a country club and an 18-hole golf course near the resort in 1923, the year the inn opened.
The golf course was part of Libbey’s decades-long effort to improve the appearance of the town of Ojai as a prominent resort community. Libbey supposedly gave landscape architect George C. Thomas free reign to design the course in whatever way he liked, instructing the engineer to, “Go ahead and build me the finest course that can be built . . . and use whatever land you wish. Give me the best. Money will be no object.”
Upon its completion, the press described the fairways as some of the most beautiful in the state. The Los Angeles Times reported that the golf course’s geography was, “designed to look as if it had been there forever.”
The Inn at Death Valley (1927) Death Valley, California
Golf can be described as diabolical. So why not experience a round at the lowest-altitude golf course in the world during a stay at The Inn at Death Valley?
Located 214 feet below sea level within the vast desert of Death Valley National Park, the resort’s Furnace Creek Golf Course features palm and tamarisk trees framing the fairways. The high peaks of the Sierra Nevada range are visible from all areas of this 18-hole, par 70 course. In 1968, noted designer William F. Bell expanded the course to a full 18 holes, and Perry Dye reworked the course in 1997 to allow the course to remain open all year.
The Wigwam (1929) Litchfield Park, Arizona
Travelers to The Wigwam in Litchfield, Arizona, are invited to step onto its historic emerald fairways and experience a golf resort built for golfers. This Litchfield tradition began in 1930 when Scottish gardener Jacques Phillip designed and dug the resort’s original nine holes. The resort had opened a year earlier and was first operated by the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, which had created the complex as a vacation destination for its high-ranking executives.
The original course design was lost in the 20th century when three new courses emerged in the 1960s and 1972: the Blue and Gold courses designed by Robert Trent Jones Sr. and the Red Course designed by Robert “Red” Lawrence. The Wigwam’s notable Gold Course opened for play in 1965. The first foursome to play the original design in the early 1940s included professional golfers Jimmy Thomson, Horton Smith, Lawson Little, and Vernon Oren Allen.
The Hotel Hershey (1933) Hershey, Pennsylvania
Looking for a sweet game? Guests at The Hotel Hershey in Hershey, Pennsylvania, enjoy access to the nearby West Course, a golf course built with support from chocolate magnate and philanthropist Milton S. Hershey in 1930 for the brand-new Hershey Country Club. Golf course architect Maurice McCarthy designed this par 73 course.
Since its founding, numerous national tournaments have been held at the Hershey Country Club. Individuals, including players Arnold Palmer and Jan Stevenson and former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, have walked its greens.
Alisal Ranch (1946) Solvang, California
Guests at the Alisal Ranch, founded in 1946 in Solvang, California, can enjoy playing the resort’s historic mid-century par 72, 18-hole championship golf course: The Ranch Course. The ancient oaks, manicured fairways and greens, and spectacular panoramic views of the Santa Ynez River and nearby Santa Ynez Mountains make the course a favorite among golf enthusiasts.
The Ranch Course is played along the Alisal Creek in the foothills of the Santa Ynez Mountains, and players looking for a scenic round of golf should not miss its featured hole 5: It offers spectacular views of the city of Solvang and the Santa Ynez River. The resort’s second golf course, the River Course, opened in 1992 and it is open to the public.
Rancho Bernardo Inn (1963) San Diego, California
The Rancho Bernardo Inn in San Diego, California, opened its doors to guests in 1963. Within a year, the retreat offered travelers a chance to experience a championship golf course on 6,631 yards of rolling green hills.
These greens were designed in 1964 by William F. Bell Jr., son of golf course architect William Park Bell. Bell and his father are well known for their work creating award-winning championship golf courses across the West Coast and Southwest, especially in California, Arizona, and Nevada.
Mauna Kea Beach Hotel (1965) Hawaii Island, Hawaii
The award-winning championship Mauna Kea Golf Course at the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel on the Big Island has led the way in golf course beauty and design in Hawaii since its debut in December 1964. In a made-for-television event, the course was debuted by golf’s “Big Three,” Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, and Gary Player. Since that premiere, the course has welcomed celebrities, professionals, and amateur golfers who recognize it as a “bucket list,” must-play course.
Golf course architect Robert Trent Jones, Sr. designed the course and developed a new technique that transformed the rocky surface into soil, making it the first course built on ancient lava flow. The course’s 99 bunkers and undulating greens present a challenge for the most seasoned golfers and a memorable day of play for leisurely golfers. Its signature over-the-ocean hole 3, par 3, is among the world’s most daunting, photographed, and awarded par 3 holes. It is a stunning, over-the-ocean tee shot of 272 yards from the championship box to the green.
Omni La Costa Resort (1965) Carlsbad, California
Omni La Costa Resort in Carlsbad, California, maintains 36 holes of golf across two green championship courses: the links-style Champions Course and the parkland-style Legends Course. When La Costa opened in 1965, its Champions Course was an immediate star attraction. The resort’s planners had invited architect Dick Wilson to design a 72-par, 7,200-yard golf course over 215 acres.
The greatest professional golfers of their day would eventually grace the links, too, including Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino, Phil Mickelson, and Tiger Woods. The upper crust of Hollywood’s elite were drawn to the Legends Course as well. Stars like crooners Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, and entertainer Bob Hope all regularly visited the golf course throughout the 1970s.
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Golf. A sport as old as time. According to History.com, its rules were first recorded in 1744, but people had been playing for centuries. Many of these iconic, historical courses were built or became part of hotels as time passed.
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