Country Club of Detroit - Michigan - USA

Founded in 1897, the Country Club of Detroit had a course in play soon after its formation, thanks to the efforts of Bert Way, an English professional golfer – and former apprentice to Willie Dunn at Westward Ho! – who had emigrated to America the previous year to take up an appointment at Shinnecock Hills.

Harry Colt was commissioned to redesign the layout in 1912 and his partner Hugh Alison would return during his nine-year American stay to make further improvements in the late 1920s. Robert Trent Jones Sr. carried out a renovation in the early 1950s and Keith Foster rebuilt the bunkers in 2005 before Tom Doak’s Renaissance Golf Design firm rebuilt all the greens in 2012, returning the course to its Colt/Alison roots.

The club has hosted the US Amateur twice. The first time was in 1915, with Robert A. Gardner winning for the second time, and the other occasion was in 1954, when Arnold Palmer claimed the Havemeyer Trophy after a narrow one-hole victory in the final. The course is also often used for an annual pro-am event called the Turning Point Invitational which raises money for Detroit schools.

Tom Doak commented as follows in his January 2020 newsletter:

“When Brian Slawnik did our greens renovation here a few years back, we worked around the existing bunker scheme, but the club finally decided they didn’t need every green surrounded by bunkers, and asked us to take a few more out!”