Badger Beauty

Wisconsin's Erin Hills isn't two years old, but it's already on a fast track to be a U.S. Open venue

Erosion bunkers guard a natural punchbowl green at Erin Hills' 414-yard par-4 11th.

By Gary D'Amato
Photos By Stephen Szurlej March 28, 2008

Bob Lang has a favorite saying, one that could have been printed in fancy script on one of the greeting cards or calendars he once sold: "Golf is a journey." He concludes e-mails with the phrase and slips it into conversation, and it might sound corny if Lang wasn't so sincere about his abiding respect for a game he rarely plays.

But no one, especially Lang, could have foreseen the journey he would take when he set out to build a little nine-hole course for friends and family to enjoy on lazy summer evenings in Wisconsin.

The course he wound up with is not exactly a pitch-and-putt.

Erin Hills GC, a public layout carved into glacial dunes in the scenic Kettle Moraine about 35 miles northwest of Milwaukee, is so highly regarded by the USGA it was awarded two national championships before it was two years old and is considered a front-runner for a future U.S. Open.

When the USGA announced recently that Chambers Bay, a municipal course in suburban Tacoma, Wash., had been selected to host to the 2010 U.S. Amateur and 2015 Open, almost lost in the announcement was that Erin Hills also had been awarded the 2011 Amateur.

It was big news in Wisconsin, for several reasons: 1. The state has never hosted a U.S. Amateur; 2. The announcement further enhanced the Badger State's growing reputation as a major player in the world of championship golf; 3. The U.S. Amateur seemingly paves the way for a future U.S. Open at Erin Hills. "It's a place we're looking very seriously at [for] a U.S. Open," says Mike Davis, the USGA's senior director of rules and competitions. "If there wasn't some genuine interest and we weren't seriously looking at it [as an U.S. Open venue], I'm not really sure a U.S. Amateur would be played there. ? We're incredibly intrigued."

Lang, a humble, self-made millionaire who sold his greeting card/calendar business in 2003 but still owns a construction company and a boutique hotel in nearby Delafield, can only shake his head in wonderment over his incredible good fortune. "It's surreal," he says. "I'm not a guy who was well-connected in the world of golf. I do not even consider myself a golfer. My enjoyment comes from respecting the game for its traditions. My enjoyment comes from being able to walk down the fairway and watch the sun set and the shadows spread over the course. It's an escape, a place to get away from all the challenges of life."

When Lang first saw the heaving land that would become Erin Hills in 1999, he had no idea he was looking at a site that has been called one of the great natural settings for golf in the U.S. Bulldozed by glaciers during the Ice Age and largely untouched by man since, the 600-plus-acre tract he bought -- so rugged most of it was unsuitable for farming -- was an architect's dream.

"It's one of the great natural sites anybody has ever had to work with," says course architect Dana Fry, who designed Erin Hills along with design partner Mike Hurdzan and Golf Digest/Golf World architecture editor Ron Whitten.

"I've been doing this since 1983," Fry says. "I've been everywhere. There are not many sites this natural for golf."

Says Davis, "I can't remember when I've seen land like this in the Midwest. It just doesn't exist."