Chicago Golf Club

Wheaton, IL Private

Overview

Chicago Golf Club opened the country’s first 18-hole course in 1893, built by C.B. Macdonald, the preeminent golf expert in the U.S. at the time. Two years later Macdonald built the club a different course after the membership moved to a new location in Wheaton, Ill.: “a really first-class 18-hole course of 6,200 yards,” he wrote. Members played that course until 1923 when Seth Raynor, who began his architectural career as Macdonald’s surveyor and engineer, redesigned it using the “ideal hole” concepts his old boss had developed 15 years earlier (he kept Macdonald’s routing, which placed all the O.B. on the left—C.B. sliced the ball). For reasons of history and practicality, no major remodels have occurred since then, allowing the club to merely burnish the architecture by occasionally upgrading worn parts, adjusting grassing lines and, recently, reestablishing a number of lost bunkers that had been filled in over time.

About

Holes 18
Length 6877
Slope 135
Facility Type Private
Year Opened 1894
Designer C.B. Macdonald/Seth Raynor

Awards

100 Greatest
Best Courses in Every State

Ranking history:

100 Greatest: Ranked since 1971. (The course was also included on Golf Digest's original 200 Toughest Courses list from 1966-'68.)
2023-'24 ranking (and previous): 13th.
Highest ranking: No. 12, 2009-'10.

Best in State: Ranked first since 2011. Ranked inside the top 5 since 1983.
2023-'24 ranking (and previous): 1st.

Panelists

Ratings from our panel of 1,900 course-ranking panelists

4.8

100 GREATEST/BEST IN STATE SCORES

Shot Options
8.1951
Character
8.568
Challenge
7.9347
Layout Variety
8.2182
Fun
8.0234
Aesthetics
7.9987
Conditioning
8.2899

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