The Club at Golden Valley

For most of its history, Golden Valley has been in a state of flux. Tom Bendelow designed the club’s first course before A.W. Tillinghast was hired in the 1920s to construct a new course. A number of his bunkers were removed in the 1930s to reduce maintenance costs (Tillinghast, by this time, was traveling the country on behalf of the PGA of America, advising clubs on ways to cut costs during tight economic times), and others were tinkered with and modified in one way or another. A series of mid-century renovations took the design further from the one Tillinghast put in the ground, but recent work, first by Ron Forse and, in 2023, by Kevin Norby, has gradually restored much of the architect’s ideology. Greens have been expanded to add new hole locations, trees have been thinned and Tillie’s lost bunkers have returned with their shapes redefined. This is a classic parkland expression of golf on a graceful property that demands drives be placed in the fairway and approach shots left below the hole.