Aronimink Golf Club

Aronimink began in December 1896 as the Belmont Golf Association, formed by cricketers who laid out a few holes at 52nd Street and Chester Avenue in southwest Philadelphia. It incorporated as Aronimink in 1900, taking the name of a Lenape chief, and moved to 54th Street and Whitby Avenue and then, in 1913, to Drexel Hill. In 1926 the club sold the Drexel Hill land, for $1.2 million according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, and bought 300 acres in Newtown Square.

The club engaged Donald Ross to lay out 18 holes on the new property. The course was built in 1927 and the club moved in on Memorial Day 1928, with a clubhouse by Charles Barton Keen. Ross drew the plans and left hole-by-hole field notes, but, as Golf Digest's Derek Duncan reports, construction was overseen by his associate and foreman J. B. McGovern, a member of the club. Ross came back in 1948, shortly before his death, and remarked that he had built better than he knew; the club put the full quotation on a plaque behind the 1st tee at its 1996 centennial rededication.

Holes to Know

From the Black tees (7,313 yards on our card) Aronimink is par 35 on each nine, 3,574 yards out and 3,739 in. There are four par 3s (the 5th, 8th, 14th and 17th), twelve par 4s and two par 5s (the 9th and 16th). The longest hole is the 605-yard 9th, and the 15th, a par 4, is longer than the par-5 16th.

The 413-yard 2nd from the Black tees, stroke index 11, bends left past a cluster of six bunkers between about 245 and 300 yards, mostly on and left of the line. The PGA of America describes a semi-blind landing area sloping left to right. In the restoration these bunkers were rebuilt 15 to 20 yards farther out than the originals. The green is wider than deep, with one bunker short left and three along its right front.

The 242-yard 8th from the Black tees, stroke index 13, is the longest par 3. It plays downhill over a small pond, about 65 to 100 yards short of the green centre, to a green set across the line with two bunkers short left and one short right. Its green almost meets the 10th green at the low point of the property.

The 425-yard 11th from the Black tees, stroke index 4, is straight and carries the most bunkers on the course: seven on the right of the fairway between about 240 and 305 yards, three on the left, and about ten around a green that is wider than it is deep. A creek and pond lie along the right of the approach.

The 546-yard 15th from the Black tees, stroke index 2, is a par 4; a new tee for the 2026 PGA Championship made it the longest par 4 on the course. It runs straight to a green open across the front, with bunker groups about 305 to 325 yards short (both sides), 240 short (right) and 45 to 95 short (both sides), one bunker short left, one right and three behind on the left.

The 229-yard 17th from the Black tees, stroke index 18, crosses a pond that runs up the left side of the green, with three bunkers short of the right half.

Ross's Design Here

The routing is the part of the course that is plainly Ross's. Andy Johnson, writing for PGA.com in 2020, compares the property to a bathroom sink: the 10th plunges to the low point near the 8th green, the 9th and 18th climb side by side back to the clubhouse, the 2nd, 3rd and 13th sit on the flattest ground and are defended by bunker clusters, and the 6th, 7th, 15th and 16th run across the side slopes, where drives that land on the low side kick toward the rough. The club's own course text says Ross set out to make long-iron play "the supreme test" and points to the opening hole, which drops sharply from the tee and then climbs about 250 yards to the green.

The bunkering is harder to attribute. Duncan reports that Ross's plans showed fewer than 80 bunkers, and that during construction they were built instead as clusters of two or three smaller, lower-faced bunkers, taking the total past 200. Ron Prichard, the club's consulting architect from 1994, believes McGovern made that change without Ross's input. The clusters are what Victor Dallin photographed from the air in 1929, a year after the opening, and they are what the course has today. The 11th shows them most clearly: the 1929 aerial showed 23 bunkers there, and 20 were rebuilt.

One green has a documented Ross specification. Before the restoration the club found a document in which Ross wrote down the dimensions of the 15th green, a large punch bowl with slopes that draw the ball toward the centre. It had shrunk to about 6,000 square feet and was rebuilt at more than 10,000, with 30 feet added at the back.

Historical Significance

Aronimink held the 1962 PGA Championship, won by Gary Player, at 7,045 yards and par 70. It hosted the 1977 U.S. Amateur, won by John Fought, the 1997 U.S. Junior Amateur according to the Inquirer, and the 2003 Senior PGA Championship, won by John Jacobs. The PGA Tour's AT&T National came in 2010 (Justin Rose) and 2011 (Nick Watney), and the BMW Championship in 2018 (Keegan Bradley). With the 2020 KPMG Women's PGA Championship, won by Sei Young Kim, it became the first club to stage all three of the PGA of America's rotating majors.

The PGA Championship returned on May 14-17, 2026, at 7,394 yards and par 70. Aaron Rai of England won at 271, nine under par, three strokes ahead of Jon Rahm and Alex Smalley. The club places the course on Golf Digest's list of America's 100 Greatest Golf Courses.

Changes Since Ross

Over the decades the clusters were merged or removed. Duncan and Top100GolfCourses record William Gordon's work in the 1950s, which eliminated out-of-play fairway bunkers and moved others closer to the greens, followed by changes from Dick Wilson, George Fazio and Robert Trent Jones; the Inquirer also names A. W. Tillinghast among those who altered the course. By 2016 the course had about 75 bunkers.

Ron Prichard's restoration, completed in 2002 before the 2003 Senior PGA, rebuilt the course to Ross's drawings and field diagrams rather than to what had been built in 1928.

In 2015 the club hired Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner. Superintendent John Gosselin had copies of Dallin's photographs, from the collection at the Hagley Museum, and the club decided to rebuild the course they show. Work ran over two seasons, with the course closed from October to April each year, and was finished for the 2018 BMW Championship. The bunker count rose to 174 by August 2017 and 176 in 2018 reports, with a few of the 1929 bunkers left out, all on new bases and drainage. Greens were returned to their early size and shape, recovering nearly 30,000 square feet in total. Fairways were widened by about 20 percent, trees were removed, and 13 sets of tees were reshaped to follow the land in place of raised runway tees. Some bunkers, including those on the 2nd, went back 15 to 20 yards farther out than in 1928. For the 2026 PGA Championship a new back tee lengthened the 15th to 546 yards, and a forward tee on the 13th brings the out of bounds left of the green into play when used.

Uncertainties

• Opening year: the club, the Inquirer and Top100GolfCourses give Memorial Day 1928; Duncan's 2026 Golf Digest piece says 1929. This listing uses 1928.

• Bunkering: Hanse and the club describe the 1929 clusters as Ross's as built; Duncan reports Ross's plans showed fewer than 80 bunkers and Prichard attributes the clusters to McGovern. This listing describes them as built in 1927-28 under McGovern's supervision.

• Bunker count: 174 (Gosselin, August 2017), 176 (Inquirer, 2018) and "more than 200" (Duncan, 2026). This listing uses about 175.

Sources & Notes

1. Aronimink Golf Club, "History of Aronimink," https://www.aronimink.org/web/pages/history - 1896 founding, moves, 1926 purchase, Memorial Day 1928, Keen clubhouse, 1996 plaque and Ross quotation ("I intended to make this my masterpiece, but not until today did I realize that I built better than I knew"), championships and winners, facilities.

2. Aronimink Golf Club, "Championships," https://www.aronimink.org/web/pages/championships, and "Course Tour," https://www.aronimink.org/web/pages/course-tour - championship list; club scorecard; "supreme test" and opening-hole text.

3. Philadelphia Inquirer, "Aronimink Golf Club exudes history," June 28, 2010, https://www.inquirer.com/philly/sports/golf/20100628_Aronimink_Golf_Club_exudes_history.html - Lenape name, Drexel Hill sale, built 1927, 1948 return, Tillinghast/Wilson/Gordon/Jones, Prichard completed 2002, 1997 U.S. Junior Amateur.

4. Derek Duncan (Golf Digest), "The real story behind the complicated architecture of Aronimink," May 14, 2026, https://www.australiangolfdigest.com.au/pga-championship-2026-aronimink-golf-club-design-history/ - McGovern, plans vs as-built bunkering, Prichard 1994 onward, Gordon 1950s, Hanse and Wagner hired 2015.

5. Joe Juliano, Philadelphia Inquirer, reprinted by Hanse Golf Course Design, "Aronimink restoring its course as 2018 PGA Tour event nears," Aug. 23, 2017, https://www.hansegolfdesign.com/news/aronimink-restoring-its-course-as-2018-pga-tour-event-nears/ - 15th green dimensions and size, 75 to 174 bunkers, 11th's 23 and 20 bunkers, 13 sets of tees.

6. Frank Fitzpatrick, Philadelphia Inquirer, "The World War I flier behind Aronimink's restoration," Sept. 4, 2018, https://www.inquirer.com/philly/sports/the-world-war-i-flier-behind-aroniminks-restoration-20180904.html - Dallin photographs, Hagley, 176 bunkers, closures, fairways widened 20 percent, 2nd hole bunkers moved out.

7. Andy Johnson (The Fried Egg) for PGA.com, "The Sink at the Mink," Oct. 12, 2020, https://www.pga.com/story/how-a-distinctive-property-and-a-donald-ross-routing-create-variety-at-aronimink - routing and landform.

8. PGA of America, "A Hole-by-Hole Look at Aronimink Golf Club," May 2026, https://www.pgachampionship.com/news-media/articles/a-hole-by-hole-look-at-aronimink-golf-club, and "Official Yardages for Round 1," May 14, 2026, https://www.pgachampionship.com/news-media/articles/2026-pga-championship-official-yardages-for-round-1 - hole descriptions, new tees at 13 and 15.

9. Wikipedia, "2026 PGA Championship," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_PGA_Championship - dates, winner, score, runners-up, 7,394 and 1962's 7,045 yards.

10. Top100GolfCourses, "Aronimink Golf Club," https://www.top100golfcourses.com/golf-course/aronimink - later architects, Prichard, green area recovered, tree removal.

11. Greens Visited scorecard, course-tour geometry (OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL) and hole aerials (PEMA Orthoimagery 2021-2023 via PASDA) - all hole pars, yardages, stroke indexes, shapes, hazards and green sizes.