Minneapolis Golf Club

Minneapolis Golf Club organized in 1916 and initially opened play that summer on leased ground at what is now Golden Valley. Within months the membership elected to relocate to a larger, contiguous tract in St. Louis Park and retained Willie Park Jr. to lay out the golf course there. The club’s first event at the present site was held on May 19, 1917, confirming the quick transition from organization to a functioning course.

By 1919 the club planned a substantially larger clubhouse on the property’s north side, a move that precipitated a comprehensive routing revision. In 1920 Donald J. Ross & Associates produced a new routing plan to accommodate the clubhouse relocation; a copy of that plan, discovered by the Donald Ross Society’s history committee in 2011, substantiates Ross’s direct involvement. Contemporary and club-history summaries agree that the Ross work re-ordered the sequence rather than creating a wholly new course from raw ground, positioning play more coherently around the future clubhouse that opened in 1923.

No publicly available minutes or correspondence confirm whether Ross returned for field supervision beyond the routing commission, and construction phasing between 1920 and the early 1920s remains sparsely documented in open sources. The most reliable accounts frame Ross’s role as a routing/redesign intended to integrate the clubhouse change, not a grass-roots replacement of greens and hazards across the property. Establishing the precise extent of in-person Ross site work would require access to club minutes (1919–1923), contractor records, and any retained Ross office correspondence.

Unique Design Characteristics

As it exists today, the course displays a sequence consistent with a 1920 Golden-Age rerouting imposed upon prairie-like terrain: fairway corridors shift subtly across a gentle rise-and-fall, and green platforms, many slightly perched, accept or deflect approaches based on angle. Three present holes illustrate how the routing and green sites drive the playing experience:

No. 10 (par 3): The most photographed shot at MGC plays over water to a raised green. However the water feature’s vintage is not documented in public sources; what can be said with certainty is that the hole’s siting—turning the back nine with an immediate test—reflects the routing logic Ross supplied for a clubhouse-anchored inward nine.

No. 3 (par 5): At roughly 560-plus yards, the third uses fairway width and bunkering to shape the second-shot decision. The hole’s scorecard yardage has varied across eras, but modern photography confirms a classic three-shot rhythm with placement value on both the drive and the lay-up.

No. 18 (par 4): The uphill finishing two-shotter plays to a green sited for gathering spectators and members near the clubhouse—precisely the sort of arrival a rerouting to a new clubhouse would be designed to achieve.

Beyond individual holes, recent restorative work intentionally re-expanded green surfaces and re-introduced short grass around green complexes, which has sharpened the angle-based character long associated with the course. Public sources do not publish Ross’s original green drawings for MGC; accordingly, claims about specific interior contours being “pure Ross” cannot be made responsibly without primary documentation.

Historical Significance

Within the Ross corpus, Minneapolis Golf Club is a prominent example of routing-led redesign to integrate a new clubhouse footprint into an already-established private course—an assignment Ross received at several clubs in the late 1910s and early 1920s, and one that often determined the long-term identity of the host venue. At MGC, that identity quickly became championship-caliber: the club staged the 1940 Western Amateur (won by Bud Ward), the Golden Anniversary U.S. Amateur in 1950 (Sam Urzetta over Frank Stranahan in a 39-hole final, then the longest on record), and the 1959 PGA Championship, where Bob Rosburg closed with 66 to win by one. The PGA set-up that week measured 6,850 yards at par 70, a reminder that tournament configurations have periodically deviated from the club’s everyday par-72 card.

Later state and regional events have been frequent, but it is those three national championships that place MGC within the mainstream historical narrative of American championship sites—and, by extension, preserve Ross’s role in shaping a venue that proved adaptable for elite play. Rankings lists vary year-to-year, yet independent course surveys consistently position MGC among Minnesota’s stronger classic-era courses, with particular attention to the back-nine start at the tenth.

Current Condition / Integrity

The routing skeleton attributable to Ross’s 1920 plan remains legible: a clubhouse-centric flow, a back-nine turn that opens with a prominent par-3, and an 18th green complex suited to member-spectator convergence. That said, a century of evolution—tree-planting campaigns (notably ca. 1930), irrigation updates, changes to bunker styles and mowing lines, and tournament-driven tee placements—has inevitably altered the canvas. The most consequential modern intervention followed the severe winter of 2018–2019, when the membership approved a full re-grassing from predominantly annual bluegrass/poa to bentgrass along with green-surface restorations, expanded short-grass surrounds, select bunker work, and fairway-pattern adjustments. The club characterizes the result as a harmonization of the original Park/Ross design with contemporary agronomy and maintenance, and the consulting architect of record has continued in an advisory capacity.

Because publicly accessible archives do not include Ross’s detailed green plans or a hole-by-hole construction ledger, the precise survival of original 1920s green-edge geometry or bunker placements cannot be quantified from open sources. Present photography and hole-by-hole summaries do, however, indicate that many green platforms remain in the same general locations and that recent work has favored recapturing perimeter rather than wholesale relocation. The signature tenth’s water carry is a particularly conspicuous modern element and should not be assumed to be a 1920 Ross feature absent documentation.

Preserved/recaptured today: routing logic relative to the clubhouse; many green sites and their general elevations; wider fairway corridors and expanded greens restored in 2019–2020 to reclaim historical playing width and pinning variety.

Altered/lost or modernized: individual bunker forms and sand lines; tree density (notably reduced in recent years for turf health); agronomy (conversion to bentgrass); specific hazards such as the pond fronting the tenth, which reads as an addition from a later era.

Uncertainties / points requiring primary verification

Extent and nature of Ross’s in-person field work (1920–1923): Open sources confirm a 1920 routing plan by Donald J. Ross & Associates and tie the redesign to the impending clubhouse. Whether Ross personally staked greens and bunkers on site—or delegated to an associate or contractor—cannot be resolved without club minutes, invoices, or Ross office correspondence.

Original vs. current features by hole: Publicly available materials do not publish Ross’s green drawings or a construction plan set. Assigning individual contours or specific bunker lines to Ross would require access to the club’s archival plan sheets, early aerial photography (late-1920s/1930s), and period newspaper accounts.

Whether Ross “expanded to 18 holes”: Some secondary reporting describes Ross as expanding the course to 18 holes in the mid-1920s; other sources indicate the Park-routed St. Louis Park course was already 18 and that Ross’s 1920 work rerouted the sequence to accommodate a new clubhouse. Resolving this discrepancy requires consulting club archives and contemporary press accounts.

Sources & Notes

St. Louis Park Historical Society. “Minneapolis Golf Club.” Confirms Park Jr. as original architect at the St. Louis Park site; first event May 19, 1917; and a 1920 Ross-produced revised routing to make way for a new clubhouse.

Donald Ross Society. Directory of Courses (June 2023).

Lists Minneapolis Golf Club (St. Louis Park, MN) with Ross involvement dated 1920. (Directory entry; corroborative.)

Minneapolis Golf Club – Course Tour. Club page noting back-tee yardage (~7,045 yards) and providing a “View Scorecard” link. (Dynamic page; accessible via the club site.)

Minneapolis Golf Club – Golf page / practice facilities. Club pages describing practice range, short-game area, putting, and indoor bay/simulator; general description of the recent renovation’s intent (recapturing green contours, integrating more short grass).

GolfCourseGurus. “Minneapolis Golf Club (Saint Louis Park, Minnesota)” review with photos and hole-by-hole highlights; provides modern yardages/ratings and identifies the 10th (par 3 over water), 3rd (par 5), and 18th (finishing par 4) as representative holes. Useful for present-day features, treated here as secondary observation.

Wikipedia – Minneapolis Golf Club. Aggregates the 1916 organization/relocation timeline, cites the discovery of a 1920 Donald J. Ross & Associates routing plan, and notes 2019 restoration work. (Used only where supported by other sources and to reference the 2011 plan discovery.)

Jeff Mingay, Architect. Project page describing the 2019 work at MGC: green-surface restoration, fairway-pattern adjustments, re-grassing, and select bunker work; identifies construction partner Golf Course Architecture (Richard Humphreys).

“Minneapolis Golf Club begins re-grassing project” (Aug. 2, 2019). Reports member approval of re-grassing following winterkill; notes recent tree removals for turf health. (One paragraph in this item claims Ross “expanded the course to 18 holes” in the mid-1920s; that assertion conflicts with other sources and is flagged above as disputed.)

USGA – article on Sam Urzetta (2011). Confirms 1950 U.S.

Amateur final at Minneapolis Golf Club, a 39-hole win over Frank Stranahan—then the longest final on record.

Western Golf Association – Western Amateur History. Confirms 1940 Western Amateur at Minneapolis Golf Club (Bud Ward champion).

PGA of America / PGA Championship historical records. Confirms 1959 PGA Championship at Minneapolis Golf Club and includes comeback stats for champion Bob Rosburg; see also the championship’s Wikipedia summary for yardage and par (6,850 yards, Par 70). Historical trade press. Golferdom, Sept. 1959 (archival PDF) noting financial/attendance metrics from the 1959 PGA at MGC, corroborating event details.