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SEATTLE GOLF CLUB
PAR 3 165 YARDS
Seattle, WA
206.363.8811
www.seattlegolfclub.com
Enchanted is the place where the great Bobby Jones and President William Howard
Taft played golf; where Jack Nicklaus helped the US demolish Britain and Ireland in
a Walker Cup; and where the par-3 11th hole can look more like Augusta National
than Augusta National. Its 100th birthday in the rearview mirror, Seattle Golf Club has
loyal members who work arduously to retain "respect for tradition." And so it is, with
a Swiss chalet-style clubhouse that looks like it did when Taft was there but works
so much better, and with the enduring golf course overlooking Seattle's Highlands.
The 11th hole, not far from the clubhouse, is a members' favorite. It is a delicate hole,
much like the 12th at Augusta, an all or nothing-at-all par 3. From the most used tee,
the length is 165 yards, but it can vary from less than 100 yards to more than 200. For
average players, the concern is making it over the lake in front of the hole. They'd just
as soon have the pin as far from the water as it can be. Good players fear the back
half of a severe two-tiered green, for anything that lands short or spins back leaves a
very difficult two-putt to the back pin position.
Seattle Golf Club is different. It hosts only amateur events, and in selecting new
members it is more about character than cash flow. It didn't raze its old clubhouse,
but rather renovated it. In the 1990s when Arnold Palmer's design company
suggested rerouting the 10th hole to the 11th green, changing the approach angle
and losing the beautiful framing of the hole as it exists today, the members wouldn't
have it, respecting tradition. They always do.
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Photograph by Rob Perry
