Back Creek Golf Club

Back Creek Golf Club, designed by Allen Liddicoat and David Horne and opened in fall 1997, was the first public golf course built in New Castle County, Delaware, in 25 years when it opened on land that was once farmed by Delaware's first governor, Joshua Clayton. The par-71 layout stretches 6,957 yards and features generous fairways, undulating greens, and sculpted bunkers characteristic of a links-influenced design, earning recognition in a 1999 issue of Golfweek as one of the Top 100 Modern Golf Courses in America.

Back Creek Golf Club opened in fall 1997 in Middletown, Delaware, built on farmland once owned by Joshua M. Clayton — the first governor of Delaware — at a construction cost of $2.4 million. The course was designed by Allen Liddicoat and David Horne, creating a links-style layout described at opening as the first new public golf course built in New Castle County in 25 years.4 — figures that establish Back Creek as among the demanding public courses in Delaware and a genuine championship-length test appropriate to the regional golf market's appetite for quality public venues. Liddicoat and Horne modeled the design loosely after The Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, incorporating more than 80 strategically placed bunkers from tee to green and waist-high rough consistent with the links tradition. These design choices create the visual and strategic characteristics of links-style golf — open fairways framed by penal rough and sand rather than trees, with bunkers demanding carry or avoidance throughout the round. The routing works with the native contours of the former farmland, circumventing wetland areas without imposing awkward forced carries, and the walkable design allows players who prefer to carry their bags to experience the course on foot in the links tradition. In March 1999, just over a year after opening, Golfweek magazine ranked Back Creek among the Top 100 Modern Golf Courses in America — specifically at No. 98. This rapid national recognition for a course with such modest construction cost validated Liddicoat and Horne's design achievement and established Back Creek's standing within the competitive Mid-Atlantic public course market. The Golfweek ranking generated substantial regional attention and golf tourism interest that put the Middletown area on the map for Mid-Atlantic golf travelers. The site's connection to Delaware's earliest political history gives Back Creek an unusual historical dimension. Joshua M. Clayton, the first governor of Delaware after the state's ratification of the Constitution in 1787, owned the farmland on which the course was built. Clayton served as governor from 1789 to 1796 and subsequently as a U.S. Senator, connecting the property to the constitutional era and to the foundational generation of Delaware's political leadership. Middletown itself has grown substantially since the late 1990s as the State Route 1 corridor through New Castle County developed into one of the fastest-growing residential areas in Delaware. The state's favorable tax environment — Delaware charges no sales tax and has low personal income tax rates — has attracted residents from the Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Wilmington metropolitan areas who commute to those employment centers while living in Delaware's more affordable suburban communities. Back Creek has served the growing Middletown-area golf community throughout this period of expansion, maintaining its position as the most architecturally significant public course in New Castle County through consistent conditioning and the enduring quality of the Liddicoat-Horne design.