Baltusrol Golf Club: Upper Course

The Upper is the hillside half of Baltusrol's dual A.W. Tillinghast routing, built simultaneously with the Lower Course when the club replaced its original 19th-century layout. Tillinghast used the slopes of Baltusrol Mountain to set the Upper apart from its flatter sibling, and the course has its own major-championship lineage, most notably as host of the 1936 US Open and 1985 US Women's Open.

The Upper Course at Baltusrol Golf Club is one of two A.W. Tillinghast-designed 18-hole layouts at the club's property in Springfield, New Jersey, and together with the Lower Course it formed what is widely cited as the first 36-hole contiguous golf development built in the United States. Baltusrol, founded in 1895, had originally operated a single course known as the Old Course. By the late 1910s the club had outgrown it, and in 1919 the membership engaged Tillinghast to plow up the Old Course and create two new 18-hole routings on the same land.

Tillinghast's work on the Upper and Lower began in 1919, and both courses officially opened for play in June 1922. For the Upper, Tillinghast integrated the slopes of Baltusrol Mountain directly into his routing, using the elevation change and hillside terrain to distinguish it from the flatter ground of the Lower Course below. The project, completed at a time when American course architecture was rapidly maturing, was a critical commission in Tillinghast's career, and in 2014 Baltusrol was designated a National Historic Landmark in part for the importance of its dual Tillinghast courses to that career. The Upper Course has its own major-championship history that is distinct from the more frequently used Lower.

It hosted the 1936 US Open, won by Tony Manero, and the 1985 US Women's Open, won by Kathy Baker, giving the Upper two USGA majors and establishing it as a championship venue in its own right rather than merely a complement to the Lower. It has also played a supporting role in USGA events when Baltusrol hosts multi-course championships, most recently serving alongside the Lower during the 2018 US Junior Amateur. After more than a century of play and several incremental modernizations, the club commissioned architect Gil Hanse to conduct a full restoration of the Upper Course, aimed at returning the layout to Tillinghast's 1922 vision. Construction began after the close of the 2023 golf season, lasted approximately 12 months and cost roughly $22.8 million.

The Hanse-led team rebuilt all greens, bunkers, tees, approaches, fairways and rough, installed new irrigation and drainage to allow for firm, fast conditions, expanded greens back to their original dimensions, and removed trees that had obscured Tillinghast's long-range sight lines. Hanse and his team worked from more than 5,000 archival documents related to Tillinghast's original intent, and the Upper Course reopened in May 2025. The Upper plays to a par of 72 at roughly 7,348 yards from the championship tees following the Hanse restoration.