Prairie Dunes Country Club

Prairie Dunes Country Club is a windswept masterpiece in Hutchinson, Kansas, ranked by Golf Digest among the top thirty courses in America. Its links-like terrain, native prairie grasses, and strategic bunkering create a uniquely American golfing experience.

Prairie Dunes Country Club owes its existence to the Carey family of Hutchinson, Kansas, whose fortune came from the Carey Salt Company. In 1935, patriarch Emerson Carey and his four sons commissioned Perry Maxwell, the Oklahoma-based architect already renowned for his work at Southern Hills and Colonial Country Club, to build a golf course on a 480-acre tract of dunesland on the eastern outskirts of Hutchinson. The land was an improbable setting for a golf course -- flat Kansas prairie giving way suddenly to sand hills sculpted by Ice Age winds, covered in native grasses, yucca plants, sandhill plum thickets, and cottonwood trees. When Maxwell first surveyed the property, he reportedly declared, "There are 118 holes here, and all I have to do is eliminate 100." He had found, in the middle of the Great Plains, terrain that rivaled the great linksland of the British Isles. Maxwell drew plans for eighteen holes, but the Careys, exercising Depression-era caution, opted to build only nine. Construction was headed by Maxwell's brother-in-law, Dean Woods, using men hired through the Works Progress Administration, rudimentary equipment, and minimal earth movement. Maxwell's design philosophy held that the architect's job was to reveal what nature had already provided, not to impose artificial features on the land. At Prairie Dunes, this meant routing holes through the natural valleys and ridges of the sand hills, allowing the existing contours to dictate the placement of fairways and greens. The original nine holes opened on September 13, 1937, and they are widely considered the finest nine holes Perry Maxwell ever designed. Maxwell continued to refine plans for the second nine but did not live to see them built. He died in 1952 at the age of seventy-three.

By that time, the club's members -- who had purchased the property from the Carey family in 1950 for $95,000 -- were ready to complete the course. The logical choice for architect was Press Maxwell, Perry's son, who had worked on the construction crew for the original nine before flying B-24 bombers in World War II. Press returned to Hutchinson with a deep understanding of his father's design principles and the advantage of modern equipment -- bulldozers that were not available two decades earlier allowed for more precise shaping. The second nine opened in 1957. Although the land for the new holes had fewer dramatic dunes and less natural undulation, Press succeeded in creating a seamless companion to his father's work. Just as the original nine is considered Perry's finest achievement, the back nine is widely recognized as the best work Press Maxwell ever produced. In some instances, Press consciously played off his father's holes, creating echoes and counterpoints that give the full eighteen a unified artistic vision despite the twenty-year gap between their construction. The finished course measures just over 6,500 yards and plays to a par of 70, but the numbers scarcely convey its difficulty. The ever-present Kansas wind -- which can blow from any direction and at considerable force -- transforms the course into a different test from one day to the next. The rough, known locally as "gunsch," is a punishing mixture of native bluestem grasses, plum thickets, yucca, and soap weeds that swallows errant shots. The greens are vintage Maxwell: flowing, undulating surfaces with subtle breaks that reward imagination and penalize mechanical putting.

The terrain rises and falls through the sand hills, creating blind and semi-blind shots, elevated tees with panoramic views, and approach shots that must account for wind, slope, and the firmness of the turf. Prairie Dunes has been a favored venue for USGA championships, hosting eight through 2006 with two more scheduled. The club's championship history began with the 1964 U.S. Women's Amateur, an event it hosted again in 1991. Juli Inkster won the first of her three consecutive U.S. Women's Amateur titles at Prairie Dunes in 1980 -- a detail that would gain added significance when she returned in 2002 to capture her second U.S. Women's Open at the same venue, defeating Annika Sorenstam by two strokes in a standout compelling finishes in the championship's history. The 1986 Curtis Cup was held at Prairie Dunes, won by Great Britain and Ireland in a notable upset. The club also hosted the 1988 U.S. Mid-Amateur (won by David Eger), the 1995 U.S. Senior Amateur (won by James Stahl Jr.), and the 2006 U.S. Senior Open, won by Allen Doyle at eight under par. Looking ahead, the USGA has awarded Prairie Dunes the 2029 U.S. Senior Open and the 2032 U.S. Senior Women's Open, which will be the ninth and tenth USGA championships held at the club. The course's appeal to championship committees reflects not only the quality of the layout but also the fairness of its test. Prairie Dunes does not overwhelm with length; it asks for creativity, course management, and the ability to control ball flight in the wind. These are the same qualities Maxwell valued when he designed the course, and they are the qualities that continue to separate great players from merely good ones on this ground. Prairie Dunes has been ranked consistently among the top courses in the United States by every major publication. Golf Digest has placed it among the top thirty in America. The course is a model for minimalist design -- a demonstration that a gifted architect working with extraordinary natural terrain can create something that no amount of earthmoving and budget could replicate on lesser land. Perry Maxwell, who also left his mark on the greens at Augusta National and the bunkers at Pine Valley during his career, may have done his most personal and inspired work in Hutchinson, Kansas, on a piece of ground that looked, to anyone without an architect's eye, like nothing more than windswept prairie.