Golf Master Tips, Pete Dye the Golf Course Architect - Any list of the best golf courses in America always includes courses like Harbour Town at Hilton Head and the Ocean Course at Kiawah Island, both in South Carolina, TPC Sawgrass in Florida, and Whistling Straits in Wisconsin.
What all of these world-class golf courses have in common is their designer, World Golf Hall of Fame course architect Pete Dye. Long before he built any of those other courses, he created his first real masterpiece in Carmel, Indiana with Crooked Stick Golf Club. And although it's Pete that usually gets the headlines and accolades (or, at times, the criticisms), many of his more famous designs have been in collaboration with his wife, Alice.
"It was a partnership from the very beginning," Alice explains about her and Pete's design process and division of labor. "We laid out the holes and we talked about it together. We had a dining room table and we'd cut strips of paper and laid them out on the map and talked about the best arrangement." In fact, it was Alice's idea to make the green at the par 3 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass an 'island', creating one of the most iconic golf holes in the world.
Alice brings a wealth of golf knowledge to the partnership by way of being a highly accomplished amateur golfer, winning multiple Indiana state titles. Her contribution to the process didn't stop at the dining room table, though. In a photograph hanging in the Indiana Golf Association offices in Franklin, IN, Alice is seen - circa 1960 - at the controls of a bulldozer, moving dirt to create their first course, El Dorado Country Club in Greenwood, Indiana (a course now known as Dye's Walk).
After El Dorado, Pete and Alice designed another 10 or so courses before they tackled Crooked Stick. But 'the Stick' was the first in which they had a hand in every aspect of the development. They found the land, raised the money to buy it, designed the layout and completed the construction. Perhaps that's the reason the Dye's still maintain a residence along Crooked Stick's 18th fairway.
In addition to Crooked Stick, Indiana features another two dozen Dye designs, giving the state the highest concentration of Pete Dye courses in America. Seven of those courses comprise the Pete Dye Golf Trail. Designed to promote golf and vacation tourism in Indiana, the trail is made up of Mystic Hills GC in Culver, The Kampen Course at the Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex in West LaFayette, Plum Creek GC in Carmel, The Fort in Indianapolis, Maple Creek in Indianapolis (his first 18-hole design), Brickyard Crossing on the grounds of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Indianapolis and The Pete Dye Course at the French Lick Resort in French Lick.
Through hundreds of courses and literally thousands of holes, the Dye's still trace their beginnings to Central Indiana. The very first hole Pete designed is now the 10th hole at Dye's Walk in Greenwood, where the tee sits next to a small cemetery. Asked today if starting a golf course right next to a burial ground gave him pause, Pete Dye responds, "I've built more golf courses around cemeteries - I think they haunt me". (John Cinnamon)
