The SOCIETY #125

The Last Nine

We take for granted that 18 hole golf courses are the norm - that 72 holes is required at minimum to win a major…

24 times a major championship has been played on a venue with fewer than 18 holes. The last of which was the 1898 US Open

• Prestwick 12 holes (15 times until 1882)

• Musselburgh 9 hole (6 majors)

• Saint Andrew’s 9 hole (1894 Pre-USGA)

• Newport CC 1895

• Myopia Hunt 1898

3 US Opens were contested over 36 holes

31 Opens were contested over 36 holes

THE LOST NINES

For all the technological evolution, agronomic advancement and distance gains in modern golf, we often take one thing for granted, that a championship course must have 18 holes and that a major championship somehow requires 72 holes of golf to properly crown a champion.

Yet the earliest days of championship golf tell a very different story.

In fact, 24 major championships have been contested on courses with fewer than 18 holes. The final occurrence came at the 1898 U.S. Open at Myopia Hunt Club, but for decades before that, golf’s greatest titles were routinely decided on layouts that modern golfers would scarcely recognize as “championship venues.” These courses were rugged and quirky and personally I love it!

The most famous example is Prestwick Golf Club, the original home of The Open Championship. Prestwick measured just 12 holes, and from 1860 through 1882 it hosted the championship 15 times as a 12 hole golf links. Competitors simply played multiple loops around the property (in Prestwick’s case three loops equally 36 holes) to complete the event. Young Tom Morris, Old Tom Morris and Willie Park Sr. built their Open legends not on sprawling 18-hole examinations, but on a compact links laid across the Scottish coast.

Then there was Musselburgh Links, perhaps the most extraordinary championship venue of them all. The Ancient Links of Musselburgh consisted of only 9 holes, yet it hosted six major championships between 1874 and 1889. Imagine telling a modern fan that one of golf’s biggest titles would be played over repeated circuits of a rugged 9-hole course. Yet that was the reality of championship golf during its formative years.

America followed suit in 1894 with the first ever pre-USGA U.S. Open at Saint Andrew’s Golf Club of NY, further emphasizing that golf’s competitive traditions were far more flexible than today’s rigid assumptions.

The USGA followed suit in it’s first sanctioned U.S. Open. In 1895 Newport Country Club hosted the first USGA sanctioned U.S. Open with a course that had not yet evolved into the now-standard 18-hole championship model. One year later the championship moved to play an 18 hole Shinnecock Hills, which was just over 4400 yards in length (the shortest 18 hole golf course to ever host a Major), and by 1898 the U.S. Open arrived at Myopia Hunt Club, another venue with fewer than 18 holes at the time of championship play.

That 1898 U.S. Open at Myopia Hunt Club  would mark the end of an era. From that point forward, 18 holes became golf’s unquestioned standard and eventually an inseparable part of championship identity itself.

But perhaps the real lesson is this: greatness in golf has never truly been defined by the number of holes.

The game’s earliest champions competed on 9-hole links, 12-hole routings and unconventional layouts that demanded creativity more than conformity. Championship golf was once far more adaptable than we remember. The architecture mattered. The strategy mattered. The competition mattered. The hole count did not.

In an era obsessed with length, par and championship formulas, it is worth remembering that some of golf’s most important titles were won on courses that today might be dismissed as “too small” or “not championship enough.”

History suggests otherwise.

Shinnecock Hills:

Milestones from 1896 to 2026

When the U.S. Open returns to Shinnecock Hills in 2026, it will not simply be returning to one of America’s greatest golf courses. It will be returning to one of the foundational places in American golf.

Shinnecock opened in 1891 as one of the oldest incorporated golf club in the United States and became one of the five founding clubs of the USGA. Its first course was 12 holes, laid out by Willie Davis, before being expanded to 18 holes in 1895 by Willie Dunn. One year later, in 1896, Shinnecock hosted both the U.S. Amateur and the U.S. Open.

That 1896 U.S. Open was historic for reasons far beyond the scorecard. John Shippen, a young Black assistant professional at Shinnecock, and Oscar Bunn, a Shinnecock Indian Nation member, became the first two minority players to compete in a major championship. When some players objected to their participation, the USGA refused to remove them from the field. 

Shinnecock was also ahead of its time in the women’s game. From its founding, the club allowed women to play, and in 1893 it opened a separate nine-hole course for women, believed to be the first course in the United States designed specifically for female members.

After its 1896 U.S. Open, Shinnecock waited 90 years before the championship returned in 1986. Since then, it has become one of the USGA’s most trusted championship venues, hosting the U.S. Open in 1986, 1995, 2004, 2018 and now 2026.

The course we know today is largely the work of William Flynn, who redesigned Shinnecock in 1931. Flynn’s routing used the wind, the hills and the open ground to create one of the purest championship tests in American golf.

In 1896, Shinnecock measured just over 4,400 yards. For the 2026 U.S. Open, it is expected to play around 7,440 yards to a par of 70.

From a 12-hole beginning to a Flynn masterpiece, from women’s golf to minority participation, from 1896 to 2026, Shinnecock Hills is not merely a great U.S. Open venue. It is one of the places where American golf became American golf.

CELEBRATE 130 YEARS OF THE US OPEN AT SHINNECOCK HILLS

Antiquity Golf Co designed a hat that celebrates the first ever playing on the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills and its once famous hazard…THE BASTION. If you are interested in acquiring one of these hats reach out as we only made 40 of them.

THANK YOU!

Thank you for taking the time to read our newsletter. We may have 1-2 spots open at Oak Hill CC if you have an interest. We are spending the entire date at Oak Hill- golf, lunch and dinner with speakers. So excited to see you there!