Submitted by John Dodge
One hundred years ago, the then-called Olympia Golf & Country Club (OC&GC) opened the first golf course built on the shores of Puget Sound. The original nine-hole course, six miles north of Olympia on Budd Inlet, a source of pride to the club’s 175 members, opened in the spring of 1926 on some 100 acres of rolling farmland, ravines and stately stands of Douglas fir trees, part of the original John L. Butler Land Claim. The unique and challenging test of golf featured commanding views of Mount Rainier and Budd Inlet.
Golf historians describe the mid-1920s as a golden age for new golf courses, thanks to the nation’s economic prosperity, increased mobility brought about by cars, vast tracts of developable land and growing interest in the game of golf. The Olympia golf scene was no exception.
Early History of the Olympia Country & Golf Club
The first round of golf was played by women’s club members on Thursday, April 1, 1926. Club President George W. Draham, an Olympia mayor (1923-24) and civic leader known by the 1920’s as “Olympia’s father of golf,” had this to say that day: “It’s fitting that the ladies be given the first opportunity of playing … They have always been a help to us from the start.”…