Other Notable Championships at Spyglass Hill
In October 1964, Osborne wrote to Hanna: “Del
Monte Properties Co. would agree to a lease from Spy- glass Hill to the Golf Association of enough land so that the Association could build its offices provided that the offices included a Founder’s Room at no cost to the club and could be worked into a part of a master plan for an eventual clubhouse.” Consequently, a loan in the principal sum of $100,000
was negotiated for the construction of NCGA offices and a clubhouse at the Spyglass Hill site. As for the course itself, 150,000 yards of earth were
moved, and Jones’ signature pop-up greens were built, be- fore it was seeded in the middle of 1965. Hanna also went about providing the layout some extra character, naming most of the course’s 18 holes after sites and characters from Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic, “Treasure Island.” Hanna and the NCGA were mighty proud of their
new course. “If the Monterey Peninsula isn’t the golf capital of
the world then it certainly is the ‘golf showplace of the world.’ And Spyglass Hill is destined to become one of the greatest 18 holes of golf in the game,” he said in Golfdom Magazine shortly after it opened. Spyglass Hill officially opened on March 11, 1966.
Soon after, it hosted its first significant tournament, the 1966 NCGA Amateur Championship. Less than a year later, Spyglass joined the course rotation for the annual Bing Crosby National Pro-Am (today the AT&T), replac- ing Monterey Peninsula Country Club.
Course architect Robert Trent Jones Sr. leads a meeting during course construction. Del Monte Properties Company President Richard Osborne is far right (above left).
Bob Hanna was the NCGA’s first executive director and a driving force in getting Spyglass Hill built (above right).
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AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am (1967-1976; 1978-present) U.S. Amateur (1999) California State Amateur (multiple years for medal play) Callaway Pebble Beach Invitational (1979-1980, 1990-present)
As Sports Illustrated added in 1967, “Spyglass was not built for the pleasure of pros and celebrities. It is, instead, a public course—and already the best one in the U.S. … What the NCGA envisioned—as all golf course investors do—was 18 holes that ‘would bring Arnold Palmer to his knees.’”
But just 10 years after Spyglass Hill opened, the
NCGA again experienced growth. So in 1977, the NCGA purchased a nearby 164-acre parcel in the Del Monte For- est. The price was $7,000 per acre, to be paid over seven years. The goal was to build its own course and headquar- ters. The project began as the Hilltop Course, eventually becoming Poppy Hills. The NCGA moved to Poppy Hills when the course opened in 1986, and has been there ever since. But it all began with Spyglass Hill.
SUMMER 2014 /
NCGA.ORG / 39
PHOTO: PEBBLE BEACH COMPANY LAGORIO ARCHIVES
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