n the history of golf—past, pres- ent, and future—it is unlikely that there will ever be a family of golf architects more productive, more distinguished, or more historically signifi cant than the family of
Robert Trent Jones: Robert Trent Jones Sr. (1906-2000), and his two sons Robert Trent Jones Jr. (born 1939) and Rees Jones (born 1941). Together the three Joneses con-
stitute a veritable dynasty of golf architects, with a whopping 173 years of golf course design and construc- tion between them: 70 years for Trent Sr., from 1930 to his death in 2000; 53 years for Bob Jr. (Bobby), from the time he started working in his dad’s business in 1962 to the present; and 50 years for Rees, from the time he began assisting his father in 1965 to the present. In those 17 decades the Joneses
created nearly 900 golf courses, locat- ed in more than 50 different countries on six of the world’s seven continents (minus only Antarctica), and in every U.S. state but two (somehow missing Mississippi and South Dakota). With
Runway tee boxes became a trademark and revolutionary design feature of Robert Trent Jones Sr. golf courses. Pictured left: Mission Viejo CC
Bobby (right) and Rees (left) stand with their
parents Robert and Ione after winning the Family of the Year Award from the Metropolitan Golf Writers Association in 1979.
a typical golf course averaging some 150 acres, those 900 courses constitute 150,000 acres, or 235 square miles, of golf courses designed by Jones and sons, the equivalent of 178 Central Parks or six Disney Worlds. To design all of those courses, Trent, Bobby and Rees logged more than 15 million miles, or 602 trips around the earth. And what golf courses did they
design. More than 100 national or international championships have been played on courses that one of
the Joneses designed or redesigned. The list includes 27 U.S. Opens, on such courses as Atlanta Athletic Club (Highlands), Baltusrol (Lower), Bel- lerive, Congressional, Hazeltine Na- tional, Oak Hill (East), Oakland Hills, Olympic Club (Lake), Southern Hills, Bethpage (Black) and Torrey Pines (South). The latest addition comes this summer when the U.S. Open will be played at Bobby’s Chambers Bay, on Puget Sound in the state of Washington. The Jones portfolio also
Bobby (left), Trent (center) and Rees walk Spyglass Hill, the fi rst golf course Bobby worked on with his father.
SPRING 2015 /
NCGA.ORG / 43
PHOTO COURTESY OF ROBERT TRENT JONES JR.
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