Atlanta Athletic Club history

The club leaders soon realized the increased interest in golf, and in 1904, acquired property in the “suburbs” of Atlanta to create a country club, engaging golf architect Tom Bendelow to lay out the course.

It was a downtown athletic club, but in 1908 it decided to build a golf course six miles down the streetcar line from the city center, calling it East Lake Country Club.

In 1913, famed golf course architect Donald Ross redesigned the Bendelow course at East Lake.

That’s where a young Bobby Jones took up the game (his father was a member) before taking the golf world by storm in the 1920s.

Using the original Philip Shutze architectural drawings, the clubhouse was brought back to its 1926 design and condition.

2 course was opened on May 31, 1930, to coincide with the final day of Bob Jones’ victorious British Amateur championship match.

Jones, afflicted by the neurological disease syingomyelia, had not been able to play golf since 1948.

The original course and clubhouse were saved when a group of 25 members purchased them and began operation as the newly formed East Lake Country Club in 1968.

In 1970, the East Lake Meadows public housing project was built on the site of the club’s “Number 2” course and became a center for poverty, drugs, and violence.

When the club closed its downtown operation in 1971, the golf facility became simply Atlanta Athletic Club.

David Graham, who won the 1981 United States Open at Merion, had this to say about the two courses: “Merion is a classy lady.

1984 Mid-Amateur - Champion Michael Podolak

In 1994, Rees Jones restored Donald Ross’s original golf course layout.

Atlanta Athletic Club decided in 1995 that it needed some Rees Jones treatment of its own.

The tournament was first played at East Lake in 1998 and has been held at East Lake 21 times since then.

2001 The Atlanta Challenge - Andy Roddick’s first professional tournament win

2002 United States Junior Amateur - Champion Charlie Beljan

In 2008, an impressive addition to the Clubhouse was completed and several modifications were made to the golf course, including changing the putting surfaces from Bentgrass to Bermuda grass.

Every year since 2009 an independent survey group has ranked the Atlanta Athletic Club in the top ten of athletic clubs in the United States.

2010 Atlanta Tennis Championship

So, Rees Jones was brought in again after the course was awarded the 2011 PGA Championship, this time to toughen it up.

In 2015, the Club announced in conjunction with Golf Channel, that it would be hosting a new annual collegiate event, the East Lake Cup.