Across society as a whole, the game of golf does not have the most inclusive reputation.

Though golf began as a game played by all social classes in the Scottish towns in which it was born, it evolved into a pastime largely for the wealthy, because clubs and balls were expensive. The invention of the cheap gutty ball in the mid-nineteenth century made golf more financially accessible, and sparked the first boom in the game, but by this time, the divide between gentlemen amateurs and swarthy professionals already existed, and the image of golf as a game popular among an elite was set.

Things are very different now, but if you stop a random person on a random street and ask them what they think about golf, it is very probable that its supposed exclusivity will be quickly on their lips. To this day, the most famous golf clubs tend to be among the most exclusive.

To golf’s credit though, the game has a history of the rich supporting the poor. And one of the classic examples of that is currently taking place in South Central Los Angeles with the reconstruction of the nine-hole Maggie Hathaway Golf Course.

South Central is famous – some would say notorious – as the home of hip-hop crew NWA. The area became majority African-American by the middle of the twentieth century, and black people trying to move into self-decreed ‘white’ areas were persecuted, creating de facto segregation.

From the 1970s onwards, the decline of manufacturing industry in the area and the loss of service sector jobs caused influx of cheaper, mostly Hispanic, workers, sent the economy of South Central into decline, crime and poverty to increase, and a culture dominated by street gangs, and the associated drugs trade, to emerge.

Now renamed South Los Angeles, extensive regeneration and community engagement projects dramatically lowered the crime rate in the area, though it rebounded significantly after the Covid-19 pandemic.

In 1962, a nine-hole par-three golf course was created in Jesse Owens Park, called the Jack Thompson Golf Course. It was renamed in 1997 to honour Maggie Hathaway, a blues singer and actress who became both a golfer and a civil rights activist, and led a campaign to open up Los Angeles’s municipal courses to black players.

The facilities at the Maggie are pretty basic. But as a consequence of the US Open that was held at Los Angeles Country Club in 2023 – which, as the crow flies, is less than ten miles from the Maggie but feels like a different world – a huge investment is being made to rebuild the course and associated practice area, and to create a learning centre and programming for local juniors.

The project is enormous, given the small and frankly humble nature of the course. The donors include the USGA itself, Los Angeles Golf Club, the team in the TGL indoor golf league led by internet entrepreneur Alexis Ohanian and his wife, tennis star Serena Williams, LACC itself, LA County Parks and Recreation, the Southern California Golf Association, the Western States Golf Association, and a host of private funders.

The construction cast list includes a team from Total Turf Golf Services comprising superintendent Shellene Elmore, project manager Paul McKinney, shapers Cristian Velasquez and Fernando Cerrillo, and operators Carlos Garcia, Pancho Salome and Salvador Granados. Heritage Links is the irrigation contractor.

Hanse Golf Design has donated its services to handle the course redesign. Speaking at the groundbreaking ceremony in January 2025, Gil Hanse said: “We want to make sure the golf course is recognisable and enjoyable for the people who have been here for 30 or 40 years…If we do anything here that makes this golf course less welcoming, less enjoyable or less recognisable for the people who have supported it over a long period of time, then we have failed.”

Hanse himself is shaping the greens, but the job is being run by LA-based Hanse associate Tommy Naccarato.

Naccarato is a legend in online golf architecture discussion circles, where he has been active for over a quarter of a century and is affectionately known as ‘the Emperor’. He may be loved by denizens of sites such as golfclubatlas.com, but he has not always been so popular among some golf architects, for his (rather trenchant) views on their work. And he is one of my dearest friends in the business.

Tommy has had a tough time of late. He suffered a stroke, which kept him in hospital for a month, last November. And if that misfortune wasn’t enough, he lost his home in the Pacific Palisades area of Los Angeles in the January wildfires. Thankfully, the online golf architecture community came together and raised money to help get him back on his feet (you can donate by searching his name on gofundme.com). It isn’t an exaggeration to say that the Maggie project is what has kept him going.

Maggie Hathaway does not occupy an expansive property. It is essentially a square some 220 yards on each side, with an additional tongue of land that is 150 yards long and just over sixty wide. In this twelve acres of land are nine holes of golf, a driving range and the ‘clubhouse’. But once the Hanse team is done, there will be few such small areas anywhere in the world that contain as much golf, and as much golf interest. Tommy and his team are incorporating many of the most famous green designs in golf into the course: a Redan, Biarritz, Eden, you name it.

What makes the Maggie project important for golf is, without doubt, its community aspects. Even after years of regeneration, the surrounding area is not affluent. Yet the nature of urban development means it is cheek by jowl with some of the wealthiest areas on the planet, making it a stark reminder of the inequalities of modern life. From the golf course, the skyscrapers of downtown Los Angeles are clearly in view. SoFi Stadium, where the Chargers and the Rams play NFL football is only two miles away. The topography of the Los Angeles area means that both the Hollywood sign and the Griffith Observatory can be seen from the golf course. I have been visiting Los Angeles for over twenty years, but it was only when I visited Maggie Hathaway that I realised how close wealth and poverty were in the city.

I had not realised, until I visited the course with Tommy, that his family has deep roots in the area. As a part of the work, the first green will move perhaps twenty yards, making the aiming point the spire of Saint Eugene’s Catholic Church a few blocks away. Tommy pointed it out and said to me ‘My aunt and uncle were married there’.

When it reopens, possibly as early as late this year, I hope the people of the area enjoy playing golf at Maggie Hathaway, and that a huge number of young Angelenos discover our great game in its twelve acres. But most of all, I hope Tommy can sit in the parking lot in his car, wave his arm at the course and say with pride ‘I did that’.

This article first appeared in the April 2025 issue of Golf Course Architecture. For a printed subscription or free digital edition, please visit our subscriptions page.