Mill Valley Golf Course

Origins

Golf in Mill Valley took three attempts to get off the ground. A group of local business leaders first tried to establish a club in 1896, and again in 1916, only for the Second World War's predecessor to intervene. The Mill Valley Golf Club was finally organized in 1919 at a meeting held at the Outdoor Art Club, with 40 charter members.

John H. "Dad" Clark, a greenskeeper and professional golfer who had already laid out courses at the Marin Golf & Country Club in San Rafael and the Ingleside course in San Francisco, was brought in to design the new 9-hole layout at the base of Warner Canyon. The roughly 2,200-yard course was declared fit for play on November 1, 1919, with the clubhouse following in 1920.

Development

The club survived barely two decades as a private operation. The Depression gutted membership nationwide, and by 1938 Mill Valley Golf Club was down to just 38 members. Facing collapse, the club's board asked the City of Mill Valley to buy and run the course instead of letting it close.

Voters rejected the bond proposal twice before finally approving it in 1939, and the course has operated as a municipal facility ever since.

Today

More than a century after John Clark first laid it out, the course still plays as a 9-hole, par-33 municipal track, now managed by KemperSports and paired with a separate short course (par 27) for golfers still learning the game. The on-site restaurant, Porch 1919, takes its name directly from the club's founding year.