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The Honors Course is a private 18-hole Pete Dye golf club in Ooltewah, Tennessee, created specifically around championship amateur golf. Coca-Cola bottling executive Jack Lupton joined Bill Taff, Lew Boyd, Bill Healy and Joel Richardson in acquiring more than 400 acres at the foot of White Oak Mountain after the site was identified in the late 1970s. Pete Dye began construction on July 23, 1981, and the course officially opened on July 2, 1983.
It plays to par 72 and was intentionally established as a golf club rather than a full-service country club: the founders explicitly rejected swimming, tennis and evening dining in favor of a secluded, uncrowded golf operation. S. S.
The course is an 18-hole parkland golf course. Designed by Pete Dye, the course originally opened in 1983. It is a private members' club. On-site facilities include Clubhouse.
Efforts to create a championship course for Chattanooga stretched back decades. In 1978 a large tract at the foot of White Oak Mountain came onto the market. Bill Taff, Jack Lupton, Lew Boyd, Bill Healy and Joel Richardson ultimately formed the core group that acquired the land and recruited additional founding members.
The founders gave Pete Dye unusually explicit operating and design goals: the course should be challenging, uncrowded, secluded from hole to hole, capable of comparison with leading courses elsewhere and free from the distractions of surrounding development. Dye also developed a water strategy that captured runoff from White Oak Mountain in man-made lakes, supplemented by a pipeline from Wolftever Creek.
Construction began July 23, 1981. Fairways were planted by June 1982 and greens followed that August. The club formally opened July 2, 1983 and immediately pursued its stated mission of hosting important amateur competitions.
The Honors Course has become one of the most significant amateur-championship venues in the United States, hosting USGA championships, NCAA finals, the Curtis Cup and recurring elite amateur events.
The club remains focused narrowly on golf and amateur competition rather than conventional country-club amenities. Its motto and operating philosophy continue to center on 'Honoring Amateur Golf.'
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