“God builds golf links and the less man meddles the better for all concerned.”  - W. Herbert Fowler

1921 - Ambassador Golf Club (W. Herbert Fowler)

 In July of 1921 a great exhibition golf tournament was held to celebrate the opening of the new Ambassador link's. Guests on the opening day included many of Southern California's best golfers including Dr Paul Hunter, Jack Neville, Jimmy Simpson and MacDonald Smith as well as Max Behr, Scotty Armstrong, Everett Seaver, C.H. Palmer and Ambassador pro Arthur Clarkson.

According to the July 17, 1921 Los Angeles Times - "The scores registered by the athletes afford ample proof of the severity of the course. Fowler has trapped it and bunkered it, taken advantage of all natural resources, such as barranca, hill and the ocean wind, and manufactured a real championship test of golf."

 By the spring of 1922 the club had changed it's name to the Rancho Golf Club and the course was modified after poor results with the fairway grass forced 'winter rules' to prevail.

At the end of 1922 Sawtelle residents voted to be annexed into the City of Los Angeles and Rancho Golf Club made plans to have a reliable city water supply which allowed the club to hire contractor / architect Billy Bell to refurbish the original Fowler course that included installing a new irrigation system that could better grow grass on the bare hills while also enlarging some tees and widening some of the fairways. The clubhouse locker room and restaurant were also improved for the expanding membership of the club and it's visitors.

With a smartly up-rated clubhouse the course was soon a mainstay of tournament golf in Southern California hosting numerous exhibitions with Tommy Armour, Walter Hagen, Gene Sarazen, Bobby Jones, Francis Ouimet, Archie Compston and it was also the home to the championship Rancho Golf Club whose teams and players would win Southern Californian, Regional and National golf championships for the next 10 years with Rancho members Willie Hunter, George Von Elm, Scotty Chisholm, Cheif Soldano, Howard Hughes, Duke Kahanamoku, Leon Keller, and many others.

The course continued operating throughout the 1930's attracting the infamous yearly M.G.M Tournament and many other special amateur and professional events. After Pearl Harbor the course also hosted tournaments for war bonds that were held until the summer of 1943 when the lease and the second 10 year management of the course came to an end. 

In 1944 a large fire burned from west to east along Pico Boulevard destroying most of the front nine and almost getting the old abandoned clubhouse as well.

Since 1933 when the course was seized the City of Los Angeles had been trying to get Rancho from the Federal Government. After 13 years of wrangling and dealing which included court cases with the Fed's and the County, they took legal possession of the land and golf course in 1946.

They then hired now legend and Rancho old hand Billy Bell to tear up the old course and design a new Championship course to be paid for completely out of green fee's from the other jewels in city hands the Griffith Park golf courses. The design brief asked for holes suited to the left to right fade shot of the average golfer while retaining some of the hilly feel of the old Rancho Fowler course.

1946 plan for the Rancho

From March 1946 to September 1948 the largest hills on the property were cut down and re-graded by mammoth earth movers that moved one and a quarter million cubic yards of earth around the 184.6 acre property. In all, 20,000 trees and shrubs were planted including a single redwood which still stands behind the driving range today.

Billy Bell had assistance from legendary Rancho golfer George Von Elm in the design of the new course which retained remnants of the old Fowler course on the present hole #13 which it was said was the only recognizable hole from the old course.

Bell and Von Elm also worked with the Department of Parks and Recreations superintendent William Johnson in the design of the course and of the par 3 pitch and putt course which was built over the old 1st green and along the old 2nd hole. Lakeside Amateur Champion Johnny Dawson has also been credited with assisting Billy Bell in the new layout.

The new 6,643 yard par 71 course was first played on by Maurie Luxford, George Von Elm, Willie Hunter, Billy Bell, Johnny Dawson, Bill Johnson, C Cunningham and Harold Dawson to rate the course for the upcoming U.S.G.A. Public links Championship proudly held on Los Angeles' new golf course gem. The opening tournament and subsequent tournaments were a great success.

For the opening festivities put together by Parks and Recreation Department President Maurie Luxford an exhibition match was played between Bob Hope and Johnny Dawson who were defeated by George Von Elm and Bruce McCormick. Bob was 'beaten but not silenced' according to the Times and shot a not too pretty 85.

In 1952 after swapping the greens and tees on the 10th hole, now the present 18th, and the 9th hole, now the 10th, the Driving range was nearing completion in this 1952 aerial.

In 1968 the tour went to Brookside for one year which gave the city time to update the Rancho clubhouse adding air conditioning and sprucing up the locker area and also carrying out additional work enlarging some of the tees and paths around the course. 200 new trees were also planted with 1,700 trimmed and 56 Tons of fresh sand trucked in for the bunkers. The driving range was also leveled and planted with sod and surrounded by a new fence.

After 16 years, the second to last Los Angeles Open was played at Rancho in 1972.

Archer loved Rancho where he had played his first PGA Tour event and also where he had won the last LA Open played on Rancho in 1972 as did Arnold Palmer who won all 3 of his LA Opens at Rancho.

With two legendary championship courses having occupied the land in succession over it's 87 year history the Rancho Rincon de Los Buelles has remained at the very heart of American golf and has grown in parallel with the development of the game of golf and of golf course design throughout golf's history.

Special Thanks to the Amateur Athletic Foundation, the Los Angeles Public Library, the University of California at Santa Barbara, the Los Angeles Deparment of Recreation and Parks, Google Earth, Charles Vides, and Scotty Chisholm, for help with this article.