Lake Shore Country Club was organized in 1908 on what had been Beck’s Farm along the Glencoe lakeshore. In 1909 the club brought in the Olmsted firm—Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. and John Charles Olmsted—to plan the grounds so that buildings, circulation, and recreation areas related to the topography without overwhelming the lake bluff. The clubhouse commission went separately to Chicago architect Howard Van Doren Shaw. Golf development occurred in this same 1909–1910 window: period golf journals and later research credit Tom Bendelow with laying out the course, and contemporary notes indicate construction activity around January 1910.
Donald Ross’s involvement was not an original design but a remodeling. Newspaper notices and compiled research indicate that Ross was engaged “around 1921” to rework the existing eighteen holes and that he returned in 1923 to make additional changes. A plan associated with the club from this period even contemplated 27 holes, though available evidence suggests that Lake Shore remained an 18-hole facility through the 1920s. The Tribune items cited by researchers (February 6 and May 6, 1921; October 24, 1923) place Ross on site in this timeframe; the “course plan” image often reproduced alongside these notices does not resemble Ross’s office drawings and was likely prepared locally, a caution for attributing details solely from that sheet.
Ross’s 1921–1923 work occurred during his concentrated Chicago-area activity (including nearby Northmoor and Evanston), and Lake Shore’s club history today lists him—after Olmsted Jr. and Bendelow—among the architects who shaped the course’s greens and strategy. What portion of Ross’s recommendations were fully built in the early 1920s remains imperfectly documented without consulting club files; one modern account by consulting architect J. Drew Rogers notes that the club retains copies of Ross plans and implies that implementation at the time was “limited,” which would explain the persistent mix of features from several eras.
Subsequent modernization is also part of Lake Shore’s story. In 1971 Dick Nugent and Bob Lohmann made further alterations; beginning in 2004 and continuing into the late 2010s, Ron Prichard guided a historically sympathetic “facelift” that included bunker and green-surround attention and iterative refinement of features. The club’s outward communications continue to credit Prichard for the most recent round of renovation.
Unique Design Characteristics
Because Lake Shore sits on a confined, bluff-edge property cut by ravines, both the original and later architects were constrained—and inspired—by the same terrain. The present routing uses the ravines repeatedly, especially on the outward holes, to influence drives and approaches. Even without full access to the Ross plan set, the club’s own description emphasizes greens as the locus of architectural identity, crediting Bendelow and Ross among those who molded them; on the ground this is experienced as predominantly back-to-front tilts with strategic bunkering biased to one side, often asking for approaches from preferred angles off the tee. On the front nine, for example, the par-fives at No. 7 and No. 9 (both over 520 yards from the Champ tees) bracket a run of mid-length par fours where ravine carries and placement precede smallish targets; on the back nine, a short par three (No. 14, ~120 yards from Champ) punctuates a sequence of longer par fours (Nos. 15–18) in which approach control to canted greens tends to decide the hole. These hole-by-hole characteristics are verifiable from published yardage/pars and align with the club’s summary of how its “greens” carry the historical DNA.
Identifying, with certainty, which specific Lake Shore greens and bunkers are “pure Ross” is not currently possible from open-source materials. Given the acknowledged 1971 work and the extended Prichard program after 2004, the most plausible surviving Ross fingerprints would be on greens and approaches that still present simple pad construction, pronounced fall-offs forward or to one side, and diagonal bunkering that keys off drive angles—features consistent with the period and terrain.
Historical Significance
Within Ross’s Midwestern portfolio, Lake Shore is instructive as a remodel of a Bendelow/Olmsted-era course rather than a new ground-up. It sits geographically between more thoroughly documented works (Skokie’s 1914 Ross rebuild; Northmoor’s early-1920s work) and shows how Ross adapted an already popular North Shore club whose lakefront setting and circulation were set by non-golf master planning. Its competitive record includes hosting the inaugural Illinois PGA Championship in 1922, won by Lake Shore professional Eddie Loos over Jock Hutchison, evidence that the venue held stature in the Chicago golf scene in the exact window following Ross’s engagement. While Lake Shore is not commonly singled out in national “Ross rankings,” it contributes to the regional narrative of the 1910s–1920s when North Shore clubs were refashioning earlier layouts to keep pace with equipment and competitive golf.
Current Condition / Integrity
Today’s Lake Shore is best described as a layered Ross course. The routing remains compact and ravine-driven, but significant elements reflect later campaigns. The 1971 Nugent/Lohmann changes introduced modern lines and some new construction; the 2004–2020 Prichard program sought to re-emphasize classic green sizes, fairway widths, and bunker placements without claiming a museum-grade reset. Course-wide yardage now reaches 6,844 yards at par 71, with rating/slope reported in the mid-70s/140 from various back tees—numbers consistent with a historic course adapted for contemporary play. Bunkers and drainage have seen iterative upgrades in the past two decades, and the club continues to describe the course as “classic parkland” with greens at the center of the challenge. In sum, the integrity of Ross’s 1921–1923 work is partial: strategic ideas likely persist in green locations and approach asks; detailing and surrounds show the imprint of later architects, with Prichard’s interventions the most visible today.
Sources & Notes
Lake Shore Country Club — “Our Course” and “History” pages (accessed 2024–2025). The club credits Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., Tom Bendelow, and Donald Ross for shaping the greens and notes recent renovations by Ron Prichard; overview language also describes the course as a classic parkland with ravines by Lake Michigan.
U.S. National Park Service, Lake Shore Country Club site entry and Olmsted Archives pages summarizing the 1909 engagement of John Charles and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. to plan the property.
GolfClubAtlas discussion, “Reunderstanding Ross,” posts referencing Feb. 6, 1921, May 6, 1921, and Oct. 24, 1923 Chicago Tribune notices; thread notes Ross “came in around 1921 and reworked the 18 holes,” returning in 1923, and cautions that a widely circulated “course plan” appears to be a club drawing rather than a Ross office plan. Verification needed from club archives and Tribune originals.
J. Drew Rogers, Lake Shore County Club (project page). Summarizes the club’s design lineage, mentions Bendelow’s early role, and states that Ross plans survive but were “apparently” only partially implemented; records Nugent/Lohmann work in 1971 and Prichard’s program beginning in 2004 and extending toward 2020.
Vinci Hamp / von Weise Associates and SCK Architecture project pages (clubhouse and campus renovations; confirm Shaw’s original clubhouse and repeated modernization of non-golf facilities on site).
Illinois PGA historical features and championship list (documents that the first Illinois PGA Championship was played in 1922, won by Eddie Loos, then of Lake Shore CC; some narrative articles note the event was staged at Westmoreland, with Lake Shore’s professional winning; tournament hosting references vary by source).