The Waverley Country Club is a

country club A country club is a privately owned club, often with a membership quota and admittance by invitation or sponsorship, that generally offers both a variety of recreational sports and facilities for dining and entertaining. Typical athletic offer ...

located in

Clackamas County Clackamas County is one of the 36 counties in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2020 census, the population was 421,401, making it Oregon's third-most populous county. Its county seat is Oregon City. The county was named after the Native ...

, Oregon United States. Chartered in 1896, the club was the second private golf club established west of the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...

History

The club was established in April 1896, with its original golf course laid out several miles northeast, in the

Richmond Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States * Richmond, London, a part of London * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, ...

neighborhood, near the present-day corner of Southeast César E. Chávez Boulevard and Powell Boulevard. Established two years after the Tacoma Country and Golf Club, Waverley was the second private golf club in the United States established west of the

. A year later, in 1897, the club moved to its present location on the east bank of the

Willamette River The Willamette River ( ) is a major tributary of the Columbia River, accounting for 12 to 15 percent of the Columbia's flow. The Willamette's main stem is long, lying entirely in northwestern Oregon in the United States. Flowing northward b ...

in unincorporated Clackamas County just south of the Sellwood neighborhood of Portland. It was built on the site of an orchard owned by Oregon pioneers

Henderson Luelling Henderson William Luelling (April 23, 1809 – December 28, 1878) was an American horticulturist, Quaker, abolitionist and early Oakland, California settler. He introduced varietal fruits to the Pacific coast, first to Oregon and later to Californ ...

and

Seth Lewelling Seth Lewelling (1820 – February 21, 1896), alternatively spelled Luelling (including by Lewelling himself), was a pioneer orchardist from the U.S. state of Oregon, best known for developing the Bing cherry. Born in 1820 in North Carolina as ...

, where Seth and his orchard foreman Ah Bing developed the

Bing cherry Bing is a cultivar of the wild or sweet cherry (''Prunus avium'') that originated in the Pacific Northwest, in Milwaukie, Oregon, United States. The Bing remains a major cultivar in Oregon,Zebian, Maureen. (8/11/2011) "'Bing' Those Cherries On!" ...

. A golf course was built at the current location in 1898. Jack Moffat, Waverley's first golf professional assisted members in routing the new course. Between May 1912 and 1924, H. Chandler Egan assisted members in establishing the current course routing, completed comprehensive bunkering and constructed numerous green complexes. Until his death in 1936, Egan continued to guide all golf course improvements. Over the past century many of Egan’s classical design elements had been overgrown, or had disappeared. In 2012,

Gil Hanse Gilbert Hanse (born August 12, 1963) is an American golf course architect. Hanse, along with his business partner Jim Wagner, was selected to design the Rio 2016 Olympic Golf Course, the first Olympic venue to host golf since 1904. Education A ...

using old photographs, was critical in recognizing the masterpiece of classic golf design Egan had imprinted upon Waverley. Today Egan’s vision can be seen in the expert restoration of numerous classic architectural elements at Waverley Country Club. The club, which was originally spelled Waverly after the Waverly-Richmond district in which it was first established, changed its name to Waverley in 1912, with some accounts blaming an engraving error for the change in spelling.

Course

Tournaments hosted

The Blyth Tournament, one of the oldest international golf matches in the United States, has been held at Waverley since 1897. The first Oregon Amateur Golf Tournament was held at Waverley in 1904. Winners of major championship tournaments held at Waverley:

References

External links

* {{Coord, 45, 27, 8.51, N, 122, 39, 12.49, W, display=title 1896 establishments in Oregon Buildings and structures in Clackamas County, Oregon Golf clubs and courses in Oregon Sports venues completed in 1896 Sports venues in Portland, Oregon