Norwood is his only course west of the Mississippi River. Stiles was a brilliant but oft-overlooked Golden Age (1915-1935) golf course architect, whom famed golf architect and author Geoffrey Cornish calls “the most underrated golf course architect in the Northeast, if not the entire country.” https://golfclubatlas.com/feature-interview/bob-labbance-and-kevin-mendik/ Cornish, co-author of The Golf Course and The Architects of Golf, along with Ron Whitten, golf architecture editor for Golf Digest magazine. recounted that Stiles “would walk the land for weeks and weeks before a spade of dirt was ever turned,” to “lay out the course with his eyes.” He calls him “a master at routing a golf course.”
Bob Labbance and Kevin Mendik, who authored a book on Stiles and his golf courses, The Life and Work of Wayne Stiles, call Norwood’s West Course Stiles “first great golf course.” The authors favorably compare his work to that of renowned Golden Age architects A.W. Tillinghast and Donald Ross, noting that his design aesthetic is a close cousin of Tillinghast’s. Both are known for the dramatic contours of their greens and their elegant and strategic use of topography. In fact, when bringing his Norwood design to life, Stiles enlisted the help of construction superintendent Sam Lyle, who had helped Tillinghast construct his gem at San Francisco Golf Club. After helping Stiles shape Norwood’s rolling fairways and devilishly contoured greens, Lyle put down roots in St. Louis, serving as the Club’s course superintendent for the first two decades of Norwood’s life.
Stiles was a founding member of the American Society of Golf Course Architects (ASGCA), an organization that recognizes him as “one of the finest golf course architects of his era.” https://asgca.org/architect/wstiles/. Originally trained as a landscape architect, Stiles was a master of tree selection and siting, and routed and shaped his courses to highlight the beauty of the terrain, especially its elevation changes, from its most robust hills to its more modest swales and hollows, and to showcase its natural vistas. Norwood is no exception. One of Stiles’ other great courses, Taconic in Williamstown, Massachusetts, proudly resides at #62 on Golf Magazine’s Top 100 Courses You Can Play list. https://golf.com/travel/courses/best-public-golf-courses-top-100-you-can-play-2020-21/ As at Taconic, the West is fraught with the “chance of three-putting, which is the real peril on surfaces that are often perched on high spots around the property.”
It is thus not surprising that the West Course enjoys a rich history of hosting elite events, boasting among its credits a major championship, the 1948 PGA Championship (won by Ben Hogan and where, according to biographer Bob Labbance, “praise for the course was universal”); as well as multiple USGA championships, such as the 2001 USGA Senior Amateur Championship and the 2018 USGA Women's Mid-Amateur Championship. Over the years, both the PGA Tour and LPGA Tour have recognized the West’s elite quality by choosing it as a tournament venue. It is now the proud host of the Ascension Charity Golf Classic, a PGA Champions Tour event whose 2021 inaugural tournament was won by major champion David Toms. With legends Hogan, Kathy Whitworth, Louise Suggs, Lee Trevino, Gene Littler, and Toms all having raised trophies at Norwood, it is one of the rare courses whose shot-making and flatstick demands consistently identify great champions.
Stretching to just beyond 7,000 yards and playing to a Par 71, the West is one of the best in St. Louis, with greens unmatched in their contour and conditioning. True to Golden Age course design, the West features rolling, undulating fairways and strategic contoured greens, requiring accurate driving and deft, precision iron-play to get close to the pin or even hold the green. The front nine climbs up, down, and across ridges: down a valley and up a ridge on Hole 2, a par-5 with a multi-tiered green; playing through ridges on Hole 6 and up to a dramatic, punch bowl green; and culminating on the difficult par-4 ninth, with its demanding drive to a right-to-left sloping fairway, and then over a dell to a devilish, false fronted green. The back nine, especially holes 13-18, is a stern test, with more elevation changes, demanding driving holes, and one of the most muscular and challenging finishes in the region. The par five 15th was recently re-crafted per a re-design plan conceived by architect Mike Riley, who worked for many years as a design associate with Bob Crupp and Jack Nicklaus, and who grew up caddying and playing at New Jersey’s Somerset Hills Country Club, a Tillinghast Golden Age masterpiece. The West Course is ready to escort you back to golf’s Golden Age, demand your best, and reignite your love for the game.