Designed By Alexander Findlay

Once Tavistock Country Club was incorporated, the next important item of business was to design and build a golf course. Alexander Findlay, a Scot who came to America in 1887, was hired to design said course. Findlay is known as one of the very first golf course architects in the US. Unlike many of the early Scottish pros and green keepers like Donald Ross or Willie Park Jr., Findlay sailed to the US not intending to be in the golf business, but simply to make a better life for himself. When he got off the boat, golf did not (or barely) exist in the country. It was through his love, passion, and longing for the game that he manufactured his own clubs and laid out one of the earliest courses on the continent on an unknown pasture in Nebraska in 1887. Eventually enough people noticed him and fell in love with this great game themselves and Findlay was able to make golf his career introducing people to the game of golf through designing courses, building clubs, and making golf balls.

Findlay’s golf courses can be found across the country, but it seems like his best work can be found in the Pennsylvania/Philadelphia region at Llanerch, Manor, Galen Hall and of course, Tavistock. These courses have similar characteristics with mounds, narrow trench-like bunkers and flowing green contours. Findlay’s courses were built very early in the history of American golf, but contained far more golden age characteristics than most of the Victorian Age courses which were often comparable to a steeple chase layout. With Tavistock as Findlay’s best remaining course, holes like #1, 10, 11, 12, 17 are some of the best examples of his style and most authentic remaining holes, although they had much different numbers back in his time (#1 was the same, but #18 today was 13, and the course finished on #9). It's no surprise that these holes have some of the best greens and most imaginative features on the golf course.