Deerwood Country Club
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| Club information | |
|---|---|
| Location | Jacksonville, Florida, US |
| Established | 1960 |
| Type | Private, member-owned |
| Operated by | Deerwood Board of Governors |
| Tournaments hosted | Greater Jacksonville Open |
| Website | www |
| Deerwood Golf Course | |
| Designed by |
George Cobb (1960) Brian Silva (2004) |
| Par | 72 |
| Length | 7,223 |
| Course rating | 75.6 |
| Course record | 64 |
Deerwood is the oldest gated community and country club in Jacksonville, Florida, US. After it was established in the mid-1960s, it was the most exclusive residential area on the south side of Jacksonville and remains so today, with round-the-clock guard service at two entrances and high standards for membership and residency. The golf course hosted the Greater Jacksonville Open in the late 1960s and early 1970s, forerunner of The Players Championship, and was once the site of talks between President Gerald Ford and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in November 1975.
Richard Green Skinner came to Jacksonville in 1899 in search of pine trees for harvesting sap to produce turpentine for his marine supply business. Land to the south and east of the St. Johns River was mostly pine trees, sand dunes or marsh; inhabited by wildlife. After 1900, the Skinner family owned close to 40,000 acres (160 km2). That land was distributed to his six sons upon his death in the 1920s. The oldest brother, Bright, and two other brothers moved to Tampa and received the land owned there. The acreage nearest to the downtown went to Ben Skinner, who built the Skinner Dairy and Farm, which was closed and developed as Southpoint in the late 1970s.
Chester and Richard were given the biggest tracts because the land was quite remote—miles from existing roads. Richard Skinner, in turn, gave his children, Richard, Jr., Bryant, and Dottie his land, including the property on which Deerwood would be built.
Bryant built the golf course in 1960-61, designed on a limited budget by notable golf course architect George Cobb. He then constructed the first home in the Deerwood development (his own) the following year. Brother Richard Jr. built his home there in 1963. In early 1962, Bryant began to outline and lay out a unique (for Jacksonville) and exclusive gated golf community that would become Deerwood. Within his rural Florida location he envisioned a neighborhood that incorporated curving roadways, panoramas, and distinctive homes on voluminous lots with large open common areas incorporating lakes, built around a country club that would feature golf, swimming and tennis. There was plenty of room for a riding stable and bridle paths. The development was named Deerwood because of an abundance of wildlife: turkeys, wild hogs, raccoons, bears and lots of deer.
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Wikipedia