Behind Closed Doors: Oakmont’s Storied Clubhouse

Behind Closed Doors: Oakmont’s Storied Clubhouse

[Music] one of the really neat features of the lockers is when you open them up every locker features a little hidden locker inside of it and every one of these lockers is a booze locker that was designed and installed during prohibition that way the players would get done with their round and still be able to have a weed drip it’s part of the history here so even the new lockers get built with that little uh booze locker as they call them around here so the benches here at the club are as old as the club itself and you look down and you could see all these old pock marks from the old metal spikes you literally have the footprints of the game’s greatest players bobby Jones Arnold Palmer Jack Nicholas Tiger Woods they’ve all changed their shoes on these benches and literally their footprints are stamped into time the history and the heritage here is so important to the membership it’s the reason why you know our clubhouse is is the way it is you know the the legacy dating back to the phones is in every subsequent generation they’ve always wanted it to feel how Mr phones intended it to be when he opened this place in 1903 and into 1904 so you know the heritage here the history here is so important to the members to the staff trying to give the modern amenities but keep that historic feel to the club and I think we’ve done a fantastic job of that when we talk about Oakmont it always makes the most sense to start from the very beginning and the gentleman that is the reason that we are here today is this guy right here his name is Henry C phones he was born in Pittsburgh in 1856 and just like the majority of the wealthy elite in Pittsburgh at the turn of the century Henry made his fortunes in iron and steel he and his brother owned a company called the Kerry Furnace Company which is over in Rankin PA along the Mananga River and at one point it was one of the most profitable blast furnaces in western Pennsylvania so profitable in fact that it was sold to CargI Steel in 1898 which made Henry an incredibly wealthy man at a relatively young age so a couple years go by in 1903 Henry and a and a group of guys create the Oakmont Land Company and they purchased this original 191 acres here in Oakmont to create what became Oakmont Country Club which is officially incorporated in June of 1903 that fall Henry and a team of 150 men and two dozen horses and mules set out to create arguably one of the best golf courses in the world they created the layout that is now the US hope and host for this year Oakmont Country Club the golf course opened on October 1st 1904 it played at 6,46 yards and a par of 80 and there are plenty of people around that will tell you it should still be a par 80 but what Henry created here at Oakmont has withtood the test of time for the last 120 years the way he created these green complexes the angles of attack into these greens you know the undulations of the land it is what makes Oakmont one of the most difficult golf courses on the planet and it’s a reason why despite all the technology and all the you know the athleticism of today’s modern golfer it is still one of the toughest championship tests uh on the major rotation every year as the golf course opened in October 1st 1904 the clubhouse opened with it the clubhouse here at Oakmont Country Club was designed by a local architect named Edward St who designed numerous buildings around the city of Pittsburgh but when it comes to the clubhouse here what Henry wanted was more of a quaint Scottish farmhouse that would blend in uh to the surroundings and you know as you play the golf course when you’re out on the especially on the far side of the turnpike you know the clubhouse really kind of blends into the surroundings it doesn’t necessarily stand out from a distance but as you return to the clubhouse up number nine and up number 18 the clubhouse you know kind of reemerges with you on that walk and it becomes you know such an important part of the landscape and it’s a testament to Edward St and what he designed for Henry back in 1904 the original budget for the clubhouse was $25,000 and when Sts was done it came in at about 38,000 so quite a bit over budget but Mr phones was happy with what Stats provided and it’s been a part of our culture since the very beginning the building is basically symmetrical with three gabled sections and you see here in the use of half timbering which in England or in Tudtor Revival architecture generally would probably be brown you most often see it painted brown but it makes perfect sense that here is painted green to sort of reflect the landscape it would have been a very very welcoming place to enter after playing on this course it really does exemplify the sort of domestic English that starts was looking for and I I would think that the phones were extremely pleased so the original clubhouse is uh the structure here from this tall gable over to the other tall gable this area here the ballroom and the phones room wouldn’t be added till later the ballroom gets added in 1925 so when the club first opened players would come in from town get dropped off at Holton Station here in Oakmont and they would take a horse and buggy taxi up the hill you would come through the main gate and you would come around the drive around this corner here and the front door was actually right here on this set of steps you would get dropped off by your horse and buggy here you would go in the front door go upstairs change your shoes come back down and then return to the first tea which is right here to my [Music] right this was the original entrance one of the most interesting architectural features of the clubhouse I think are these fan lights I guess you would call them around the doorway it’s kind of exemplary of the building in that the style of the building is a kind of what starts called domestic English architecture and so there’s a very human homey kind of character to it it’s a really lovely embellishment that that sustains the domestic character of clubhouse at the same time that it lends a little refinement and elegance to it so the one question we’re always asked uh when it comes to the history of Oakmont is when were women first allowed to play golf here when were they first allowed to become members ladies have always been welcome to play golf here henry Phones’s daughter his nieces were all very prominent golfers at the time so women have always been a major part of Oakmont’s history here even if their tournament history didn’t necessarily start on the national level until the 1990s but this is the ladies locker room uh it is arguably one of the best spots in the clubhouse for the ladies to hang out beautiful original wood lockers with the metal lattice um every locker is built to the same specification so even if they add lockers they try to recreate it as best they can to this original look and the one thing about the ladies locker room that is significantly different than the men’s is the ladies locker room is air conditioned uh which the ladies are are very appreciative of where the men’s locker room has never been airond conditioned and if the gentlemen have their way and most likely never will be but the ladies locker room offers you know just the the great amenities that uh the same amenities really that the men enjoy and even more so because of the air conditioning so this is the men’s grill that we’re standing in right now during the golf season this is the the guys solitary hangout they could come in here have uh lunch and dinner during the off seasonason the ladies are allowed to come in and have dinner um but during the season it is the the gentleman’s hangout and you know this is really the one room in the club that’s kind of geared more towards the members all the the champion boards are on the wall in here the president’s board is on the wall in here um and it’s really just a great room to sit down and have a meal you have the 18th hole right behind us here at the clubhouse you kind of get a beautiful view of the golf course as you sit here and eat and it it truly is one of the most special rooms in the clubhouse welcome to the iconic Oakmont locker room this is one of the rooms that really is still a throwback to the old days the the locker room here in Oakmont has changed very very little over the 120 plus years of the club’s history all the lockers even the new ones are built to the same specifications this style wood with the knobs the metal lattice and one of the really neat features of the lockers is when you open them up every locker features a little hidden locker inside of it and every one of these lockers is a booze locker that was designed and installed during prohibition that way the players would get done with their round and still be able to have a weed drip and even till this day as they’re built they’re still built with them even though obviously prohibition is not is a thing of the distant past but you know it’s it’s part of the history here so even the new lockers get built with that little uh booze locker as as they call them around here so the benches here at the club are as old as the club itself and you look down and you can see all these old pock marks from the old metal spikes and most of the benches here have not been touched over the 120 years so you you literally have the footprints of the game’s greatest players bobby Jones Arnold Palmer Jack Nicholas Tiger Woods they’ve all changed their shoes on these benches and literally their footprints are stamped into time so one of the important amenities for any locker room is the showers and uh there are several members here that will tell you that Oakmont has the best showers in all of golf uh and we have a very traveled membership that have played some of the best courses and clubs across the globe with these showerheads and the water pressure and everything they say it truly is one of the best amenities in all golf so one of the unique things about Oakmont uh the cell phone policy in the locker room you are allowed to use your cell phone but they still ask if you’re going to make a phone call that you go into one of our one of two remaining phone booths uh so you go in there you have a little desk to take notes and uh you know it’s really just a throwback to a different time if you go to make a phone call you know this is a thing of the past for most places but you know in a club like this it’s still a major part of our history and a major part of Americana here at Oakmont the members game is known as the SWAT uh it dates back to WC phones and the founding of the club and it is played weekly and on every holiday we have records dating back to the 1950s and this room here is the men’s SWAT room so uh every Wednesday Friday and weekends and holidays the the SWAT goes out this room here is where they congregate the teams are formed they get come in get changed in the locker room find out their team go out for their tea time play a match and come back in and everybody commiserates one of the really really neat things about the SWAT is they have kept detailed records dating back to 1955 and in this display case here you have all the SWAT books with every record of the SWAT dating back to 1955 all the way to today meticulously kept records how much money has been exchanged how many points were earned that day the teams it’s not just the members that play guests play it ahead of the US Open a lot of the professionals will play in it in fact our book from 1973 right before the US Open features Arnold Palmer and Julius Burroughs who would go on to be the 54 hole leaders of the tournament and they played in that that squad immediately preceding the 1973 US Open you know one of the other neat features is you know you can look along the ceiling here and you’ll see uh playing cards with dollar bills tacked to the ceiling and this actually uh one of our members is friends with a magician that this is his famous card trick that you know he not exactly sure the mechanics of it but somehow you you sign your card you put it back in the deck with a dollar bill he does this trick you shoot it up with a rubber band and it sticks to the ceiling and you’ll notice that there’s you know a few random bills up there but there’s only one that’s framed and if you look at the gentleman that signed that ace it’s Arnold Palmer and that’s Arnold Palmer’s dollar bill and his card uh from from that particular magic [Music] trick this is known as the Champions Grill on the wall behind me you can see there’s a photo of each one of our 20 national champions here at Oakmont but one of the really really cool things about this room is the floor that we’re walking on this is the original hardwood floor dating back to the opening of the club in 1904 and if you look just like the benches in the locker room you can see those little black pock marks that are literally the footsteps of champions bobby Jones Ben Hogan Jack Nicholas Arnold Palmer Tiger Woods have literally left their footprints on this floor here at Oakmont to me this is one of the most masterful elements of the entire building the use of what’s called Roman brick these thin bricks uh which I might note were very popular with Franklidd Wright who was actually starting his career right about the time that Stz was designing this building as we’ve seen in other buildings around town by St the use of brick in different ways so right above the fireplace it’s a vertical to create a kind of almost like a little keystone effect and then this wonderful wood carving that surmounts the actual fireplace um with the OG arches that terminate in these little fluid deilli elements so it is a really great sort of incorporation within the interior of the design aesthetic of the exterior the bar here actually isn’t original to this room uh it was originally at a bar downtown called Froggies and when Froggies closed about 15 20 years ago now a couple of our members were very good friends with the owner and they decided to buy Froggy’s Bar and the reason being is this is Europeanmade but it dates to 1903 which of course is the year that Oakmont was founded so the bar here is uh of vintage of the same age of the club and what’s really neat is if you can hit the angle right with the light on the mirrors you can still see some of the old chalk and marker lettering of you know the specials for that day and things like that and then the other great feature is this picture here of our ninth hole from the 1927 US Open so right here this is Bobby Jones putting which you know the green is right here to my right and tending the flag is WC Phones Jr who was the son of Oakmont’s founder Henry Phones but also at the point of this picture was the president of the USGAA it’s just such a unique piece and really a piece of Pittsburgh history that was saved after Froggies uh closed their doors for the last time pittsburgh is it’s one of the best cities in the world oakmont’s one of the best clubs in the world and the relationship between the two is so special um you know we’re we’re founded on you know Pittsburgh steel uh with Henry Phones’s earlier career in the steel industry and you know all the titans of Pittsburgh industry from the first days of the club really till now you know the the titans of industry here in the city are members here you know you think of Pittsburgh as this great sports city with the Steelers and the Penguins and the Pirates the last 120 years and you know Oakmont’s no different we are a major part of this uh the city of champions as we’re known 10 US Opens 21 national championships as of this June you know our our history here is just another important piece of the fabric of sports history in Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh’s overall history [Music] this space really exemplifies the domestic character of the clubhouse as a whole that starts was seeking you have a staircase that you could find in any home of you know middle class or upper middle class home at the time ballister nothing at all uh ornamental or extraordinary about it but you have this sense of you can imagine people coming down these steps prepared to play golf in the t at the turn of the 20th century and making a kind of entrance here almost as if there’s a kind of procession down to the golf course so one of the things that has been sort of lost to history here at Oakmont is the history of the furrowed bunkers so when the course was first founded the sand bunkers was not you know your prototypical golf sand that you’re used to today the original bunkers here were filled with river sand from the nearby Alageney River so it was coarse it was dense it was pebble filled and the way that they raked it to really create a a true penalty for finding a bunker is what they called the furrows so this rake right here which weighs about 50 lbs features 4-in long steel tines and you would rake the bunker perpendicular to the hole and it would create these furrows that you can see here in this fantastic picture from 1953 and what it would ultimately create is these ridges here and imagine your golf ball lands in it and you’re going to be in between one of these ridges the only way to get clear contact on the ball would be to pitch out sideways which is what the phones has intended you to do if you tried to advance the ball forward you would have had to go through this mound to get to the ball and then through this furrow as well making it very very difficult to actually get out of any bunker so really on a golf course that has no water tra you know water or anything like that the bunkers were the true penalty and as far as the phones were concerned a shot misplayed was a shot irrevocably lost so if you found the bunker what they wanted you to do was to chip out and it became such a controversy that in 1953 the players actually threatened to boycott the US Open until there was an agreement made that the furrows would be taken out of the fairway bunkers but remain around the greenside bunker so if you look at this picture right here you can see this is our pro-lam at the time hitting out of the furrows around a greenside bunker during the 1953 US Open phones believed in a true Darwinian test of man versus golf course many of boys that would come up every spring hoping to be caddies and if they couldn’t lift that rake they weren’t ready to be a caddy quite yet this year these are the four championship trophies of the USGA championships we have hosted at Oakmont that we were allowed to display so the two here on the left are the Havomire trophies that were that are awarded annually to the champion of the US amer this trophy here on the left this more Victorian era trophy is the original Havamire that was awarded from 1895 through 1925 the last time this trophy was awarded was here to Bobby Jones at the 1925 US Amter following his win he took the trophy home to East Lake Golf Club and tragically the trophy was lost in a fire that November and the following year the USGA had to come up with a new trophy and they created this more modern sleek design of the trophy here on the right so since we have hosted a US amer prior to and post 1926 we are allowed to display both versions of the Havier trophy and then when you come down here these are our replicas for the two opens of course the men’s US Open trophy here on the lefthand side and then the Harton Simple trophy awarded annually to the champion of the US Women’s Open on the right hand side each of these four trophies are 90% scale replicas they’re created by a silver smmith firm out of London and we are one of only three clubs in the United States that can display these four trophies it’s us Baltus Roll in New Jersey and then Newport Country Club in Rhode Island this is my favorite room in the clubhouse it’s where I spend the most time because it’s where most of our history sits this is what we call history hall uh this hallway here is dedicated to each of our now 10 US Open championships each US Open gets a display case filled with memorabilia from the champion and the championship as well as photographs from the event above it each one of these display cases was actually just renovated over the winter so we’re you showing off about 75% of the photos are new photos a lot of the stuff in the display cases are new pieces that both the members and the guests have haven’t seen maybe ever um it truly is one of the most special places in the club and really shows off the tournament history here at Oakmont so this display case here is to the 1935 US Open which we talked about a little earlier with Sam Parks uh the Pittsburgh native that that really was a dark horse Cinderella story when he claimed the national championship here in 1935 but one of my favorite artifacts and one with one of the best stories behind it happens to be this ticket in the display case so during the 1935 US Open uh it was uncovered that there was a counterfeit ticket operation going on during the first round of the championship when 100 or about 1,500 tickets were sold by the club in the USGA and 4,000 people showed up and the newspapers uh at the time highlighted the story um as well as the championship saying that the counterfeits were so good that the only way you could tell whether they were a fake ticket or a real ticket was the coloring around the edge was slightly off and the hole punch for the the string to attach to your lapel was slightly bigger than the actual tickets so this is the only example of a 1935 US Open ticket that we have here at the club i have no idea if it’s a real ticket or if it’s one of the counterfeits and I I think it’s one of the best stories that we have in this hallway you know the periscopes were before the grandstands that’s how you saw when the crowds were 10 12 15 people deep so you hold it up there’s two mirrors in there and you would get to see the action over the people in front of you so this picture is from the 1962 US Open but we have uh one from the 1953 uh open in in that display case and we do actually have one of these down in the archives so this display case is for the 1973 US Open here at Oakmont which is arguably our most famous championship to date because of what Johnny Miller accomplished on Sunday that year when he shot that magical 63 the best piece of this display case is the putter that came from Johnny Miller himself and it’s an old bullseye putter that is marked Johnny M as you can see there and if you look it is the exact putter that he used to win the US Open because here he is putting out on 18 and you can very clearly see that putter in full view of the camera it was given to us directly from Johnny Miller a number of years ago it’s arguably one of the best pieces that we have here at the club in our collection and it’s always prominently shown right here in history hall this is the 2007 US Open display case uh honoring Anel Cabrera for his victory here that year and you know of all the the great things that we have in these display cases from clubs from the champions and you know the oldfashioned periscopes and and things like that sentimentally personally my favorite artifacts are these two cigarette butts that are in the display case so uh my endearing memory of the 2007 US Open especially that final round is Anel Cabrera smoking cigarettes between every single shot throughout that round and when we put these display cases together and we got the caddy bib from uh Mr cabrera uh in the front pocket was all those Marorrow cigarette butts and you know I remember sitting home watching that championship uh as a as a teenager and that enduring memory of him just constantly smoking to calm his nerves and you know uh it it’s just such a a a silly but important part of that story an important part of that championship so when you come through History Hall you look in the 2007 display case you will see a couple of those cigarette butts in there with his caddyy bib and it to me is just such an important part of the story so this room here is actually one of the newest rooms in the clubhouse this area between the ballroom and history hall this room what we call the phones room has been changed and alterated a number of times over the last 100 years or so and this room was specifically created as a corporate hospitality room to overlook the first T for a US Open but it’s dedicated to our founders Henry Phones and his son William C phones Jr who would go on to be president of the USGAA so the room features artifacts from the two of them what highlighted here by this wonderful painting that was created about 10 years ago by Tom Pinch showing father and son uh from an original picture of the first golf team here at Oakmont from 1903 and then the display cases here feature various artifacts related to the phones family some of the best are in this case here including this small metal on the top shelf that is WC Phones’s USGA President’s Badge and we actually have a photo right around the corner and you could see it on his lapel as he presents the US Open trophy to Bobby Jones in 1926 as USGA president and then tucked away in the corner here but certainly still of massive importance this is the original rendering of the clubhouse that was created by Edward Stson in 1902 for Henry Phones so as you can see here the color is a little different it’s more of a beige but you have that wraparound porch that was originally constructed and then eventually this would be turned into the the sitting room off of the current porches um but this is what Edward Sts had originally designed for Henry Phones and this is what eventually came to be in 1904 this room here is what we call the phones library all golf books on the right side here um the library here is dedicated more to WC Phones um and some of the really neat things that we have on display are his gold medals from his various wins so in here we have um some of his gold medals from his Western Pennsylvania Golf uh amateur championship victories and the Pennsylvania State Amter Championship uh which he won four times and uh he won the Westpen Amter eight times in his career we have some more of his medals on the other wall couple of his photos from when he was USGA president and if you remember back to the phone’s room that little lapel uh metal on his lapel as you can see here in that picture as he presents the trophy to Bobby Jones it’s right there on his lapel and then we have this great uh portrait of WC in front of the clubhouse as it looked back in the day you know WC Phones is arguably one of the most important people in American golf history that you know kind of gets overlooked in an era of the great amateur champions such as Jones and We Met and and Jerome Travers and um and Chick Evans but you know WC Phones was probably a top 10 player in the country during his era he won the US Amter 1910 he won eight Western Pennsylvania Amiter titles two Westpen Open titles four Pennsylvania Aminer titles helped get the Walker Cup going played on the Pennsylvania Leslie Cup team a number of times and then you know as his playing days loomed became an executive committee member with the USGA vice president and eventually president of the USGA so you know WC Phones is arguably one of the most important figures in early American golf history and you know here he’s he’s very very important to [Music] us so we’re in one of the new dorm rooms here in the clubhouse this entire third floor was redone last year to create uh 12 new overnight rooms for members and their guests so we’re currently sitting in the 1983 room each of the 12 rooms are numbered after our US Opens and our US women’s open so and all the photos uh in each room correspond with that particular championship so of course we have a picture of Larry Nelson from 1983 it was totally common when a clubhouse was built that there would be overnight accommodation rooms a lot of them were actually for the you know the the general manager and some of the staff but there was always rooms available for the the membership uh here in particular there was probably about 10 rooms that were available for overnight stay for the members because again you know in 1904 this is out in the country if the you missed the last train to Pittsburgh which I believe was about 7:30 each evening you were stuck here so you at least had a room to stay overnight uh with some good accommodations and you know the the club is trying to continue that to this day uh we could sleep about 40 guests overnight on the property including 12 in the clubhouse your entire experience is here you don’t have to leave to go stay in a hotel you don’t have to leave for meals you literally come in the front gate and your entire experience is right here and you know for for Oakmont it’s such a huge part of the experience you know the golf course is always going to be first to foremost but you know they they want your experience with your dining and your accommodations to be just as top-notch is what they printed on the golf [Music]

In today’s ever-changing golf landscape, how does a historic club keep its traditions intact? There’s no greater example than Oakmont Country Club, host of the 2025 U.S. Open. History’s greatest golfers have literally made their marks here, and will continue to for generations to come.

Which of the greatest golf clubhouses in the world should we visit next? Drop a comment below to nominate your favorite.

0:00 Welcome to Oakmont
1:34 Oakmont’s Origins
2:32 The U.S. Open Test
3:27 Building the Clubhouse
4:38 Exterior Architecture
6:01 Original Entrance
6:41 Ladies’ Locker Room
7:48 Men’s Grill
8:29 Men’s Locker Room
11:05 SWAT Room
13:07 Champions’ Grill
16:54 Living Room
19:41 The Trophies
21:03 History Hall
25:37 Fownes Room
27:18 Fownes Library
29:05 Overnight Rooms

—–
At GOLF.com, we’re here to help you live well, play well. From the Top 100 Courses in the World to the Top 100 Teachers in America, we connect you with the places and people that make golf the greatest game in the world. Our personalities provide exclusive access to Tour pros, celebrities, and golf’s colorful characters. Subscribe to our YouTube channel, visit GOLF.com, and follow us for the latest Tour news, interviews, gear reviews, and features you won’t find anywhere else.

Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/golf_com
—–
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/golf_com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GOLF_com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/golf
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@golf_com