De Anza Desert Country Club

Overview: De Anza Desert Country Club is an 18-hole desert course in Borrego Springs, where Lawrence Hughes’s routing works through open desert ground with broad mountain views. The course plays to par 72 and 6,778 yards, giving the site enough scale for a full-length round while retaining the spacious, dry-land character of the Anza-Borrego region.

History: The first nine holes were built in 1958, with the second nine and clubhouse completed the following year. De Anza’s history traces the project to a 1954 state-approved plan for a 400-acre golf and residential development. The course also hosted a Ryder Cup teams Pro-Am in November 1959, soon after the full routing was completed.

Did You Know? De Anza’s 1959 opening chapter is unusually well documented for a desert club. The sequence from the first nine to the completed 18-hole course explains why the club’s history distinguishes the initial construction from the finished layout.