Mission Hills Country Club

Overview: Mission Hills Country Club is a historic Tom Bendelow parkland layout in the Kansas City garden community of Mission Hills. Tree-lined fairways, mature hardwoods, Brush Creek and traditional bunkering give the course a settled, classic character. The directory lists it at 6,454 yards and par 70. The design is shaped by the relationship between the creek, wooded hills and small valleys, producing a strategic round that rewards placement and thoughtful approaches rather than brute force.

History: Mission Hills Country Club was built in 1914 as part of the planned community envisioned by J. C. Nichols, whose garden-city principles used wooded hills, streams and green spaces as a framework for development. Tom Bendelow designed the original course, which became part of the green belt around the Kansas City suburb. A major renovation associated with Keith Foster rebuilt tees, fairways, greens and bunkers, improved drainage and stabilised Brush Creek; the course reopened on June 30, 2007. The present layout therefore combines an early twentieth-century Bendelow foundation with a substantial modern restoration.

Did You Know? The City of Mission Hills describes three golf courses as part of the community's surrounding green belt. Mission Hills Country Club is thus part of a broader landscape plan in which streams, valleys, art and golf were designed to work together.