San Francisco Golf Club

Overview: San Francisco Golf Club occupies rolling, tree-lined ground in the city's Ingleside district, where A.W. Tillinghast shaped a private course around strategic bunkering, demanding approaches and finely contoured bentgrass greens. The property is secluded despite its urban setting. Its interest comes from the way the routing uses slopes, angles and changes of direction, asking players to manage position and trajectory rather than simply chase distance.

History: The club traces its origins to 1895 and moved to its present site in 1915, where Tillinghast laid out the course that defines its reputation today. A freeway later altered part of the eastern end of the property, and work in the early 2000s brought architect Tom Doak into a restoration of Tillinghast's greens and other original design characteristics. The result is a course that combines an early twentieth-century strategic concept with careful later stewardship.

Did You Know? The par-three seventh is known as the Duel Hole because it overlooks the site of the 1859 fight between U.S. Senator David Broderick and Judge David Terry, remembered as California's last notable duel. Granite markers identify the positions associated with the two men, giving one of the course's most celebrated holes a historical reference that is unusually specific and visible.