The storied history of the Fairfield Golf & Country Club

FAIRFIELD — Fairfield occupies a special place in the annals of golf history in America, because it holds the oldest continuously operated golf course west of the Mississippi River.

The Fairfield Golf & Country Club was organized in 1892 as the Kahgahgee Golf Club, and later incorporated under the name Fairfield Golf Club in 1914. To celebrate its 130th anniversary this year, the club is hosting a celebration at 5 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 27 complete with food, wine, live music, putting and driving contests, and fireworks.

In addition to celebrating the club’s anniversary, the Fairfield Golf & Country Club will use the occasion to launch the Kahgahgee Historical Golf Foundation, a nonprofit organization that will provide youth programming and capital improvements to the course.

The idea to start a foundation to support the course came from club member Jim Weaton, who has taken an interest in learning about the club’s history since he moved to town four years ago.

“I’ve always been interested in the historical significance of different entities,” Weaton said. “When we moved to town, somebody mentioned that they thought this course was the oldest west of the Mississippi. I began to do some research, and talked to a few longtime members, and I was able to uncover a lot of information.”

Through his research, Weaton confirmed that Fairfield was indeed the oldest continuously operated golf course west of the Mississippi River. Weaton was a career professional for the YMCA, and was a strong proponent of endowing his local Y to preserve it through tough times. He wanted to do the same thing for the Fairfield Golf & Country Club given its historical significance, so he began searching for ways to do that.

He learned that the second oldest continuously run golf course west of the Mississippi River was on the west coast in Portland, Oregon. He reached out to that club, and its members told him they established a 501c3 to preserve their course and develop the game of golf in their community.

“That gave me motivation to keep plowing forward on this,” Weaton said. “They were great partners to work with as I was developing articles of incorporation and all the necessary paperwork for the 501c3 application, which is 40 pages long. It’s a pretty intensive process.”

Weaton said the newly formed Kahgahgee Historical Golf Foundation opened a bank account this month, and hopes to receive its official status as a charity soon. Then it will begin raising money toward programs, especially youth programs, to expand golf in Fairfield and the region.

Early days

Weaton said he found a number of fascinating tidbits about the course’s history in his research. The course was the brainchild of a Fairfield doctor named James Frederic Clarke, who attended a doctor’s conference in Chicago in 1892 where he was exposed to the game of golf and played on a local course.

When Clarke returned to Fairfield, he found a pasture where he could establish a golf course. Weaton said that, in those days, they had to rely on cows to keep the grass short since there were no lawnmowers. Clarke created a seven-hole course, which ran across what is now Park Street. Since the course was near Crow Creek, and the Native American name for that creek is Kahgahgee, Clarke decided to use that as the name for the course, the Kahgahgee Golf Club.

At its founding, the course offered a single handcrafted golf club, a driver, which all players shared. It was made from a wooden rod and a tin cup.

“These clubs were very primitive,” Weaton said.

Weaton remarked that Dr. Clarke was a golf pioneer at a time when golf was really catching on in the Midwest. After Fairfield’s got its golf course up and running, neighboring towns followed suit. Washington established a golf course a few years later, and at one point the presidents of the two golf clubs entered a match featuring golfers from the respective towns.

Fairfield’s club president at the time, Charles Jacob Fulton, was a descendant of the Fulton family that established the town. He was also the town’s mayor and later a state representative and state senator. Weaton noted that one of the earliest golfers to belong to the club was William Louden, founder of the famous Louden Machinery Company.

First clubhouse

The Fairfield Golf Club purchased a log cabin in 1900 that served as the first clubhouse. The club built a clubhouse a few decades later in the 1930s or 1940s, but that building was destroyed by fire in 1954. Weaton said the first golf club that Dr. Clarke used was on display in that clubhouse, but it was lost in the fire.

Today, the Fairfield Golf & Country Club’s clubhouse has a sports bar known as the “19th Hole” where golfers can get a drink and watch games on television. The building also includes a great hall for hosting big gatherings like weddings or anniversary parties, a fireside room with a formal bar for smaller corporate gatherings, and the west end dining room for fine dining and a soon-to-be monthly supper club.

“We can host a lot of different things in our current clubhouse,” Weaton said.

Bring golf to more people

Weaton said the club has about 200 members. That number had been trending down until the pandemic caused a resurgence in golf because it was a safety activity to do outdoors. Weaton said that when Parsons College graced the north side of town, the college had an agreement with the club to offer free membership to the faculty. Due to this arrangement, the club was able to boast between 350-400 members.

With the establishment of the new foundation, Weaton hopes to bring golf to new young players.

“If we want to preserve and expand the game of golf, we’ve got to open the doors to more people,” he said.

Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com