Colonial Country Club

Fort Worth businessman Marvin Leonard founded Colonial in 1936, transforming acreage along the Clear Fork of the Trinity River into what is regarded as Texas's first course with bentgrass greens, an idea local skeptics doubted would survive the heat. Leonard engaged John Bredemus and Perry Maxwell to design it. After the USGA awarded Colonial the 1941 U.S. Open, the first held in Texas, Leonard brought Maxwell back in 1940 to toughen the layout, adding dozens of bunkers and creating the demanding current fourth and fifth holes. Craig Wood won that 1941 Open. The club began its own annual professional invitational in 1946, won by hometown star Ben Hogan, who claimed the title five times and gave the course its enduring nickname, Hogan's Alley. The tree-lined, tightly bunkered layout, especially the tough opening stretch known as the Horrible Horseshoe, still hosts a long-running PGA Tour event.