While there may be more historic venues, there may be no more fascinating 127 acres in American golf than Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades, California. Rich tournament lore, compelling architecture and a celebrity heritage make it an authentic national treasure.
For one, Riviera is home to Ben Hogan’s first national championship (1948 U.S. Open), his back-to-back L.A. Open wins (1947–48), and his incredible post-automobile accident comeback—the epic 1950 L.A. Open loss to Sam Snead when rains forced the two legends to return a week after the final round for a playoff. His heroics there led many to call the course “Hogan’s Alley.”
But the Riviera story isn’t just about Hogan. The Northern Trust Open is one of the PGA Tour’s showcase events, a favorite among players despite the initially negative reaction of the site from the architect, George C. Thomas, who toured it at the behest of Los Angeles Athletic Club founder Frank Garbutt.
Thomas eventually agreed to go forward after receiving assurances that his construction supervisor, Billy Bell Sr., would have access to all resources required to solve any soil and drainage problems. A year of arduous construction with a massive crew, soil trucked in from miles away, Bell’s engineering instincts, and Thomas’ love of heroic holes combined to create what Ben Crenshaw calls the greatest “made” course in the world.
The strategy required by Thomas and Bell’s massive bunkering survives today to create a still-fascinating, albeit different, test, emphasizing the aerial game more than the design duo probably planned.
Several classic holes define Riviera. The opening hole, a par 5, features a tee 100 feet above the fairway and finishes at a boomerang-shaped putting surface. Hogan’s favorite, the 236-yard 4th, is a modified Redan fronted by the elder statesman of man-made bunkers, while the par-3 6th is defined by the oft-bemoaned bunker in the center of the green.
No hole in America has aged better than Thomas’ masterful 10th. No matter how much the game changes, one thing is certain: Great players will fall prey to this wide, flat, well-bunkered 315 yards of pure strategic golf.
Riviera’s 10th is not complicated: Lay up down the left side and leave a short pitch to a bowling-pin shaped green. Knowing this, players still cave to temptation and play straight at the green either intentionally or via some subconscious refusal to lay up left. The aggressive route to the hole rarely leads to eagles or even birdies, and almost always causes round-deflating pars and bogeys.
The holes are not the only sources of drama at Riviera. It has been the location of many movies. Pat and Mike starred members Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy; The Caddy included member Dean Martin; and Hogan’s dramatic comeback was re-created at Riviera for Follow the Sun.
The club was also a hangout when the stars weren’t working. The 1970s were marked by Martin’s high-stakes money games, with the single-digit handicappers and celebrity antics immortalized in Dan Jenkins’ Dogged Victims of Inexorable Fate.
But no name is more associated with Riviera than Hogan. The late Jim Murray, Pulitzer Prize-winning sports columnist and longtime member, declared the Riviera-Ben Hogan partnership the most famous in sports history. He once wrote: “Ruth-Gehrig, Dempsey-Tunney, even Notre Dame-USC, have nothing on Hogan-Riviera.”
