My name is Eric Vandenberg #3089 and I am the volunteer PDGA Course Archivist. In 2012, aided by PDGA Disc Golf Course Directory Editor Cliff Towne #5450, I started what has become several projects to find and track disc golf courses and have compiled a database of known disc golf courses by course list, directory, and other sources. In the process, several particularly interesting documents have come to my attention which have helped to narrow down the installation dates for many of these courses. The following is a brief history of disc golf course lists and directories as I know it and a list of the earliest 5 or so courses by state. The information below is culled not only from these historical lists and directories, but is also based on input from many disc golf luminaries and hundreds of hours of searching the Internet and other published material.

Evolution of the Disc Golf Course Directory

In July of 1977 the inventor of the original Disc Golf Pole Hole, founder of Disc Golf Association (DGA), and former VP of Wham-O Inc., "Steady" Ed Headrick #001 sent a letter to the Executives of Wham-O listing 22 courses that he had installed (or was about to install).

"Steady" Ed's first known distributed list of disc golf courses

In December of that same year (by my calculations), DGA created a list of 29 courses which they included with one of the Wham-O disc models that they were selling. Bill Burns #581, former PDGA Commissioner and one-time Junior Champion, filed this list away for many years until he posted it on the PDGA Discussion Board in May of 2003. Three of the courses from the July letter had already been removed from this listing and Bill’s guess dated it to 1978. The list is ordered by state and city and then either by park name, business name, or street address.

In July of 1978 DGA published a newsletter detailing 14 new courses, most of which described a signature hole, with the heading 'Add these new courses to your list:' In April 1980 DGA published a newsletter which on page 3 stated "We are working on a Disc Golf Course Book that gives location, lists the pros and other pertinent data on all of our courses. With any luck we should have it finished by June." Page 4 of this newsletter lists only the state and city of 31 new courses. Page 7 of the June 1980 newsletter lists 12 new courses, again with only state and city, and with no mention of the detailed course listing referenced in April (there must be more of these newsletters published between July 1978 and April 1980 and after June 1980, but I have yet to come across them).

On August 24, 1982, DGA sent a Memo to All Sales Reps and Regional Pros "We have finally received our order of Pocket Guides to the Game of Disc Golf. We feel that these are an excellent sales tool and educational aid to be given to people who have little or no knowledge of Disc Golf". This “Pocket Guide” is a simple list of 116 US course locations by State and City and was also included in the Wham-O Frisbee Golf Disc box with a 100-E mold glow disc. Years later, Steve Hartwell #2465 tried to use it to locate additional courses when he was PDGA Disc Golf Course Directory Editor. I have also tried to make this list more detailed as well as the newsletter course listings, but identifying these courses can be difficult, especially given the location of courses outside city limits which often get assigned to the nearest large city and then over time the location gets revised as towns grow in population. 1982 is also the year that Ted Smethers #1159 contacted all the known course pros to organize a professional tour and start gathering whatever course information he could.

Box that the 100-E Mold came in (note that the box incorrectly claims more than 200 courses).

By January of 1984, Ted had completed a course directory of 167 entries, garnered from tournament flyers and pro tour dates, and as far as I can tell, was unaware of the newsletters or the 1982 directory. Ted sent out a letter making course pros aware of his directory but, due to his limited postage budget, not many people received a copy. Shortly after this, and 4 years after the newsletter mention, Ed published his own more complete version of this directory, without acknowledging Ted’s contribution, in an announcement for his “all new 1984 line of KITTY HAWK Super Discs” (the 2nd page lists retail prices as of April 12, 1984). In total, 255 US courses and 6 Canadian courses were included. Allen Risley #1752 believes it is likely that this directory was sent to DGA Regional Pros. I am pretty sure that a number of these courses had already been removed, but Ed was unaware of it.

In July of 1984 Allen Risley and Tom Monroe #033 drove from Florida to New York for the 1984 World Championships in Rochester, and, unaware of any directories, played as many courses as they knew about on their route. Talking to others at Worlds they learned of courses that they had driven by, and this inspired Allen to offer his assistance to Ted Smethers in order to get out a comprehensive listing. Ted passed his course material as well as some of Ed Headrick’s short form records of basket sales, to Allen who expanded on it, and in 1985 the PDGA started publishing, using a dot matrix printer, the “Flying Disc Golf Course Directory - Edited by Allen Risley". 209 courses in the United States and six Canadian courses were listed. The initial price was $5.00 and Allen sold many of them face-to-face at the 1985 PDGA Pro Worlds in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Throughout 1985 and into 1986 Allen reprinted some pages with new additions and, if already photocopied, he would "X" out removed courses in pen. Photocopied versions were sold for $3.00 and included between 215 and 235 courses.

Allen Risley's Flying Disc Golf Course Directory

In 1986, Steve Hartwell became involved when Allen Risley got married and started grad school and no longer had time to devote to the directory. The 2nd edition of the “P.D.G.A. Course Listing” was published in October of that year with 229 United States, six Canadian, and eight Scandinavian courses. Steve published directories or supplements nearly annually, from 1988 until 2001. After the 1993 directory Steve realized that install date would be an interesting piece of information and added that field to the update forms. These install dates first appeared in the 1994 directory, but in many cases, so much time had gone by that this value was only a best guess. (My first involvement with this project came directly as a result of almost 200 courses that still had this field blank in 2012.)

The PDGA's first official bound Disc Golf Course Listing

Steve also worked with Bill Fitler #9987 to publish the very first PDGA Disc Golf Course Directory on the World Wide Web in 1995. Originally a set of static web pages hosted by Netscape (who was Bill's employer at the time) it was moved to a dedicated website at dgc-online.com in 1998. Towards the end of the decade, Bill was unable to put much time into the website and enlisted PDGA.com webmaster Marty Hapner #4033 to take over. Marty consolidated Steve and Bill's work to create a master database with enhanced search capabilities which would lay the foundation for a comprehensive and interactive PDGA Online Disc Golf Course Directory at PDGA.com.

Over 20 years of the PDGA Disc Golf Course Directory on the Web

Current PDGA Disc Golf Course Editor Cliff Towne came on board in 2001 and continued to publish print editions annually. But with the ability for the public to submit course updates online and the continuing growth of the sport, it became clear that any printed version of the course directory would be out-of-date well before it hit the shelves. Cliff published the 22nd and final print edition of the PDGA Disc Golf Course Directory in October 2010 which contained more than 3200 courses worldwide.

America's Earliest Disc Golf Courses

The following is a list, by state, and year of basket installation of what we currently believe to be the earliest basket courses. If the target was originally not some kind of basket, then the installation year will not match the year that baskets were installed. Courses that no longer exist have a line struck through them. A list of the earliest five courses per country is available in a separate article. If you have documented evidence of different dates, we strongly encourage you to send us your feedback to help us correct our information. Although we would prefer that you contact us directly with any corrections to this early course information, anyone with an account on PDGA.com can edit the PDGA Disc Golf Course Directory to add new courses or update existing courses.

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Revised March 13, 2024

* Course re-established in park after original layout removed, or course moved to a different area of the park.