Dyker Beach Park and Golf Course facts for kids
The Dyker Beach Park and Golf Course is a fun place in Brooklyn, New York City. It has a big park and an 18-hole golf course. This area is in the southern part of Dyker Heights. It stretches from the Belt Parkway in the south to 86th Street in the north. It's between 7th Avenue and 14th Avenue.
The golf course is huge, covering 217 acres. It has 6,548 yards of golf to play! Both the park and the golf course are over 100 years old. It's one of the most popular public golf courses in the whole country.
American Golf Corporation manages the golf course. They started running most New York City courses in 1999. They also updated and made the club house bigger in 2007-2008. Dyker Beach Golf Course is one of the oldest golf courses in the United States. It's the second oldest in New York City, right after Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. You can play golf here all year round, as long as the weather is good enough.
Contents
How Dyker Beach Park Started
The park officially began in 1895. But people used this land even earlier! The Canarsee Indians and Dutch settlers from New Utrecht called it "common land." They couldn't farm or build houses there because it was mostly wet meadows, marshes, and swamps.
In the 1600s, the Van Dyke family tried to dry out this wet land. They built special walls called dykes. This is how the park got its name! It's named after the Van Dyke family or the dykes they built.
The park grew in four steps between 1895 and 1934. It started with eight pieces of land. In 1895, the City of Brooklyn bought the first piece. This land went from Gravesend Bay up to about 92nd Street. They hired a famous design company, Olmsted, Olmsted and Eliot, to plan a 50-acre park. They wanted it to be "the only seaside park in Greater New York." The plans included a saltwater lagoon, playgrounds for kids, bathhouses, and grassy areas.
The Brooklyn Parks Department said in 1896 that Dyker Beach Park would be the "finest seaside park in the world." They built bathhouses and roads. But the plans changed in 1911. A landscape architect named Charles D. Lay suggested making the lagoon smaller. He also wanted to add places for concerts. In 1918, they started filling in the swampy parts of the park.
Before the 1920s, the land from 92nd Street to 86th Street was privately owned. A company called Dyker Meadow Land and Improvement owned the biggest part. They rented the land to the Dyker Golf Club and Marine and Field Club. These clubs used the Dyker Heights Club House, built in 1898, as their golf club.
In 1916, the Poly Prep Country Day School wanted to buy this land. They were moving from Downtown Brooklyn to Dyker Heights. But they didn't have enough money. So, the land was sold to the NYC Parks Department. However, the Parks Commissioner, Raymond V. Ingersoll, offered the school a 25-acre spot. This land was on 92nd Street and 7th Avenue. Frederic B. Pratt had given it to the Parks Department. The school accepted and built a beautiful school there, which is still used today.
The Parks Department got four more pieces of land between 1924 and 1927. They got three more lots in 1934. This finished making the park bigger. These new areas covered up many streets that used to run between 92nd and 86th streets. One of these streets was 'De Russy Street,' built in the 1870s. In 2008, the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation decided to name the circular driveway in front of the golf club house after him.
The Club House was built in 1935. John Van Kleek was the architect who designed it. In 2008, American Golf Corporation updated and expanded this building. Now it holds all the golf operations. It also has a big hall for weddings and parties that can fit 300 people!
The New York City Parks Department ran Dyker Beach Golf Course until 1984. Then, a private company, American Golf Corporation, took over.
Today, besides the 18-hole golf course and the party hall, the park has many other things. You can find fields for baseball, football, and soccer. There are also courts for bocce, basketball, handball, and tennis.
How Busy is the Golf Course?
In the 1950s and 1960s, Dyker Beach Golf Course was super busy! Over 100,000 rounds of golf were played there every year.
In 1965, people played 103,581 rounds. It was a golf escape right in the middle of Brooklyn. It was one of the most played golf courses in the United States in the 1960s. On average, over 350 golfers played there every day during the golf season. Many local golfers line up very early in the morning to get a spot to play.
Famous Golfers Who Played Here
- Willy "Wiffy" Cox was the golf pro at the course from 1921 to 1935.
- The five Strafaci brothers played here often.
- Thomas Strafaci was a golf pro at Dyker, and so was his son, Thomas Strafaci Jr.
- In the 1970s, Tiger Woods' dad, Earl Woods, learned to play golf here in 1972. He was stationed at Fort Hamilton at the time.
Golf Clubs at Dyker Beach
Dyker Beach Park is also home to four golf clubs that play on the course:
- The Shore View Golf Club: This club started in 1930. It's one of the oldest public men's golf clubs in the United States.
- The Brookridge Ladies Club: This is also one of the older public golf clubs for women in the country.
- The Sand Trappers Senior Golf Club: This club plays on Tuesdays and is for older golfers.
- The Dyker Beach Women's Golf Club: This is a newer club that plays on Tuesday and Sunday mornings.
