Once upon a time there was a golf course called the Lido. It was down on the south shore of Long Island, just east of the Rockaways and designed by C.B. Macdonald, who, in large part due to the Lido, would become known as the father of American golf course architecture. It included all of the renowned template holes: there was a Biarritz along the beach, a Short with a thumbprint, an Alps hole, a Redan, a Cape. Bernard Darwin called it “the finest golf course in the world.” Claude Harmon Sr. said it was “the greatest golf course—ever.” And then? it disappeared.
Today, the Lido lives on in three forms: The public course which looks nothing like the original but sits adjacent to its original location; a nearly exact replica of Macdonald’s masterpiece at Wisconsin’s Sand Valley Golf Resort thanks to Tom Doak and modern technology; and an inspired-by design in Thailand from the mind of Gil Hanse.
On TGJ Podcast Ep. 95, Brett Cyrgalis, author of “The Hard Truth about Lido” in TGJ No. 17, takes us on a journey through the Lido’s many lives. With help from Hanse and Doak’s right-hand man Brian Schneider, he explains how we lost such an important piece of golf history, and why we should be thankful that a group of true believers are putting it back together.
