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Headlines about the golf renaissance in Philadelphia over the past 16 years have mostly dealt with places like Merion Golf Club, which hosted the U.S. Open in 2013 and will do so again in 2030; Philadelphia Cricket Club, which hosted the Truist Championship last year<\/a>; and Aronimink Golf Club, which this week hosts the PGA Championship<\/a>, its fifth PGA or LPGA Tour event since 2010.<\/p>\n What those venerated sites have in common: They are very private, critically exclusive, and magnificently expensive. They also were designed by legendary architects: Hugh Wilson at Merion, A.W. Tillinghast at Cricket<\/a>, and Donald Ross, who designed almost 400 courses, completing Aronimink in 1928. He called it his \u201cmasterpiece.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n Three years later, Ross and his associates finished Jeffersonville Golf Club. He never offered a review of Jeffersonville, but, unlike Philly\u2019s Big Three, it is a place you can review yourself without waiting for an invitation from your rich uncle. It\u2019s a public course. A course of the people.<\/p>\n \u00bb READ MORE: Rory McIlroy lauded Philly as \u2018a wonderful golfing city.\u2019 Can the Masters champ win another PGA Championship?<\/a><\/p>\n Almost half of the 140,000 members of the Golf Association of Philadelphia (GAP) do not belong to private clubs. GAP is sensitive to their situation. And \u201cThe Jeff,\u201d as local range rats call it, routinely lands among the top 10 public courses in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n The folks at GAP were aware.<\/p>\n \u201cAbout three years ago we made the decision to have a major at a public facility,\u201d GAP president Ken Phillips said. \u201cWe had a list. A lot of good names on that list. We came to Jeffersonville first. A lot of people liked the idea of playing the Mid-Am at a Donald Ross course one week after playing the PGA at another.\u201d <\/p>\n And so, for the first time in its history, GAP chose a public course to host one of its major tournaments. The 43rd GAP Mid-Am will be played here next Wednesday and Thursday. <\/p>\n Big deal? Huge deal. <\/p>\n The Mid-Am routinely is held at such courses as Merion, Cricket, and even Pine Valley in New Jersey, the course often ranked No. 1 in the world. Winners of the Mid-Am include players who belong not only to those clubs but also, in the case of four-time Mid-Am winner Michael McDermott, a Georgia club called Augusta National.<\/p>\n \u00bb READ MORE: Brotherly Love in Philadelphia: The fairytale story of Matt and Alex Fitzpatrick at the PGA Championship | Marcus Hayes<\/a><\/p>\n Why, in an area bursting with strong public courses in prettier settings, did GAP choose Jeffersonville? It\u2019s not bucolic, sitting off a busy main street lined with gas stations and hoagie shops. It\u2019s not a big-shouldered course; at 6,400 yards, it\u2019s about 1,000 yards shorter than what Rory McIlroy and the boys will face at Aronimink.<\/p>\n But it has great bones, clever routing, diabolical greens, is always in superb condition, and \u2014 the kicker for GAP \u2014 it is the essence of public golf.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d have to say that the fact that they\u2019re a municipally owned golf course,\u201d Phillips said. \u201cWe have to give credit to the Board of Commissioners for giving back to the game of golf.\u201d<\/p>\n A privately owned public course has a different flavor than a municipal course. Jeffersonville has been owned and operated by West Norriton Township since 1972. It used to be run out of a horse barn; it was built on the site of a horse farm and racetrack. Outside of the logo (a jockey\u2019s silks crossed by a golf club and a riding whip) and the sign on the halfway house (The Paddock), you\u2019d never know it. Since the completion of a $12 million clubhouse in 2024, Jeffersonville has become a regional destination for discerning golfers, but one neither too expensive for most players nor a drain on the township\u2019s coffers.<\/p>\n \u00bb READ MORE: The \u2018maze\u2019 of Braden Shattuck\u2019s last seven years has led the Delco native to the PGA Championship at Aronimink<\/a><\/p>\n The cost is never more than $100 with a cart, even on the weekends. The 69 daily tee times are constantly full. The course has hosted more than 50,000 rounds, said architect Ron Prichard, who has had a hand in the course\u2019s restoration for more than 25 years.<\/p>\n \u201cThis area is head-over-heels in love with this place,\u201d said Prichard, who lives nearby. \u201cIt\u2019s a gold mine.\u201d<\/p>\n Prichard, 87, has designed or restored more than 50 courses, but he adores everything about The Jeff. He credits course superintendent Rich Shilling and his tight, six-man crew with maintaining the level of challenge and excellence that he and Ross envisioned: trimmed, deep, and well-filled bunkers; fair and fast greens; and fancy, two-toned fairways, half cut with the grain, half cut against. <\/p>\n I\u2019ve played The Jeff for 25 years, but never for free. It gets better every year. I\u2019ve probably played every public course of note from Lancaster to Scranton to the Jersey Shore<\/a>. <\/p>\n None is better than Jeffersonville.<\/p>\n Most don\u2019t come close.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Evidence: Most private golf clubs are closed on Mondays. On Monday mornings, the vehicles parked near the pro shop at Jeffersonville make it look like a German car dealership.<\/p>\n \u201cIt might be the proper thing to say,\u201d said Mike Housley, Jeff\u2019s director of golf, \u201cbut on Mondays, the quality of the cars in the lot … Oh, yeah!\u201d<\/p>\n Philly\u2019s golf snobs flock to Jeff. That should be enough.<\/p>\n Phillips said this might be the first time a public course gets a GAP major, but it won\u2019t be the last. Not with so many courses doing such a good job at improving themselves, most notably the $180 million restoration of Cobbs Creek Golf Course in Philadelphia proper.<\/p>\n With the weight of Tiger Woods behind the project and with a history of PGA Tour events, most folks expect Cobbs Creek to one day earn a Tour stop. Once it opens next year, expect the reviews to be glowing. <\/p>\n