Oakwood Country Club

Oakwood is the oldest country club still operating in the Kansas City area. It began in 1881 as the Progress Club, founded by Congregation B'nai Jehudah as a social home for the Jewish community at a time when other clubs excluded them. When golf took off, the club bought a farm southeast of the city and Tom Bendelow designed a nine-hole course that opened in 1912. Today the club sits on about 210 acres at 9800 Grandview Road in south Kansas City, and a recent renovation by Todd Clark and Ron Whitten rebuilt greens and bunkers, added three new holes and reworked six others without ever closing the course.

The renovation is the story here. Golf Digest named Oakwood a top-three Best Transformation in America, and the club added a 12-hole putting course with a par-3 course planned. Ken Block, a member and developer, drove the investment. The membership had shrunk from about 700 in the late 1980s to roughly 300, and the club runs a no-tee-time policy that rewards fast play, so you tend to get on the course when you want to. That combination of a rebuilt course and a smaller roster is unusual in this market.

Oakwood is not in Johnson County, and most of my buyers will not live next to it. But for a golfer landing in south Leawood, Overland Park or Loch Lloyd, it is a fifteen-to-twenty minute drive east, and it is worth a look if you value course quality and availability over neighborhood proximity. The club welcomes members of all backgrounds today and also references national memberships for out-of-town members. It does not publish fees, so ask about golf and social categories and any renovation-related assessments.