Joe Lee

Joe Lee might be the most prolific golf course architect you've never heard of. Over his 40-plus year career, Lee would leave a mark on some 200 golf courses.

A direct descendant of Civil War general Robert E. and a veteran of the U.S. Navy, Lee got his start in golf working for Louis Sibbett “Dick” Wilson.

As Wilson’s career and life petered out due to alcoholism, Lee would play a significant role in the design of several late Wilson courses, including LaCosta in Carlsbad, Calif., The Blue Monster at Doral, Cog Hill in the suburbs of Chicago, Warwick Hills in suburban Detroit, and Bay Hill in Orlando.

From Wilson’s death in 1965 until his own in 2003, Lee would be responsible for more than 100 original courses throughout golf’s great later 20th-century boom years. His work took him throughout the United States and even to the Caribbean, South America and Portugal.

However, Lee is most associated with the explosion of golf in the state of Florida. He designed dozens of courses from the Panhandle to Miami and practically all points in between. From humble nine-holers to exclusive private clubs, all levels of Florida golfer have played a Joe Lee course.
Stylistically, Lee’s courses fit right in with the majority of his contemporaries’ works: Robert Trent Jones, Sr., in particular. Lee used large bunkers to frame fairways and greens, incorporated water hazards liberally and built up his greens to face the approaching player, such that they tend to slope from back to front with modest interior contouring.

Though he could sometimes rely too much on the formality of straight holes (no doubt often dictated by the residential settings where many of his courses appear), he excelled when designing movement into his courses. The par-5 14th at Bent Pine Golf Club in Vero Beach, Florida, is a prime example. By double-doglegging the hole around two primary ponds, Lee fashioned an imaginative three-shotter that the gambling player could go for in two.

Also, to his credit, though he did not shy away from heavy bunkering schemes, Lee tended to leave enough room at the front of his greens for higher-handicap and shorter-hitting players to run balls up.

"I don't think there should be any tricks on a golf course," Lee said. "Golfers want a challenge, but they want a fair one."

In an effort to give Lee further recognition, Golf Digest architecture writer Ron Whitten published the 2002 book Gentleman Joe Lee: Fifty Years of Golf Course Design.