With some 120 private and public courses scattered from Palm Springs to Indio, calling our desert “the Golf Capital of the World” seems a natural. But as recently as 1950, there wasn’t a single 18-hole course here.
The El Mirador purportedly had the first course, with the O’Donnell Golf Club being second. It’s now the oldest golf course in the Coachella Valley. Wealthy oilman Thomas O’Donnell was an avid golfer and in the early 1920s he created a course at the base of San Jacinto as his front yard. His course provided front-nine play for his friends and guests of the Desert Inn, with the inn’s Mashie course serving as the back nine.
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