Woodlawn Golf Course in Sandusky in the 1930s

The Woodlawn Golf Course opened at the corner of Camp Street and Perkins Avenue on May 30, 1931. The clubhouse was built by Miller Brothers, of Venice, Ohio. The firm of Opfer and Faber ran thousands of feet of tile, to provide adequate drainage for the golf course. Green fees were $1.00 for weekdays, and $1.25 on Sundays and holidays. On opening day, there were exhibition matches between Ed Windisch and Mel Carrier, and between Miss Polly Smith and Mrs. Cecil Laird. Pictured above are Mrs. Locke, Harley Hane, and Mel Carrier, the golf pro at Woodlawn. 

Several advertisements and announcements about the opening of the Woodlawn Golf Course appeared in the Sandusky Register of May 30, 1931.

The Manhattan store in Sandusky sold clothes that would make golfers “dress well” for the sport. Holzaepfel’s ran special sales on golf balls and golf clubs. 

In the snapshot below are: Mr. John Rheinegger, owner; Boyd Hamrick; and Chester Bohn, greenskeeper.

This is the Number 4 Fairway:

In the Spring of 1936, Charles Stamm took over the Woodlawn Golf Course as the manager and golf pro. During this economically-troubled era business declined, so that by 1938 and 1939 circuses were held on the grounds of the former golf course. This ad for the Parker and Watts Circus was featured in the Sandusky Star Journal of May 22, 1939.

Eventually, with the help of the Depression-era WPA, a new municipal golf course was created on the west side of Sandusky. An article in the May 20, 1940 issue of the Sandusky Register announced the dedication of the Mills Creek Golf Course. (The name is derived from the Honorable Isaac Mills, one of the founders of Sandusky.)

X. G. Hassenplug, Golf Course Architect

Xenophon G. Hassenplug was born in Ohio in 1908 to Mr. and Mrs. Charles R. Hassenplug. For a time Charles R. Hassenplug was a teacher in Sandusky with the Works Progress Administration. Xenophon Hassenplug was on the debating team at Sandusky High School in 1926, and graduated in 1927.

He went on to college at Ohio Wesleyan University and the University of Toledo, where he studied civil engineering.  In 1946 Hassenplug began his career in golf course design, when he worked with J.B. McGovern on Overbrook Country Club’s golf course at Philadelphia. Eventually, he went into private practice in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Mr. Hassenplug designed several golf courses in Pennsylvania and Ohio, including the Fairway Pines Golf Course in Painesville.  In an article featured in the September, 1983 issue of Golf Course Management, Mr. Hassenplug discussed the value of trees in enhancing the playability and appearance of a golf course. 

Xenophon G. Hassenplug died on September 24, 1992, after battling cancer. He was survived by his wife, a son, and two grandchildren.

Women in Sandusky

(March is Women's History Month.)

From Mrs. T. D. West at the spinning wheel…. to Mrs. Emma Frank on a Sandusky golf course in 1931…
to Mary Eloise Evans, the first female deputy sheriff in Erie County…
visit the Archives Research Center of the Sandusky Library to find photographs, obituaries, city directories, yearbooks, and many other sources of historical information regarding the women (and men) of Sandusky.