Why Big Met Golf Course Remains Cleveland's Most Played Public Track After 100 Year's

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Big Met was never intended to be an exclusionary enclave. When the Cleveland Metropolitan Park Board broke ground on the layout during the mid-1920s, visionaries William Stinchcomb and early municipal planners sought to make outdoor athletics accessible to industrial workers who had flooded northeast Ohio during the manufacturing boom. Carved into the fertile flood basin of the Rocky River Reservation, the fairways officially opened for play in 1926.

The course was an instant draw. Steelworkers, dock laborers, dockworkers, and office clerks from downtown Cleveland could catch a streetcar or pack into early Model Ts, haul canvas bags, and tee off for pocket change. The layout became the flagship of what is now eight distinct Cleveland Metroparks golf facilities. Over the decades, it survived Great Depression budget shortfalls, mid-century river flooding, and changing leisure habits, anchoring the Emerald Necklace as open parkland for anyone holding a club.