Member Clubs of and to be able to tie it back to when Lakeside Park was started in 1896 .”
The park included a zoo , a nine-hole golf course , dance hall and bowling alley and a lake for swimming and boating . The zoo was home to lions , a zebra , alligators , birds , badgers , wolves and a 40-foot tall monkey house .
By the time Lakeside Country Club was established in 1915 by a group of Jewish golfers and businessmen , the zoo was gone except for a few stone remnants that still remain along the third and fourth fairways and near the fifth tee .
Ross ’ s short ( by today ’ s standards ) but demanding golf course opened in 1921 . Kris Spence renovated the green complexes and sand bunkers to Ross specifications in 2013 .
“ I have not been able to find any other club in the world with that sort of history ,” says Crabbe , whose favorite course architect happens to be Ross .
GROWING INTEREST The club has played host to many Richmond Golf Association tournaments and has been the venue for the Tom Barry Lakeside Invitational for 69 years . Barry , now retired , is Lakeside ’ s legendary head PGA Professional . The first through fourth holes are often cited as the toughest opening stretch of holes in the Richmond area .
Crabbe was ready to roll out the rebranding at a big member party , but the coronavirus outbreak stopped that . He announced the changes via email in early August .
The change from country club to golf club is significant .
Golf-only is the fastest growing membership segment for LPC . Thirty , 40 or 50 years ago the country club was a family social hub . Crabbe thinks rebranding country clubs as golf clubs or dropping “ country club ” altogether is a national trend .
“ Lakeside Park Club speaks to that younger clientele that maybe have their own preconceived ideas of what a country club is and where they don ’ t necessarily want to be a member of a country club ,” Crabbe says . “ There are tens of thousands of country clubs . Lakeside Park Club as a name helps us differentiate ourselves .”
Bunkers await in every direction on the par-3 seventh hole . Classic wooden flagsticks and rebranded merchandise give Lakeside Park Club a new identity .
There have been some complaints , but Crabbe says 99.9 percent of the membership is supportive .
“ We are still member owned , still a private club and I don ’ t see that changing . The membership is growing ; the rebrand
“ The name change ( from country club to golf club ) has opened us up to a larger demographic . Everything is kind of falling into place ( despite the pandemic ), and I think it ’ s something we can build on for the future .”
— Rubin Unowitz
has helped . It ’ s kind of shined a light on Lakeside , which we needed . It ’ s amazing the number of people I meet who have said ‘ I live in the Northside and didn ’ t know you were here .’ We ’ ve got to get rid of that ,” he says .
“ We still have the amenities ( swimming , tennis , dining after pandemic ) we had before . We are a diverse club which is one of our strategic advantages . As I like to say , we are an inclusive club not an exclusive club . Some of the members who have been here a long time liked the name and the country club ( but no one has resigned ). It was certainly a calculated risk . We want people to be here because they are comfortable .”
A retired Richmond Times-Dispatch writer , Utley is a frequent contributor to Virginia Golfer .
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