Lions Municipal Golf Course
2901 Enfield Rd., Austin, TXLions Municipal Golf Course (known locally as “Muny”), was the first municipal golf course in Austin, Texas. Muny was established in 1924 by members of the Austin Lions Club who envisioned a modern, inclusive golf experience. The Lions Club association executed a lease with the University of Texas on May 31, 1924, for a portion of the Brackenridge Tract in West Austin. In 1936, they transferred the eighteen-hole course and clubhouse to the City of Austin. While Muny’s course layout has evolved alongside the game of golf, the property retains its historical integrity and character. The renowned American golf course architect A.W. Tillinghast consulted at Lions Municipal in 1936. Funding and labor from the Works Progress Administration program led to course improvements and new buildings in 1937-39. Many notable golfers have played at Muny including World Golf Hall of Famers Ben Hogan, Bryon Nelson, and Tom Kite. A fourth World Golf Hall of Fame member, Ben Crenshaw, credits the course as instrumental in his development. Lions Municipal Golf Course, then, is part of Austin’s golf legacy.
Lions Municipal Golf Course is also part of a broader, national story of social and cultural developments around race relations. In late 1950 – following the Supreme Court’s decision in Sweatt v. Painter but well before Brown vs. Board of Education – Muny quietly became the first desegregated municipal golf course in the South (defined as the states of the old Confederacy). African Americans routinely played at Muny thereafter. In 1951 and again in July 1953, Joe Louis (former heavyweight-boxing champion and, at that time, golf’s ambassador to black America) played at Muny. The desegregation of Muny and then other local facilities during 1950-54 occurred without conflict and with minimal public debate, in contrast to the hostile resistance of many communities in the South. Litigation arising from other southern cities demonstrated that (outside of the events in Austin) meaningful changes in the desegregation of city-owned golf courses would only happen after Brown was decided in 1954. The desegregation of Muny reflects progressive changes in the Jim Crow south before the advent of the post-Brown Civil Rights movement. For these reasons, the property is nominated to the National Register at the national level of significance under Criterion A in the area of Social History. The property is also nominated at the local level of significance under Criterion A in the area of Entertainment and Recreation as a significant municipal golf course that offered the opportunity for many to experience the sport of golf without the club membership required at the Austin Country Club’s private course (now Hancock Golf Course, NRHP 2014). The period of significance is 1924-1966, reflecting the property’s continuous use as a golf course through the historic period.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 2016.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.