December 19th, 2005 will mark the 60th anniversary of the Ponca City Country Club.
Not surprisingly, the club.s roots go back to the days of E.W. Marland and the oil boom era. The original name of the land and facilities was the Marland Institute with buildings located where the Academy Hills housing addition is now. Built in the mid-1920.s, it included spanish style, stucco buildings with dormitory type living quarters for some of the men who worked in management for Marland Oil Company at the time. For recreation the men, along with other Marland employees, played the 18 hole, sand greens golf course located next to the Marland buildings. The golf course, built in 1928, would later become an integral part of the Ponca City Country Club.
When Marland Oil Company merged with Continental Oil Company in 1928 and the golf course was completed, the name was changed from the Marland Institute to the Conoco Golf Club. In 1940, Dan Moran, President of Continental Oil Company, made the decision to sell the unused buildings and the land they were sitting on to Col. William Cox. The golf course and remaining club land were not included in the sale. At that time, Ponca Military Academy was started and operated at the site from 1941 to the late 1970.s. Young men 6 to 18 years of age from mostly affluent families throughout the United States attended school at the academy. A.W. Tillinghast, a world renowned course architect, visited the club and walked the course on January 18th, 1936. He offered his expertise on the methods to use and the potential cost of switching to bentgrass greens. Tillinghast designed several legendary U.S. Open venues including Winged Foot, Baltusrol and Bethpage Black.
In 1940 the sand greens were replaced with bentgrass for the nine holes south and east of our present clubhouse and the other nine holes of the golf course were abandoned. The Conoco Golf Club continued to operate until 1944, when Mr. Moran decided Conoco needed to get out of the golf business. His vision was to see a country club organized to include Conoco employees, professionals from the downtown area and local private business owners. Mr. Moran sat down and worked out a detailed strategy with Archie Wilkinson and D.W. Sims and together they put the wheels in motion to get the club started. Before turning the property over to the club, Moran offered to build grass greens on the 9 holes that were abandoned earlier. Ground was broken for a new clubhouse just a few days before the moratorium was issued by Congress prohibiting the use of critical materials needed for our country.s continuing World War II efforts. The clubhouse was not completely finished until 1947. The initial membership campaign for Ponca City Country Club was so successful that 251 charter members had been recruited by December of 1945. Shares of stock sold for $150. Thanks to the generosity of Continental Oil Company, the charter members had the good fortune of having an 18-hole golf course and other amenities on 223 acres of land for the unbelievable cost of only $1.00.