A landmark biography of one of golf’s most influential course architects is returning in a significantly expanded edition, with new attention given to the restoration and renovation work bringing Donald Ross designs back to their original character.
Re-Discovering Donald Ross: 25th Anniversary Edition, by award-winning golf writer and course-design authority Bradley S. Klein, is scheduled for publication by Back Nine Press on February 1, 2027.
The new edition revisits Ross’s life and extraordinary influence on American golf while also examining something particularly relevant to today’s golf course professionals: the renewed effort to understand, restore and preserve the design principles behind his courses.
Born in Dornoch, Scotland, in 1872, Ross learned golf and course design under Old Tom Morris at St. Andrews before emigrating to the United States. His early work included a teaching position in Boston and a winter appointment at Pinehurst Resort, setting the stage for a career that would influence more than 400 golf courses across the country.
More than 75 years after Ross’s death, his work continues to shape conversations about golf course architecture, restoration and playability.
Across the country, clubs have undertaken significant projects aimed at recovering elements of Ross’s original designs that were altered or lost over decades of changing maintenance practices, tree growth, bunker modifications and course renovations.
That modern restoration movement is a major focus of Klein’s expanded book.
“Donald Ross’s work has never really gone away,” Klein said. “What has changed is our ability to recognize what made his courses so successful. The restoration movement has given us an extraordinary opportunity to look at Ross’s work with fresh eyes and to understand why his design principles continue to matter.”
A New Look at Familiar Courses
The 448-page anniversary edition includes new photography, updated text, rare drawings and maps, as well as new chapters examining recent restoration and renovation projects.
Among the Ross courses explored are Pinehurst No. 2, Oakland Hills, Oak Hill, Seminole, Scioto, Inverness and East Lake, along with case studies and profiles of numerous other Ross designs.
The book also includes a new preface from golf course architect Gil Hanse, whose restoration work has included numerous Ross courses.
Hanse describes Klein’s original Discovering Donald Ross as a book he has kept close at hand throughout his own career, praising Klein’s research and the contribution his work has made to the understanding of golf course architecture.
For superintendents and other golf course professionals, the restoration stories offer another perspective on an increasingly important question: how can a course honor an architect’s original intent while meeting the agronomic, environmental and playing demands of the modern game?
Ross’s work provides fertile ground for that discussion. His strategic use of greens, bunkering, contours and angles continues to influence architects today, while restoration projects require close collaboration among architects, superintendents, club leadership and construction teams.
Revisiting an Award-Winning Golf Classic
Klein’s original Discovering Donald Ross received the USGA’s Herbert Warren Wind Book Award and became an important reference for those studying Ross and the development of American golf course architecture.
Klein has spent decades writing about and studying golf course design. He previously served as architecture editor for Golfweek and directed the publication’s national golf course rating system. His work has covered golf architecture, course operations, maintenance and development, and he has also worked as a course-design consultant.
He is a multiple award winner from the Golf Writers Association of America and, in 2015, received the Donald Ross Award for lifetime achievement from the American Society of Golf Course Architects.
The new edition includes a preface by Hanse and a foreword by the late Pete Dye.
Re-Discovering Donald Ross: 25th Anniversary Edition will be published in hardcover by Back Nine Press on February 1, 2027. Standard and signed limited editions are planned.
For golf course professionals who work every day at the intersection of architecture, agronomy and playability, the expanded edition offers not only a look back at Ross’s remarkable career, but also a look at why his ideas continue to influence the courses being restored, maintained and played today.
