George C. Thomas

George C. Thomas, often called by his nickname “The Captain,” was born in Philadelphia, where he played golf from an early age. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania in 1894, he joined his father’s investment banking firm Drexel & Company. Thomas’s passion for golf course design likely began at his family estate, where he spent his free time crafting his own golf course. Later he sold this course to a group of golfers, who converted it into Whitemarsh Valley Country Club (1908). Thomas’s first formal design project came at Marion Golf Club (1904), a small nine-holer near the coast of Massachusetts.

As a Philadelphian, Thomas was surrounded by some of the most innovative minds in golf course design — members of what we now call the “Philadelphia School of Golf Architecture.” He learned from established names such as A.W. Tillinghast, William Flynn, George Crump, and Hugh Wilson by observing their work in the Northeast. 

In 1919, after his service in World War I, Thomas moved to California in search of better conditions for growing and hybridizing roses, one of his lifelong passions and areas of expertise. Thomas is said to have cultivated more than a thousand types of roses during his time as a botanist.

Upon his arrival in California, Thomas joined Los Angeles Country Club. Among his early designs in the Golden State were La Cumbre (1920) and Red Hill (1921). These projects marked the beginning of Thomas and Bell’s partnership, one that produced many successful collaborations on the West Coast. In the middle of the decade, Thomas, alongside Bell, designed Ojai Valley Inn and Spa (1925). Over the next handful of years, the duo would work together to create timeless Southern California courses Bel-Air (1926), Riviera (1927), and Los Angeles North (renovation, 1928). 

In 1930, Thomas completed his final design, Stanford University Golf Course, marking the end of a phenomenal career. He passed away after suffering a heart attack at his home in Beverly Hills in 1932.