The culture surrounding the game of golf was quite different a century ago.

When Art Hawk bought the former Alcoma Golf Club in 2006, his daughter Megan Strasser made a surprising discovery in the clubhouse.

“There weren’t even women’s restrooms accessible to players when we bought it,” Strasser said.

In addition, as a private course built in 1923, it was not set up for public enjoyment, even aesthetically.

“It was built as a club, and the whole building was facing the wrong way for public play,” Hawk said.

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An early photograph showing the Alcoma Country Club in Penn Hills as seen from the course, facing toward Saltsburg Road.
 

Three years after Hawk bought it, he changed the name to 3 Lakes Golf Course, and it was open to the public. He and his daughter are celebrating its 100th anniversary by continuing its modernization — a process that includes tearing down the original clubhouse, which was heavily damaged by flooding in late 2017.

“People like to drive up to a bar or restaurant, and the only way to correct that was building our pavilion and concession stand,” Hawk said. “That’s all people want now. They don’t want to sit down and have a big meal, they want to grab a hot dog and a drink and go back to golfing.”

Strasser agreed.

“The pandemic obviously helped with this, but we eliminated banquets and parties,” she said. “That whole culture of these sort of B-level clubs doesn’t really exist nowadays.”

Despite about $160,000 in renovations to the damaged clubhouse, Hawk was unable to find a buyer after putting it on the real estate market in 2018.

In its heyday in the mid-1900s, the clubhouse overlooked the course designed by Oakmont native and former Oakmont Country Club course superintendent Emil Loeffler. Its stately white walls sat atop a base of brick arches framing the lower windows. Around this time of year, children would often sled the course’s hills, being careful to avoid the lakes at their base.

Over the past 17 years, Hawk added four tee boxes to every hole, shortened the course and eliminated several fairway bunkers, which “would’ve made public play too slow,” Strasser said.

“We renovated the island green with pedestrian bridges, we added a driving range, and we’re continuing to make improvements,” she said.

This winter’s project will be the replacement of an old stormwater pipe running down the middle of the 18th hole fairway.

“It’s about 70 years old and rusted out on the bottom,” Hawk said.

As part of an effort to be more environmentally friendly — and pay for less water — replacing the pipe will help to better guide stormwater to the three small lakes that gave the course its current name. From there, it is pumped to irrigate the grass.

“This way rain will run directly to the lakes, instead of leaking out into the sand traps and the rough. It makes this little swamp down where the catch basin was, and it’s a wasted resource,” Strasser said.

As Hawk approaches his second full decade of owning the century-0ld course, both he and his daughter have a firm eye on the future. After the pipe replacement, one of the next big projects will be expanding 3 Lakes’ practice area. That will happen on the ground where the clubhouse stands.

Strasser said she loves being part of a place that has so much history in Penn Hills.

“I think it builds such great community,” she said. “Anyone can come and play, you don’t need approval from the board of directors, you don’t have to know a member.”

Hawk said one thing that has continued through the course’s entire history is its function as a pleasant escape.

“When people come here, they’re usually in a good mood,” he said.

Patrick Varine is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Patrick by email at pvarine@triblive.com or via Twitter .