By Kevin Casey
As the first dance in what will be a “coming-out” summer for one of the most beautiful belles of Met Area golf, Hamilton Farm Golf Club’s Highlands Course in Gladstone, N.J., will host the 70th Ike MGA Stroke Play Championship June 23–24.
In a rare turn of events, Hamilton Farm will host both the MGA’s Ike, the region’s top amateur stroke-play event, and the New Jersey Open, the state’s most storied championship and its toughest “W.” Having these two premier events at the same course in the same year has happened only once before, in 1987, when Essex County Country Club turned the feat, akin to an eagle on a par 4.
Pat Wilson, the 2022 MGA Mid-Amateur champion and a member of Hamilton Farm, is happy with the scheduling oddity, created when Hamilton Farm graciously agreed to resolve a scheduling issue. “I’m really looking forward to this season and the rare chance to play two such important individual events on my home course,” he says.
Golf at Hamilton Farm is only the latest notable chapter on this storied property, located about 20 miles west of Summit. The modern history began in 1911, when industrialist James Cox Brady created a large English country estate in the Somerset Hills. Once reaching 5000 acres, it became one of New Jersey’s largest working farms and among the Somerset Hills’ most prolific economic engines, famed for its mansion, equestrian stables, prizewinning livestock, and formal gardens. The Georgian brick mansion with 64 rooms and 11 fireplaces transformed into a 200-bed hospital during World War II, and the magnificent, 50-stall equestrian stable eventually became home to the U.S. Equestrian Team, where it remains today.
Lucent Corporation bought the property in 1998 to build a first-class golf course. Designed by Dana Fry and then-partner Dr. Michael Hurdzan (best known today for their work at Wisconsin’s Erin Hills Golf Course, the 2017 U.S. Open host), the Highlands Course opened in 2001 and has been honored in course rankings ever since, including the latest Golf Digest Best In State (No. 18) and Golfweek’s Top 200 Modern Courses in the U.S. (T-196).
Fry/Hurzdan also designed the club’s other course, Hickory, which for two decades held the distinction of being the country’s only 18-hole, USGA-rated par-3 course. With holes ranging from 130 to 230 yards, it’s like playing 18 straight signature par 3s, each challenging, attractive, and fun to play.
Hamilton Farm quickly developed a reputation as a destination – a beautiful, demanding retreat, and a wonderful place to watch elite golf, with the club hosting five of the LPGA’s Match Play Championships between 2005 and 2012.
Beyond those events, the club largely kept to itself, satisfied to be a corporate enclave. “Early on, Hamilton Farm had a buttoned-up feel, and much of our play revolved around business golf,” says Director of Golf Drew Jordan.
In its more than two decades of existence, Hamilton Farm has not yet hosted an MGA championship. With little to no regional and state association tournament play, the region’s best players had few opportunities to experience Hamilton Farm’s charm.
But recently, there has been an evolution at Hamilton Farm. The club’s 2025 championship double duty says a lot about Hamilton Farm’s newfound commitment to this region’s golf. “We’ve changed quite a bit in just the past decade,” Jordan says. “Covid and golf’s recent popularity has helped Hamilton Farm appreciate the importance of community, both internally and in support of golf organizations outside our club.”
Hamilton Farm is bustling, with a younger, varied, and active membership. “Today, we have a far more integrated social scene, where Gen Xers, millennials, seniors, and retirees mingle in weekly matches,” Jordan notes. “For many of our members, Hamilton Farm has become their ‘happy place.’”
This appreciation of community pivots easily to a more outward-looking perspective. “The members here are really proud of our courses,” Jordan says. “They look forward to bringing their friends out here.” This altered sense also translates into more outside tournaments, attention, and respect. “Committing to this summer’s Ike was a natural,” he adds.
One measure of a club and its course is the quality of the players who play it. Any club is fortunate to have a single player of Pat Wilson’s caliber, a mid-amateur who seems to be in contention in every event he enters. Despite being a young course (by MGA standards), Hamilton Farm seems to churn out champion golfers, to wit:
Mark Costanza, who had one of the most successful years of any local amateur in 2020 when he won both the Ike and the New Jersey Open. For his efforts, he garnered MGA Player of the Year honors. A national presence, Costanza was runner-up in the 2022 U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship.
The Greyserman brothers: Max, at 29, the oldest sibling, played well enough on the PGA Tour in 2024 to earn his first invitation to this year’s Masters. He won several state titles, played golf at Duke University, and has moved on to a steadily improving professional career; Dean, who is competing for Stanford University after a successful junior career and a Florida State Amateur Championship; and Reed, the 2024 N.J. Amateur champion who plays for Princeton University.
Chester Patterson, the 2024 MGA Mid-Amateur champion.
Erik Stevens, who teamed with Patterson to capture the 2024 N.J. Four-Ball Championship.
In 2022, Dana Fry returned to the club to renovate the Highlands Course with current partner Jason Straka. They lengthened the course to 7,256 yards, repositioned and reshaped the bunkers, adjusted several tees, regraded some fairways, and opened up vistas by removing hundreds of trees. The work left the course more visible – and beautiful – than ever, illuminating the club’s claim that each hole is “uniquely distinct.”
Wilson, who is exempt into The Ike, gets excited when he talks about his home course renovations. “The course was already great, but our changes have taken it to a new level,” he says. “The bunkers are more playable and easier to maintain, and their repositioning and the tree work have left so many shots well-framed and inviting.”
When pressed, Wilson names the 14th hole as his favorite; a 545-yard par 5 that bends 45 degrees right in just the last 100 yards to an elevated, well-guarded, and shallow green. “A long drive down the right side forces you to decide how much you want to attack the green,” he says. “You can keep it safe to the left and maybe make birdie with a good wedge third shot, or go for the narrow green in two and maybe make an eagle – or a bogey with a shot that is just a fraction off. The entire course gives you choices like that.”
Case in point is No. 6, a 451-yard, slight dogleg-left, par 4 occupying the course’s highest elevation and offering round-pausing views of several holes. The recently added bunker in the middle of a spacious fairway catches your eye off the tee, effectively changing the former bomber’s delight into a binary decision heavily influenced by the flagstick’s location.
The hole also reminds each player of Hamilton Farm’s equestrian roots. Rather than tearing down a handsome but unused horse barn, Frye and Hurdzan incorporated it into the hole, leaving it an immovable object only ten feet from the green’s back-left edge. It gets plenty of action.
Especially with the recent renovation behind them, Director of Golf Jordan feels that Hamilton Farm’s combination of history, playability, and beauty sets it apart. “The Highlands Course presents expert golfers with a stream of strategic decisions and gorgeous sightlines. I’m looking forward to introducing our region’s best players to Hamilton Farm this summer.”