Mandurah Country Club was officially established in 1960, with office bearers and committee members being elected at the first meeting of the Club on 9 March 1960. At that time Mandurah was a small fishing and farming village surrounded by large tracts of privately held farmland. The town itself had very little publicly owned land.

To raise capital for the new club, Debentures were issued at ten pounds for men and five pounds for women. By July 1960, seventy five men and seventy one women held Debentures which entitled them to be Foundation Members. A significant break with tradition at that time was that women were admitted to the Club as full members, rather than Associates.

The course was constructed on 100 acres of land that came to the Council in the following manner. 50 acres was purchased by the Club from the Sutton brothers. Under an agreement with Council the remaining 50 acres was set aside in lieu of future public open space requirements under the Town Planning Act against future subdivision of land owned by the Sutton brothers at Halls Head. The two parcels of land were duly surveyed from the Sutton brothers' Title and transferred to the Council.

Course Development and Design

In the development stages of the course, a lack of capital meant it was necessary to concentrate on building only the first nine holes, called 'the outside nine'. The first fixture played on 'the outside nine' was held on 13 August 1961. The 'inside' nine was playable by 1964.

The original course design was by Mr. Murray Dawson, a retired farmer and keen golfer who had successfully designed other country courses. In 1966/67 the original sand greens were replaced with Seaside Bent grass and in 1972 a practice fairway was established on the west side of the 9th fairway, however no major changes were made to the original course design until the early 1990s.

In 1994 a plan to upgrade and redesign a number of holes was implemented. From 1995 until 2001, under the guidance of Course Architect, Greg Simmonds, the grass on all fairways (which had originally been planted with a mixture of oats, New Zealand clover and Bermuda couch) was replaced with Santa Ana couch. During the same period, over forty fairway and greenside bunkers were added and the majority of greens replaced.

Extract from the club website: