Not far from modest, low-slung stucco homes, a liquor store with barred windows and a run-down motel, sits a small green haven for South Los Angeles golfers.
The Maggie Hathaway Golf Course has been offering affordable, accessible golf for more than six decades. With its location directly in the flight path for the Los Angeles International Airport, it’s a sweet oasis for the sport. With its cinder-block tiny office and starter buildings, the unassuming, 9-hole, par-3 course is located within Jesse Owens Park, a few miles from the SoFi Stadium, at the corner of Western Avenue and Century Boulevard.
With the 123rd U.S. Open Championship coming to Los Angeles for the first time since 1948, the United States Golf Association — as it does in every city hosting the event — has chosen to endow the municipal golf course.
The county-owned golf course — which has featured the Black singer and activist’s name since 1997 — will soon receive a substantial facelift, to the tune of $15 million, officials said.
The USGA is donating the first million, joined by the Southern California Golf Association, the Los Angeles Country Club, L.A. County and other donors in raising funds to refurbish Maggie Hathaway — where golfers can play a half-round of golf for $7.25, or shag a bucket of balls at the driving range for $9. The golf course — originally named the Jack Thompson Golf Course — was first built in 1962.
The investment, billed as the FORE Youth Foundation and 2023 U.S. Open Community Legacy Project, is part of these organizations’ goal to bring the sport of golf to diverse communities, and expand junior golf programming across Los Angeles.
Norma E. García-González, director of the L.A. County Department of Parks and Recreation, said that the project’s goal is to “widen that door for African American youth and youth of color in Los Angeles.”
“We’re gonna see some improvements that are exciting, going to raise the level on aesthetics, but also bring about pride by playing there and hopefully making it a destination place for the youth,” Garcia-Gonzalez said.
“We know that the future of golf will be defined by something that looks more like the demographics of U.S. — with more African American participation, more Hispanic involvement, more women being involved,” said Dave Aznavorian, senior director of Transformational Initiatives with USGA.
The USGA hopes to further the work Hathaway herself started in the 1950s as a civil rights activist.
Aznavorian said that Maggie Hathaway could serve as “a beachhead” in LA County, that would give underrepresented groups access to golf “whether it’s to learn it, to play it, to watch it or to work in it.”
Hathaway’s humble beginnings
The name Maggie Mae Hathaway may be familiar to a lucky, chosen few.
Born in 1911 in Campti, Louisiana, Hathaway came to L.A. at 20 years old hoping to play piano in one of the city’s clubs on Central Avenue, also known as “Black Broadway.” Instead, she found herself working as an extra for Hollywood films, often playing roles of “Egyptians” or “exotics.” Her biggest claim to fame was playing the body double for singer and actress Lena Horne in the 1943 film “Stormy Weather.” She also played a dancer in the “Ziegfeld Follies” (1945), an extra in “The Manchurian Candidate” (1962), and recorded several vocal albums.
According to a biography posted at the golf course, the young actor’s film career ended when Hathaway refused to wear a bandana and sit atop a bale of hay in a biopic about President Woodrow Wilson.
Hathaway became interested in golf in 1955, after losing a bet against former heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis — who was a competitive amateur golfer and a fierce advocate for diversity in the sport. Once hooked on golf, Hathaway also began writing about it for the California Eagle and Los Angeles Sentinel.
In 1963, she started the Minority Association for Golfers to advocate for young black golfers who wanted to work in the golf industry, according to the Los Angeles Sentinel.
During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, Hathaway led a protest at the Long Beach municipal golf course. As a prominent writer, actor and golfer, she joined many local efforts to fight segregation on the greens, and went on to become a major activist in the Los Angeles-Hollywood area. She also co-founded the Beverly Hills/Hollywood branch of the NAACP with friend Sammy Davis Jr., and created the NAACP’s Image Awards.
Hathaway died in Sept. 2001, remembered by others as a “top-rated golfer… at a time when black (people) weren’t allowed on many courses.”
“She crusaded against segregation,” RJ Smith wrote in Los Angeles Magazine. She was a “troublemaker…. who had made integration possible.”
In a statement, L.A. County Supervisor Holly Mitchell said that Hathaway “broke barriers to bring the joy and excitement of golf to Black people and communities of color.”
“I am proud that this investment helps further the vision of this golf course that is a treasured community asset in the heart of South LA,” Mitchell said.
Carrying on a legacy
That drive to bring golf to underrepresented communities today is fully embodied in Maggie Hathaway Golf Course’s primary caretaker, Glen Porter.
Porter, who is Black, is CEO for Southern Area Youth Programs, Inc. a nonprofit created to promote youth minority sports. Much like the golf course’s namesake, Porter devotes his efforts to promoting golf to youth in South L.A., offering programs and classes for young golfers at the course.
Porter and his wife Mary will run out to McDonald’s or Subway, when busloads of students show up hungry. He and others volunteer to slap some fresh paint on the golf course’s aging facilities and fences.
On a recent tour of the course, Porter sighed deeply while pointing out the obvious rebar and wires covering the office building windows. The bars-over-the-windows look, he said, isn’t conducive to healthy, productive play.
“I’ve been here a long time with the kids, and we’re all barred in here,” he said. Among his wish list of changes at Maggie Hathaway include a renovated lounge area, a snack bar, and a re-flowed design for the course, so that the driving range starts at the entrance. “Do I want to come here and play golf? Do I want to invite my friends over here to see this?”
Maggie Hathaway will go through some extensive renovations, overseen by acclaimed golf course architect Gil Hanse, who has redesigned courses including the Pinehurst Resort & Country Club in North Carolina, and the Royal Sydney Golf Club in Australia.
Of the $15 million needed to cover renovations, about $9.3 million has already been pledged through anchor donors and other supporters, according to Kevin Gigax, the Executive Director of the Southern California Golf Association’s Junior Golf Foundation. Gigax said they hope to raise an additional $3 million to expand and sustain foundation scholarships and programming.
“The majority of that would be to renovate the golf course, renovate the practice area, renovate the buildings, and potentially develop like a classroom or learning center community center,” Gigax said, “sort of gathering place for the entire community.”
The USGA is also committed to provide work opportunities in the golf industry for under-represented youth. Last week, the association announced they hired 20 college students for a career training program, according to a press release.
California Senator Steven Bradford (D-35), who grew up in nearby Gardena, remembers Maggie Hathaway as the first course he ever played as a child. Bradford said he knew Hathaway personally, and that she advocated tirelessly for the racial integration of golf courses across L.A. County.
“I know how important it was to (Maggie) that this golf course be accessible and affordable to our South Los Angeles residents,” Bradford said in an email. “It’s important that the Black community and the neighborhood golfers who have been coming here for decades continue to have access to enjoy this special place.
Inclusive access concerns Porter, too, who is well aware that rising L.A. gentrification can sometimes take a turn, booting out the very people it is intended to serve. With the roar of jets from nearby LAX making their ascents, Porter shouted to be heard.
“Don’t try to change us into some little country club and raise the prices, so my people can’t play anymore and do what they do,” Porter said. “Golf has always been a rich man’s game, (and) now we have this opportunity to bring in people from all over, to bring youth in and introduce them to the game of golf.”
The municipal course will host a fundraiser to boost its endowment on Tuesday, June 13, from 3 to 6 p.m. Maggie Hathaway Golf Course is at 1921 W. 98th Street in Los Angeles. For information, see scgajunior.org.
