Meadowbrook Renovation Hails Fort Worth History

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 When the accomplished team of John Colligan and Trey Kemp began their work of redesigning a Fort Worth golf course almost 100 years old, they paid close attention to the history of Meadowbrook Golf Course.

Originally designed in 1924 by the man often considered the Father of Texas Golf, John Bredemus, Colligan and Kemp wanted to do something special with the unique topography in East Fort Worth.

Bredemus has a sterling reputation as a pioneer in Texas golf with many designs all over the state from Henderson Country Club in East Texas to San Felipe Country Club in Del Rio. In Fort Worth, Bredemus is credited with helping design Colonial Country Club in 1936 and Rockwood Park in 1938. Both of those courses involved a collaboration with the highly esteemed Perry Maxwell of Oklahoma who is famous for designing Prairie Dunes in Kansas and Southern Hills in Tulsa.

It was the 2017 renovation of Rockwood by Colligan and Kemp that supplied the momentum for the Meadowbrook project that began in November of 2023. The course just opened in late September of 2025 to universal rave reviews because of the rerouting efforts to highlight a unique hilly piece of property that makes the golfer feel as if the course is in the Texas Hill Country rather than the DFW Metroplex.

To gain a better understanding of golf’s history in Fort Worth, it is good to ponder the talents of Bredemus, a native of Michigan who was both a gifted athlete and a teacher who moved to Texas where he was enthralled with both playing golf and designing courses. He also promoted the game and helped  start the tour events in San Antonio, Dal­las and Houston. He is given credit for luring the first major to Texas when the PGA Championship was played at Cedar Crest in Dallas in 1927, won by the great Walter Hagen.

Now the spirit of Bredemus has new life at Meadowbrook with an attractive layout designed on a canvas of impressive elevation changes.

“After the successful renovation of Rockwood in 2017, which really im­proved the golf facilities for Fort Worth, the city wanted to apply that same for­mula to revitalize Meadowbrook,” Kemp said. “The facility turned 100 in 2024 and had outlived many of its golf course components.”

Like their work at Rockwood, Colligan and Kemp rerouted the holes dramatically to take advantage of the natural terrain. In the end, 15 of 18 holes were changed.

“Rerouting the golf course to take advantage of the topography was a major part of the renovation,” said Kemp. “The only holes not rerouted were holes 10, 12 and 13. However, the twelfth changed from a par four to a par five and the thir­teenth went from a par five to a par four.”

In addition to the accentuation of the unique property features, the fairways were widened to allow the golfer greater freedom off the tee. After 50 years of encroaching trees, this allows the player a chance to see more of the layout design features such as rock outcroppings and twisting water features.

Colligan and Kemp treasured this opportunity and proved their mettle with the visually stunning par 3 eighth hole that will surely have players grabbing their cell phones for pictures. The rela­tively short hole plays from a giant bluff to a well contoured green below. The hole looks so inviting that dreams of holes in one are surely in the making. Nothing breeds confidence like a big green sitting some 100 feet below the tee box.