Every October, the PGA Tour rolls into Jackson, Mississippi, and most people watching on TV couldn’t tell you what’s actually underneath the broadcast graphics. Three separate nines. A century of history. A membership nobody outside it can just walk into.
The Country Club of Jackson is a private, 27-hole club in Jackson, Mississippi, built from a 1914 Bendelow routing and rebuilt by Dick Wilson, then John Fought in 2008. Its Dogwood-Azalea 18 hosts the PGA Tour’s Sanderson Farms Championship every October. There’s no public green fee.
This guide closes that gap. You’ll get the real architectural timeline, the hole-by-hole numbers pulled straight from the club’s own scorecard, the tournament record book, and a direct answer to the question every non-member typing this search actually wants answered. Can you play it?
What Is the Country Club of Jackson, Exactly?
The Country Club of Jackson sits on 400 acres in Northeast Jackson, at 345 St. Andrews Drive. Private and member-owned, the club says so itself on its own homepage. Twenty-seven holes make up the property, split across three distinct nines named Dogwood, Azalea, and Cypress. Most golfers only ever hear about two of them.
Members founded the club in 1914, and it ranks today as Mississippi’s second-oldest private country club. That fact tells you something the club’s own site never bothers to mention. This isn’t a newly built showcase chasing a Tour date. A century-old institution just happened to land the biggest golf date in the state.
From a Bendelow Routing to a PGA Tour Test: The Architecture Timeline
Tom Bendelow laid out the original course in 1914, on 100 acres five miles west of downtown Jackson. Bendelow was prolific during golf’s first American boom, credited with hundreds of courses built fast across the country. This was one of them, and it didn’t stay put for long.
Members outgrew the site. In the late 1950s, they bought 400 acres northeast of downtown and hired Dick Wilson, one of the most respected architects of his generation, to build something bigger. Wilson’s course opened for play in the early 1960s and became the foundation the club still plays today.
It sat mostly untouched for four decades. Then in 2008 and 2009, John Fought, a former PGA Tour player turned architect, rebuilt the Dogwood and Azalea nines into a firmer, more classical test in a Donald Ross-influenced style. That renovation is what you actually watch on television every fall.
Architects built Cypress for members, not tournament golf, and it never got the same treatment. It still plays as the flexible, everyday course it’s always been.
Three architects, three eras, one course. Not many clubs outside the Top 100 conversation can say the same.
The Three Nines: Dogwood, Azalea, and Cypress
Here’s what nobody covering this course bothers to lay out: what all 27 holes actually look like, not just the 18 you see on TV.
| Nine | Par | Yardage From the Back Tees | What Sets It Apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dogwood | 36 | 3,713 yards | Home to the course’s longest hole, a 612-yard par 5 at No. 5 |
| Azalea | 36 | 3,708 yards | No. 16, a 479-yard par 4, carries the single hardest handicap rating on the property |
| Cypress | 36, or shorter formats | 3,500 to 1,400 yards, depending on setup | The only nine that flexes into a par-3 course, an executive nine, or a full regulation test |
Combined, Dogwood and Azalea make up the club’s championship 18, the course the Sanderson Farms Championship plays every year. The club lists it at 7,400 to 5,100 yards across five tee locations.
Here’s the detail that actually matters if you care about how this course plays, not just how long it is. The hardest-rated hole on each nine isn’t the longest hole. A long par 4 takes that title instead.
No. 5, the 612-yard par 5 on Dogwood, only carries the second-toughest handicap on its own nine. No. 6, a 482-yard par 4 right behind it, gets rated harder. That’s not a typo.
A par 5 gives you three shots to find the green. A 480-yard par 4 gives you two, and the second one usually comes from a lie you didn’t pick.
Cypress runs on a completely different philosophy. It’s built to flex, not just to play tough. Beginners, seniors, and juniors can run it as a short par-3 loop or an executive nine, and the club maintains a US Kids-specific tee system that scales from 1,184 yards for six-year-olds up to just over 3,000 yards for older juniors.
Cypress does more for the club’s long-term identity than the tournament ever will. It’s the nine growing the next generation of Mississippi golfers, not the one on television.
Course Rating, Slope, and What the Numbers Mean
From the championship tees, the Dogwood-Azalea 18 carries a course rating of 74.5 and a slope of 135. If those numbers mean nothing to you, here’s the short version. A slope over 130 puts a course in the difficult range for an everyday player, and 135 sits firmly in that territory.
A scratch golfer is expected to shoot close to the rating. Everyone else adjusts from there through their handicap index, which is the entire reason the number exists.
Play it from a forward tee and the difficulty drops fast. The same 18 holes play down to roughly 5,100 yards from the front markers, a different test for a different golfer entirely.
Home of the Sanderson Farms Championship
The Country Club of Jackson has hosted the PGA Tour’s Sanderson Farms Championship since 2014, making it Mississippi’s only regular PGA Tour stop. Before that, the tournament bounced around for decades. It began in 1968 as the Magnolia Classic, ran at Hattiesburg Country Club through 1993, then moved to Annandale Golf Club in nearby Madison from 1994 through 2013.
The event carries a $6 million purse and plays every October as part of the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup Fall swing. Scott Stallings set the tournament’s to-par scoring record at 24-under in 2012, a mark Steven Fisk matched when he won in 2025 as the defending champion heading into the 2026 edition.
Century Club Charities runs the event, and its primary beneficiary is Children’s Hospital of Mississippi, the state’s only children’s hospital. The tournament has raised more than $8 million for Mississippi charities since 1968, a number that’s easy to lose track of once the leaderboard graphics take over. Even the trophy has a story: a bronze rooster named Reveille, commissioned by a former Sanderson Farms CEO as a nod to the company’s poultry roots.
Private ownership and PGA Tour hosting go together more often than casual fans realize. Riviera Country Club runs an equally exclusive membership process despite drawing one of the sport’s highest-profile fields every February. Jackson isn’t the exception. It’s the rule.
Can You Actually Play the Country Club of Jackson?
Here’s the honest answer nobody else states directly. No, not as a walk-up. The Country Club of Jackson is strictly private, and there’s no published green fee because there isn’t one to publish.
Access runs through three realistic paths. You can play as the guest of a member, which is how the overwhelming majority of outside rounds happen at a club like this. You can pursue membership itself, handled through the club’s own application and sponsorship process rather than an open sign-up. Or, and this is the one nearly every non-member actually uses, you can walk the property as a spectator during Sanderson Farms Championship week each October, when the grounds open to the public on a ticketed basis.
That last option is worth being straight about. You won’t hit a shot. You’ll get closer to a genuinely great course than almost any other route open to you, and you’ll see it set up the way tournament officials, not weekend members, want it played. The spectator route is the best-kept secret in Mississippi golf tourism, and it’s not close.
Compare that to a course like TPC Harding Park in San Francisco, where anyone can book a tee time online despite Tour-caliber conditioning. Jackson runs the opposite model entirely. That contrast is the whole story of private clubs that happen to host public tournaments.
If Country Club of Jackson stays out of reach, Jackson still has real public golf. Pete Brown Golf Facility, a public 18-hole course renamed in 2019 to honor Pete Brown, the Jackson native who became the first Black golfer to win a PGA Tour title, sits right in the city. Live Oaks Golf Club, a semi-private option nearby, shows up on the same local best-of lists for a reason.
Beyond Golf: What Else Is at the Club
Golf isn’t the only reason members join. The Country Club of Jackson runs a full racquets program, a wedding and event venue built around its clubhouse, and a practice facility anchored by a certified Callaway master club-fitter, one of the larger custom-fitting investments the club claims in the state.
The junior program stands out specifically. Beyond the US Kids tee system on Cypress, the club runs one of the most extensive junior instruction operations in Mississippi under a dedicated director of instruction. For a club known mainly for its PGA Tour showcase, that’s not the amenity you’d expect to carry the most weight.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the Country Club of Jackson open to the public?
No. It’s a private, member-owned club. Walking the grounds as a non-member realistically means one of two things: spectating during Sanderson Farms Championship week each October, or coming as the invited guest of an existing member.
Who designed the Country Club of Jackson golf course?
Three architects, across three eras. Tom Bendelow designed the original 1914 course. Dick Wilson designed the current site’s layout, which opened in the early 1960s. John Fought renovated the Dogwood and Azalea nines in 2008 and 2009 into the course the PGA Tour plays today.
What PGA Tour event is played at the Country Club of Jackson?
Sanderson Farms Championship golf has been played here every October since 2014. It’s Mississippi’s only regular PGA Tour stop and the second event of the FedEx Cup Fall.
How many holes does the Country Club of Jackson have?
Twenty-seven, across three nines: Dogwood, Azalea, and Cypress. Dogwood and Azalea combine into the club’s championship 18, used for tournament play. Cypress is a flexible members’ nine that converts into a par-3 course, an executive nine, or a full regulation test.
What is the course rating and slope at the Country Club of Jackson?
From the championship tees, the Dogwood-Azalea 18 carries a course rating of 74.5 and a slope of 135, putting it firmly in difficult territory for an everyday player. The same layout plays down to roughly 5,100 yards, with an easier corresponding rating, from the forward tees.
How much does it cost to join the Country Club of Jackson?
The club doesn’t publish initiation fees or dues. Like most private country clubs, membership runs through an application and sponsorship process rather than a posted price list, and cost details are only available by contacting the club directly.
Bottom Line
The Country Club of Jackson earns its PGA Tour date honestly. A century-old routing, three different architects, and a 27-hole property most golfers only know a third of. You almost certainly can’t play it without an invitation, but you can walk it every October, and now you know exactly what you’re looking at when you do. For a look at how an even older championship venue handles the same balancing act, Shinnecock Hills carries the longer history and it’s worth reading next.