Moore County: The Masters concluded last night and Business NC just released its annual golf edition, inspiring us to take a look at North Carolina’s renowned golf county, new home of the USGA and the site of the 2024 US Open coming up in June: Moore County.
Located in the Sandhills, Moore County was formed in 1784 from Cumberland. The county gets its named from the Revolutionary War captain Alfred Moore, who later went on to serve as a justice on the US Supreme Court.
The county seat of Carthage gets its name from the ancient North African city and was home of the Tyson and Jones Buggy Factory that produced more than 3,000 horse-drawn buggies a year from the 1850s through the 1920s. Since 1989, the town has hosted a buggy festival commemorating the factory’s contributions and will celebrate its 35th year this May. Visitors can stay in the Old Buggy Inn, the Victorian home that factory owner WT Jones built as a gift for his wife, which was converted into a bed and breakfast in the 1970s. Each room is named after a Victorian-era carriage.
Introduction of the railroad into the county in the late nineteenth century not only provided an economic springboard for the local lumber economy, but also paved the way for the creation of the resort towns of Pinehurst and Southern Pines. Collectively referred to as the “Home of American Golf,” the Village of Pinehurst, Southern Pines and Aberdeen house 40 golf courses within a 15-mile radius.
The Village of Pinehurst, named by Zillow as America’s most popular retirement town, began in 1895 when James Walker Tufts of Boston bought 5,800 acres of what at the time was considered a “sandy wasteland.” Tufts intended the land to be purposed for a health retreat, due to the region’s “pine ozone” believed to cure respiratory ailments caused by the Industrial Revolution. While Tufts planned ample recreational accommodations for visitors, the visitors themselves introduced golf to the resort. While Tufts commissioned a rudimentary course, it wasn’t until he hired architect Donald Ross that Pinehurst Golf Club was born in 1903. The No. 2 course, where the US Open will be played in June, is the resort’s most famous course and is considered Ross’ masterpiece. (Pinehurst opened its newest course – Pinehurst No. 10 – just a few weeks ago.) Ross became known as one of the premier course architects in America and was responsible for the designs and redesigns of more than 400 courses, including a number of North Carolina courses open to the public. Ross died while designing Raleigh Country Club, a course his wife finished. Much of his life’s work is memorialized in the Tufts Archive in the heart of the Village of Pinehurst.
Pinehurst Resort was named the first US Open anchor site and has been named the future host of the championship in 2029, 2035, 2041 and 2047. Additionally, the USGA is rounding completion of its Golf House Pinehurst, a two-pronged USGA facility that will employ 70 people and house a research and test center, as well as the USGA Experience and Hall of Fame, an intimate museum experience offering galleries of past championships, interactive exhibits and video clips. The USGA Experience and Hall of Fame, located “a short par 4 away from Pinehurst No. 2,” is anticipated to open next month ahead of the US Open. A trip to Pinehurst is incomplete without stopping by the recently renovated Carolina Hotel, known as the “Queen of the South”, which has been part of the Pinehurst Resort for more than a century.
Politically, Moore County has been a Republican stronghold for many years. Although Democratic US Senator and presidential hopeful John Edwards spent much of his early life in Robbins, he was unable to carry Moore in a general election. The last Democratic presidential candidate to carry the county was LBJ in 1964. In 2012, Mitt Romney won the county by 28 points. Donald Trump won Moore in 2016 by 29 points and again in 2020 by 27.5 points in 2020. In the 2022 US Senate race, Ted Budd carried the county by nearly 30%.
