Arthur Hills Golf Course

Few golfers passing through central Missouri would expect to find a course bearing the name of one of America's most respected golf architects, but Arthur Hills Golf Course in Mexico, MO carries that distinction with quiet pride. Arthur Hills, the Michigan-based designer behind layouts at Inverness Club, Palmetto Dunes, and dozens of other respected venues, lent his name — and presumably his design sensibility — to this community course, giving a small Midwestern city a layout with genuine architectural pedigree behind it.

Mexico sits in Audrain County, in the rolling agricultural heartland of Missouri, where open skies and modest terrain define the landscape. It's the kind of honest American golf country where the game stays rooted in its working-class traditions, and a par-71 layout fits that spirit well — a slight departure from the standard par-72 that usually signals some strategic thinking in how the routing was assembled.

For golfers exploring Missouri beyond the well-trodden resort corridors of Branson or the St. Louis metro, this is the sort of local find worth a detour.