Opened in 1978, Nob North Golf Course is owned by the City of Dalton, Georgia, but its original head professional says it neither looks nor plays like a typical municipal layout.
“This one’s a cut above,” says Al Foster, who retired in 2011 but still spends time at the course where he put in 32 years. “Steve Davis was the (original course) superintendent, and that was his thing — he didn’t want people to know it was a city-owned course.”
Designed by Ron Kirby and golf legend Gary Player, Nob North opened two months after Player won his third and final Masters Tournament. The course was built for $1.2 million on land donated by a company owned, in part, by Stan Maples — father of Marla Maples, who was married to future U.S. President Donald Trump from 1993 to 1999 and is the mother of their daughter, Tiffany.
At 6,600 yards from the back tees, Nob North isn’t long by modern standards. But Eric Hester, who worked for Foster for a decade before succeeding him as the course’s head pro, says that’s not the point.
“The defense is the greens,” Hester says. “There’s so much undulation.
“I haven’t played anywhere that has as much slope in the greens as we have. That’s why people keep coming back.”
And come back they do. Hester says Nob North hosted more than 31,000 rounds in 2024.
“Pretty good year,” he says. “We were probably doing 27,000 to 28,000 rounds per year before COVID.”
Hester says a lot of those rounds are played by golfers who drive to Nob North from Chattanooga and Cleveland. Chattanooga native Gibby Gilbert, who won nine times on the PGA Tour and the Senior PGA (now Champions) Tour, says he’s made several trips to Nob North, including one long-ago jaunt with buddies when he was 17-under-par for two days.
“I like to play tough courses that are fair,” Gilbert says. “It’s a fine layout — a good test, fun to play and fair.”
Frazier says that in a business context, Nob North has been a “pretty much a break-even” proposition for the City of Dalton over the years and gets no taxpayer money for regular operations. Figures provided by the City show that Nob North posted gross revenues of $1.33 million in 2024 and net income of $277,000.
Hester points out that money made at Nob North goes back into the golf course. In 2018, he says, the greens were converted from bent grass, which thrives in cool weather, to more heat-tolerant TifEagle Bermuda grass for an estimated $600,000. And the course is just about finished with a $1.1 million renovation of its bunkers.
But Frazier is quick to add that where Nob North is concerned, it’s much more about pride than pennies.
“Nob North is a great asset — not just for Dalton, but the region,” he says. “People who come here for the first time are surprised to learn that it’s a municipal course, and we take great pride in that.”
Nob North Golf Course is in Dalton, Georgia, and is 36 minutes from downtown Chattanooga, traveling primarily on Interstate 75 South