Tom Fazio carved a big, bold, and beautiful course out of the forests and hills of rural New Jersey. Wait, did you say New Jersey? Yes.
Joel Moore ran an accounting firm from 1983–2012. So when he woke up one morning in 1998 and told wife Pam he was going to build a private, golf-only club with a Tom Fazio-designed course and no houses, he knew how to make the numbers work to make his dream come true.
A half-hour northeast of Princeton, N.J., Moore found 300 rural acres featuring elevation changes, brooks, rock outcroppings, and mature trees. Then, using contacts he made as a member of two Florida clubs with Fazio courses, he set up a meeting with the architect at the 1999 PGA Show in Orlando. When Fazio asked who was Moore’s second choice to build the course, Moore said if he turned down the job, the course wouldn’t be built. Replied a stunned Fazio, “No one has ever said that to me.”
It took nine months and more than two dozen routing plans before construction began in late 1999. The course opened in 2002 and rave reviews soon followed. In its short history, The Ridge has hosted a number of significant tournaments, including the 2016 Philadelphia Open and the 2022 New Jersey State Open.
Sitting high on a natural ridge that unveils dramatic views across rolling hills thick with trees, it’s little wonder that Fazio says, “Golfers will be shocked by the natural beauty and drama of this course.”
Part of that beauty is provided by the property’s red-rock outcroppings, long veins of barn-red shale that first appear behind the green on the par-five 5th hole. The red rock also rises out of the ground to split the fairway on the par-five 7th hole and forms walls behind the greens on the par-four 9th and par-five 18th holes. But its most spectacular display is as an 80-foot vertical rock wall that backdrops the downhill par-three 8th hole.
There is also Back Brook, which comes into play on nine holes, including at the last, where it guards the front of the green.
Since the course opened, Moore has done some tweaking, adding ponds and tee boxes. Fully stretched, The Ridge plays to 7,215 yards; from its shortest tees, 5,118 yards.
“We have five par threes, and most of them have eight to nine tee boxes so they can play not only from different yardages but also different angles,” Moore says. “You can have a different look every day you play the course.”
The club also has a 20-acre practice area with a separate short game area. In 2019, an 18-hole putting course was added on the 35,000-square-foot green behind the mountain lodge-style clubhouse, which opened in 2004. All part of what Moore likes to call “The Ridge Experience.”
“When a member and/or a guest come on the property, our goal is for the course and facility to exceed their expectations,” Moore says. “My superintendent has been here 13 years. I have a mandate with him that the course be as good or better than any other golf course.”
Mission accomplished.
