Florida Historic Marker Unveiled at Site of Former Dodgertown Golf Club in Vero Beach

A marker designating the site of the former Dodgertown Golf Club in Vero Beach as a Florida Heritage Landmark was unveiled during November 8, 2025 ceremonies. The marker is co-sponsored by the Indian River County Historical Society and the Tourist Development Council. Adjacent to Holman Stadium and on the west side of the Jackie Robinson Training Complex, the former Dodgertown Golf Club was privately designed and built in 1965 by Dodger President Walter O’Malley.

The unique golf course was dedicated on February 28, 1966 and, after spring training that year, on April 1, 1966 became Vero Beach’s and Indian River County’s first public golf course.  Indian River County’s only two local courses in Vero Beach were privately owned (Riomar C.C. and Vero Beach C.C.). The well-manicured, nine-hole course instantly became popular as more than 5,000 individuals played it in its first year.

O’Malley stated that the reason for the 3,300-yard course was to give all Dodger players a recreational opportunity to play golf. Many Dodger players enjoyed playing on this integrated course, which today has become an Indian River County walking trail. “Dodgertown Golf Club” and “Baseball and Civil Rights” are featured on the two sides of the Florida Historic Marker.

The Dodgers have a legacy as U.S. civil rights leaders becoming Major League Baseball’s first fully-integrated spring training site in the South in 1948. All Dodger players stayed, dined and played together on site. In March 1962, first-year Dodgertown Camp Director Peter O’Malley met with African American community activist J. Ralph Lundy and Dodger players including Tommy Davis to immediately integrate Holman Stadium so that all fans could view games from anywhere in the stands, use all restrooms and drinking fountains. This was seven years before the Vero Beach public schools were integrated.  

Dodger outfielder Lou Johnson said about Dodgertown Golf Club in the book Under the March Sun, “When they put that golf course up there, that was a highlight. I didn’t know one place we (the black players) could go to play golf. That made a big difference, I think, in the African American players in their appreciation of Walter O’Malley.”  

Peter O’Malley continued to meet with the biracial committee as Jim Crow laws were still in effect in Vero Beach. In the December 5, 1963 Vero Beach Press Journal it was reported, “A poll of Vero Beach motels and restaurants will be sponsored by the committee in an effort to acquire a list of businesses that will serve Negroes under at least certain conditions. That way, (co-committee chair) Rev. (Arnold) Wettstein explained, some embarrassment can be eliminated.”  

Lundy is mentioned on the marker “as one of Indian River County’s leading citizens and a mentor to future generations.”

With the growth of the nine-hole course, in 1971 the O’Malley family added an 18-hole course in Vero Beach at 43rd Avenue and 26th Street initially named Safari Pines Country Club and later Dodger Pines C.C.

The former Dodgertown now has two Florida Heritage Landmark markers, the first “Baseball and Dodgertown” was installed on November 10, 2014.