Jay Riviere leads the way by a large margin, with 22 golf courses designed or renovated in the Houston area. Throughout his career, he designed more than 70 golf courses in the U.S. and South America. His highest-rated course is the Loch/Paddock course at Gleannloch Pines Golf Club.

Riviere, a three-year letterman and member of Rice University’s 1954 Southwest Conference championship football team, and was also on the golf team at Rice. He spent the early part of his career working in golf shops. He worked for Jimmy Demaret at the Concorde Hotel in New York (in 1956) and for Claude Harmon at Winged Foot Golf Club from 1957 to 1959.

He was also a competent player of the game— he won an Assistant Professional Championship and qualified for the 1959 U.S. Open while at Winged Foot.

His start in the golf course design business came when he worked as a construction supervisor for George Fazio during the 1964 construction of the Jackrabbit Course at Champions Golf Club. Within a few years, Riviere had provided his first solo project, the original 18 holes at Panorama Country Club in Conroe.

He teamed up with the late Dave Marr (fellow Texas Golf Hall of Fame Member) to form Riviere-Marr, Inc., in 1981, a partnership that led to many of the courses that sprung up across the Houston area during the mid- and late 1980s. Riviere served on the oversight committee that worked to restore Memorial Park Golf Course (part of the Hall of Fame’s Texas Registry of Historic Golf Courses) to its former glory.

Birthplace: Houston, Texas

Born: October 1, 1933

Died: October 15, 2010