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A development group plans to build a championship caliber private golf course, which they believe will be rated as one of the top 100 in the country, north of Ashippun in Dodge County. The site for the course, to be called Kettle Forge, is located at W1851 Creek Road in the Town of Ashippun, 8
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Brett Craig[/caption]
The Kettle Forge development group is led by Brett Craig, a Delafield resident and former president and chief operating officer of Pinellas Park, Florida-based Transitions Optical, a manufacturer of photochromic lenses. He is also the former president and CEO of two venture capital/private equity-backed vision care companies, Roanoke, Virgnia-based Pixel Optics and Alpharetta, Georgia-based QSpex.
“The vision (for Kettle Forge) is to build a championship-caliber golf course, potentially rated as a top 100 golf course in the U.S. and that could potentially even host a major (PGA) Tour event or a very strong Tour event,” Craig said. “Whether we host (a PGA Tour event) or not will be up to the board. But we will build it to the level we would have the option of doing that.
“It’s going to be very exclusive but comfortable and casual. We’re going to obviously enforce rules and regulation within the club, but the setting is a very beautiful farm setting, so we’re going to have a casual feel to it in terms of its culture.”
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Bill Kubly[/caption]
In addition to Craig, the Kettle Forge development team also includes Bill Kubly, chairman of the board for Lincoln, Nebraska-based Landscapes Unlimited LLC, one of the nation’s largest golf course construction, development and management companies, and PGA Tour pro Steve Stricker, who has won 12 tournaments on the PGA Tour.
Landscapes Unlimited will be the project manager to build Kettle Forge. Landscapes Golf Management, a sister company of Landscapes Unlimited, will operate the club, oversee the grow-in of the course and handle membership sales and other planning functions.
The design team for Kettle Forge will be led by Chapel Hill, North Carolina-based Jackson Kahn Design. The design team also includes East Gull Lake, Minnesota-based Scott Hoffmann Golf, which provided the early routing for Kettle Forge, and Stricker, who will serve as a design consultant for Kettle Forge.
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Steve Stricker[/caption]
“It will be designed with professional input, including Steve Stricker, and as well as other resources like the PGA Tour to ensure we can build to (championship) caliber,” Craig said.
Craig said Stricker brings a premium player’s view on how the course should be designed.
“He’ll add his perspective as a PGA player and coach on what’s appropriate to make this course the top caliber golf course we want to build,” Craig said.
Kubly and Stricker were previously working on a golf course 
Aerial photo of the Kettle Forge site near Ashippun.[/caption]