The city originally acted as the trustee for the assets left behind when George Clayton died in 1899. The golf course previously was agricultural and dairy land, and the government managed it as a city golf course starting in 1932. Until 1982, the city itself owned the golf course land. Then it gave the deed over to the George W. Clayton Trust.

City Council members in the late 1980s considered trying to buy the land back from Clayton. Instead, the city paid Clayton for a promise not to develop the land.

In exchange for $2 million, Clayton agreed in 1997 to a “conservation easement,” which says the land can’t be used for anything but golf and related activities.