Hawaii Golf Hall of Famers Allan Yamamoto and Wendell Kop both turned 86 this year. Ala Wai Golf Course, where they and many, many more grew to love the game, is now 90.

The course opened for nine holes in 1931 and 56 years later was averaging 544 rounds a day. The national average was 300. Locals with ID paid $4 on weekdays and $6 weekends back then (it’s $26 and $30 now, plus cart). The National Golf Foundation verified Ala Wai as the busiest course in the country and Guinness Book of World Records later chimed in.

This was after the city and county went to a dial-a-time phone system so golfers wouldn’t line up overnight at the entrance for a tee time.

Bev Kim, another Hall of Famer who started at Ala Wai as a teenager in the 1960s, said those nights waiting are among her “fondest memories” of the course.

“We’d sleep in our cars until 5:45 a.m., when the starter would walk by, knock on our windows and give us a number,” Kim said. “Then he’d open the gate to the parking lot, we’d follow, then all get in an orderly line for the prized tee times.”

Dialing in didn’t make it much easier. The Honolulu Advertiser called the system “dial-a-prayer” back in 1986, when Ala Wai was getting nearly 30,000 calls the first half hour, with 75 getting through.

It’s still tough now, with Ala Wai’s playing numbers down even before pandemic restrictions extended tee-time intervals from six to 12 minutes, limited groups to foursomes and eliminated wait lists. Witness all the golfers religiously on their phones each morning at 6:30.

Pandemic rules are looser now — hey, social distancing is ingrained in golf — but you no longer hear Ala Wai starters advise players to tee off two-at-a time. Golf magazine called it “synchronized driving”

“It was crazy busy,” says Mark Chun, who worked at Ala Wai 20 years ago, and also shot 60 there — parring the final three holes. “How I measure it is the waiting list. People would wait two to three hours to play golf.

“It was kinda nuts. You would work the window a couple hours and trade off with a partner because it just keeps coming at you. It does not stop. I related it to the DMV. All the way until twilight, it doesn’t let up.”

Ala Wai remains crazy, in so many ways.

Built on 150 acres that was the site of the Territorial Fairgrounds, the municipal course boasts views of Diamond Head, the Koolaus and Waikiki. Even the neighboring Ala Wai Canal looks good as you pray your ball doesn’t go in the water fronting the 14th and 18th greens.

A location so convenient for so many — including tourists across the canal — and the bang for the buck have had huge impact. Also, chances of bad weather are as remote as getting through when you call for a time.

Then there is the flat and friendly course. Sony Open in Hawaii pros bring their family to play. Hall of Famers like Yamamoto, Kop, Kim, Ted Makalena and Jackie Pung grew up there before organized junior golf, some playing barefoot. Now, juniors play free as they seek college scholarships.

But older adults are absolutely the majority, and most find it as fun as it is affordable (those 65-older can buy a 10-round monthly pass for $95). Many play many times a week.

“It’s muni-style user-friendly, not a very difficult course. Everyone can play it, all levels can play it with ease,” Chun says. “You can get to a point where you kind of master it.

“Some courses are so tough it’s not fun, but it’s a fun course. And it’s got a driving range that’s super busy also, day and night.”

Rocky Kuba started at Ala Wai in 1960 and now, at 93, still walks the 6,000-yard, par-70 layout. Early in the morning, he can finish under 3 hours. “I like it because it’s pretty easy and easy to walk,” Kuba says, “but still challenging.”

It goes slower as the day moves on — there might be as many stories about 6-hour weekend rounds as golfers making the turn at 7 a.m. — but Ala Wai could truly be the home of golf’s well-worn mantra “If you cannot play good, play fast.”

Its ambience is as intriguing as it is unique. At Ala Wai, you have to play it to believe it.

It is simple like its dress code (“shirts must be worn at all times, no slippers or barefeet”) yet calculated — and sometimes risky — in regulars’ rush to the finish line.

Made for the masses, it is also home to the legendary. Guinea Kop — Wendell’s dad and yet another Hall of Famer — was its first pro. Fellow Famers Ted Makalena and Ron Castillo followed. Kim grew to love the game there after Guinea Kop’s lessons and being adopted by Palolo Women’s Golf Club aunties like Hope Yee, May Lee, Ethel Kahikina and Jeanette Kapu.

“Guinea taught me technique and mechanics,” Kim says. “The aunties taught me everything else about respect, playing, competing and having fun.”

Wendell Kop, who used to play barefoot, recalls all the changes at Ala Wai. That included a layout tweek to protect drivers on Date Street and the “shack” of an original clubhouse — “People could go in and sign up and that was about it.”

It became “a bigger shack like a wooden barn” and in 1990 morphed into a two-story, 24,000-square-foot behemoth that might be known best for its L&L Hawaiian BBQ with a bar downstairs and ballroom dancing upstairs.

Yamamoto’s affinity for Ala Wai began when his University of Hawaii coaches in other sports began inviting him to be their fourth so he would keep playing golf. Eventually he had a regular game with Makalena and played with pretty much every Hall of Famer here.

The course hosts major local events and was home to the 1960 U.S. Amateur Public Links and 1984 U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links. More than 1,000 golfers entered — 348 more than ever before.

Ala Wai has always drawn a crowd.

“It’s where I fit in,” Kim says of the early days. “The location was good, the price was right, all the people were great — beach boys, UH professors, juvenile detention home wardens, barbers, bus drivers, nurses, teachers.

“The pleasure, joy, excitement, exercise, fellowship and other real life opportunities it provides so many are priceless.”

For 90 years now, and counting.