History of Women’s Professional Golf

Image Sources: "Mary Queen of Scots Golfing" from National Library of Scotland & "Early LPGA Group Photo" South Dakota Sports Hall of Fame

Posted on March 7, 2018

The participation of women in golf is continually growing to new heights each year. There were approximately 5.8 million women who play golf, according to a 2017 National Golf Foundation report. Involvement of women in golf has continued to increase over the past few years. Women and golf have a long history together dating back to the 1500s. Let’s explore the history of women in golf and the advancement of professional women’s golf.

Mary, Queen of Scots

Mary, Queen of Scots, ruled Scotland from 1542 to 1567 and is noted by some as the first female to play golf. During her reign the famous St Andrews Links golf course was built. Mary is credited for creating the term “caddie” which was derived from the word “cadets” used by her when referring to her assistants.

The first recorded golf tournament for women only occurred on January 9th, 1811. The tournament was held in the town at Musselburgh, East Lothian, Scotland for local fisherman’s wives of Musselburgh and Fisherrow, a neighboring town. The event was organized by the Musselburgh Golf Club and took place on their eighteen hole pitch and putt course. The prize for the winner was a creel and a shawl, with the runner up receiving two handkerchiefs from Barcelona.

In 1843 the St Andrews Golf Club was formed in Scotland. Later in 1867 the very first women’s golf club was formed, which was initially formed as The Ladies Club of St Andrews. The club later became known as the St Andrews Ladies Putting Club and is currently known as The Ladies Putting Club of St Andrews. After initial struggles to gain members the club grew to 500 members after its first 19 years. Madeleine Boothby, a wife to a member of the R&A, was the first president of the club. In 1868 at the golf course Westward Ho!, in south-east England, there was a specially built 18-hole ladies course. Local English women played a tournament after three months of the course opening.

One of the earliest golf clubs to form within the United States was the Shinnecock Hills Golf Club located in Southampton, New York in 1891. The club allowed women to play and after growing popularity built a 9-hole course for women. The Shinnecock Hills Golf Club would be host to the 6th U.S. Women’s Amateur in 1900, won by Frances Griscom. The first U.S. Women’s Amateur was held at the Meadow Brook Club in Hempstead, New York in 1895, won by Lucy Barnes Brown. Prior to the U.S. Women’s Amateur the very first women’s golf tournament held in the United States took place in 1894 on the 7-hole course in Morristown, New Jersey.

Issette Miller

Although golf began as an elitist and male dominated sport there was a growing acceptance of women in golf at the turn of the century. In 1893, Issette Miller was a leading female golfer of the time who helped influence the game for all. Miller invented the very first golf handicapping system, which helped even the playing field and let less experienced players have a competitive chance. In 1917, the Women’s Tournament Committee of the United States Golf Association (U.S.G.A.) was formed, which became the Women’s Committee of the U.S.G.A. in 1934.

In 1932 the inaugural Curtis Cup match was played in England at the Wentworth Club. The competition is between amateur women golfers and puts a team representing the United States against a team representing both England and Ireland, similar to the Walker Cup for amateur men golfers. The Americans took home the first Curtis Cup and the event has been played biennially since. The Cup was presented by Harriot and Margaret Curtis, who had won the U.S. Women’s Amateur four times collectively.

Helen Hicks

Helen Hicks was among the first women to become a professional golfer in the year 1934. She signed with Wilson-Western Sporting Goods Company becoming one of the first women to sign with a sporting good company. Hicks won two tournaments which are now major tournaments on the LPGA tour, the 1937 Women’s Western Open and the 1940 Titleholders Championship.

After being denied amateur status in golf, former Olympian, Babe Zaharias competed in the 1938 Los Angeles Open, which was a PGA event. Zaharias was the first to attempt to play in a professional men’s tournament, which wouldn’t be tried again for almost another six decades. Unfortunately after the initial two rounds Zaharias failed to make the cut. Along with making golf history at the tournament Babe made her own personal history as she was paired with George Zaharias, whom she would marry eleven months later. Babe Zaharias would go on to become one of America’s first female golf sensation and major player in the 40s and 50s.

Babe Zaharias

In 1945, Babe Zaharias competed in three more PGA Tour events and made the initial cut in all three, becoming the first and only female to do so. At the Los Angeles Open, Babe first had to qualify to play then made the two-day cut, but didn’t make the three-day cut. She not only made the cut but finished in 33rd place at the Phoenix Open. At the Tucson Open she finished tied for 42nd. Zaharias was the first American to win the British Ladies Amateur in 1947. She won a total of 82 amateur and professional golf tournaments, including all golf titles available at the time and an unmatched feat of 14 straight amateur wins.

Patty Berg was another sensational female golfer of the time. Berg won several major tournaments and became the first female golfer to have her own golf clubs. Wilson Sporting Goods produced a line of Patty Berg Cup Defender golf clubs in 1941. In 1946 Berg became the first champion of the U.S. Women’s Open, which took place at Spokane Country Club in Seattle, Washington. The first U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship was held in 1949 with Marlene Bauer emerging victorious at 15 years old, she would turn pro later that year.

LPGA While the Ladies Professional Golf Association, LPGA, wasn’t established until 1950 the true ground work for the LPGA was laid 6 years prior with the formation of the Women’s Professional Golf Association, or WPGA. The WPGA was founded by Hope Seignious, Betty Hicks and Ellen Griffin. However due to financial struggle, although Wilson Sporting Goods assisted in 1948, the WPGA stopped after its 1948 season and officially ended in 1949. In 1950 the Ladies Professional Golf Association, LPGA, was formed by a group of 13 prominent female golfers; Alice Bauer, Patty Berg, Bettye Danoff, Helen Dettweiler, Marlene Bauer Hagge, Helen Hicks, Opal Hill, Betty Jameson, Sally Sessions, Marilynn Smith, Shirley Spork, Louise Suggs, and Babe Zaharias. The inaugural president of the LPGA was Patty Berg. The LPGA was established with the help of financial aid from Wilson Sporting Goods. In its first season the LPGA held 14 tournaments with $50,000 in total for prize funds.

By 1952 the LPGA increased its number of events to 21 and established the Vare Trophy to be awarded to the player with the lowest scoring average at the end of the season. The Vare Trophy derives its name to honor Glenna Collett-Vare who was a stellar amateur golfer in the 1920s and 30s, winning a number of women’s amateur titles along with being part of the first Curtis Cup. In 1959 the LPGA forms its Teaching Division, which later in 1992 became the LPGA Teaching and Club Professional (T&CP) Division, and the prize fund reached the $200,000 mark that year.

Mickey Wright & Kathy Whitworth

In the 1960’s two sensational female golfers emerged to dominate the field, Mickey Wright and Kathy Whitworth. Helping spark the popularity of women’s golf was a televised exhibition match between the great Arnold Palmer and Dow Finsterwald against Mickey Wright and Barbara Romack in which Wright and Romack defeated the pair of male golfers. Mickey Wright would win 68 LPGA tournaments during the 1960s on her way to a career 82 LPGA Tour wins. Kathy Whitworth holds the record for the most career LPGA Tour victories with 88 total with 53 coming in the 1960s.

The LPGA first gained national television coverage during the 1963 U.S. Women’s Open Championship final round. In 1967 the LPGA Hall of Fame, which was established in 1951, finally had a physical premise in Augusta, Georgia. Its inaugural members were Betty Jameson, Louise Suggs, Patty Berg and Babe Zaharias. The LPGA Hall of Fame was eventually merged together with the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1998. At the end of the 1960s the prize money upon the LPGA Tour grew to $600,000 with 34 scheduled events.

In 1970 JoAnne Carner joins the LPGA Tour at 30 years old and wins 23 of her 43 career wins within the decade. Carner is the only woman to have claimed the U.S. Girls’ Junior, U.S. Women’s Amateur, and U.S. Women’s Open championships, becoming the first golfer to win three different U.S.G.A. events. In 1972, the first LPGA tournament with a six-figure prize money is added to the LPGA Tour, the Colgate-Dinah Shore Winners Circle which had an $110,000 purse. The following year Mickey Wright would win that tournament to claim her 82nd LPGA Tour victory, a record at the time which would later be surpassed by Kathy Whitworth’s 88th win in 1985.

The first commissioner of the LPGA was hired in 1975, Ray Volpe, and he moved the headquarters to New York, established a Board of Directors and selected a player council. In 1976 Judy Rankin becomes the first player on the LPGA Tour to earn over $100,000 in a single season, banking a total of $150,734 in winnings. Two years later, in 1978, rookie Nancy Lopez has a stellar start to her LPGA career winning 9 tournaments, 5 of them consecutively, and earning both Rookie of the Year and Player of the Year honors. The annual prize money for the LPGA Tour reaches $4.4 million by 1979.

Kathy Whitworth becomes the first female golfer to reach $1 million in career earnings in 1981. In 1985, Kathy Whitworth achieves a feat not match by any other golfer, male or female, by winning her 88th LPGA tournament at the United Virginia Bank Classic. The most wins on either the PGA or LPGA Tour. The 1980’s saw the emergence of rising stars Beth Daniel, Betsy King and Patty Sheehan. In 1986, Pat Bradley nearly achieves the single season grand slam after winning three of the four LPGA major championships but finishing 5th at the U.S. Women’s Open. Bradley was awarded the Player of the Year and Vare Trophy that year. In 1989, the LPGA creates programs to reach youth by establishing the Girls Golf Club and the Urban Youth Golf Program.

Juli Inkster

In 1990 at the Invitational Pro-Am at Pebble Beach, the only professional golf tournament which has men and women competing head to head, sees the first woman victor, Juli Inkster who won by one stroke. Inkster had already won three major championships by that time and would go on to win a total of seven majors and complete the career Grand Slam. 1990 was also the inaugural year for the Solheim Cup, which put U.S. golfers against European golfers similar to the men’s Ryder Cup. The United States team beat the European team at the first Solheim Cup, but the Europeans would be victorious two years later at the second Solheim Cup. The record stands with the United States with 10 wins and the Europeans with 5 wins for the biennial tournament, for 1990 through 2017. As well in 1990 Beth Daniel won seven tournaments, including a major, within the year and earned over $1 million in a 12-month period.

There was growth and development programs which emerged in 1991 to help encourage women’s participation in golf. The LPGA Foundation is created to encourage the growth of the game within youth and support junior golf and offer scholarships for girls. Nancy Oliver founded the Executive Women’s Golf Association, EWGA, to boost golf within working women. There was also a Women in Golf Summit held for the first time in 1991, which was held to discuss participation of women in golf.

In 1992, the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation becomes the first official charity of a professional golf association after partnering with the LPGA. By 1996 the LPGA gains television broadcasting for 26 of their 38 events. The annual prize fund reaches $25 million in 1996. That year Karrie Webb, in her rookie season, became the first woman golfer to reach over $1 million within a single season. Another milestone for women in golf is reached when the U.S.G.A. elected Judy Bell as their first woman president. In 1997 the LPGA Teaching and Club Professional division surpasses the 1,000 member mark. In 1999, Aree Wongluekiet at the age of 13 won the U.S. Girls’ Junior Golf Champion to become the youngest winner.

Michelle Wie

At the dawn of the Millennium, Michelle Wie made her debut at the 2000 U.S.G.A. Women’s Amateur event as the youngest player to qualify at the young age of 10. In 2001 Karrie Webb won the LPGA Championship to complete her Career Grand Slam, the youngest to do so. Webb is actually noted by the LPGA as the only “Super Career Grand Slam” winner as she is the only one to have won five different tournaments which were recognized as majors. Along with Webb, the other players to complete the LPGA Career Grand Slam are Pat Bradley, Juli Inkster, Inbee Park, Annika Sorenstam, Louise Suggs, Karrie Webb and Mickey Wright. That same year Karrie Webb competed in the first male-female pairing event that was televised on prime-time, the Battle of Bighorn, which featured the team of Annika Sorenstam and Tiger Woods against Karrie Webb and David Duval. Sorenstam and Woods defeated Webb and Duval on the 19th hole of the tournament. The Women’s Senior Golf Tour, now known as the Legends Tour, was also established for women professional golfers age of 45 or older in 2001.

In 2002 Suzy Whaley won the Connecticut PGA Championship, a tournament in the Connecticut section of the PGA of America, becoming the first woman to win an individual PGA professional tournament. With the win Whaley qualified to play in a PGA Tour event, the 2003 Greater Hartford Open now the Travelers Championship, becoming the first woman in 58 years to do so. Her qualifying for the tournament caused controversy as she played from forward tees in her qualifying tournament which prompted the PGA to introduce the “Whaley rule” which requires all entrants, male or female, to play from the same tees.

In 2003, Michelle Wie wins the U.S.G.A.’s U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship at the record young age of 13. The following year Wie became the youngest golfer to qualifier for an LPGA event at the Kraft Nabisco Championship. In 2004 Wie became the fourth and youngest woman to play in a PGA Tour event, the Sony Open in Hawaii, however she missed the cut. In 2006 another young star from Hawaii, Kimberly Kim, won the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship at a record 14 years old. The youth trend continues in 2007 as Morgan Pressel sets a record at the time for youngest female golfer to win an LPGA major at the Kraft Nabisco Championship at the age of 18. That same year Lexi Thompson made her debut as the youngest qualifier of the U.S. Women’s Open at 12 years old, but she failed to make the cut. One of the most famous and prestigious golf courses, the Old Course at St Andrews, hosts their first professional women’s tournament, the 2007 Women’s British Open.

In 2011 Mariel Galdiano becomes the youngest golfer to make the cut at the U.S. Women’s Open at 13 years old. That year Lexi Thompson won the Navistar Tournament to become the youngest woman to win an LPGA tournament at 16 years old. Thompson is also granted an exemption and given full-time status on the LPGA tour, waiving the 18 year old requirement. In 2012 a 14 year old Lydia Ko wins the New South Wales Open to become the youngest player to win a professional golf tournament. Later that year Ko would set a record for youngest winner of an LPGA tournament at the CN Canadian Open at the age of 15. By 2013 the LPGA again waived its 18 year old requirement to allow Lydia Ko full time LPGA Tour status at 16 years old.

Michelle Wie won her first career major tournament at the 2014 U.S. Women’s Open. The record for youngest qualifier for the U.S. Women’s Open is broken by Lucy Li at the age of 11 years old. In 2014 the LPGA introduces the International Crown Tournament, which featured the top four golfers from the top eight qualifying countries competing in a match play team format. Spain won the inaugural biennial tournament. At the 2015 RICOH Women’s British Open Inbee Park earned her fourth women’s major tournament to earn her Career Grand Slam. In 2015, at age 17, Brooke Henderson wins the Cambia Portland Classic to join Lexi Thompson and Lydia Ko as the only golfers to win an LPGA Tour event under the age of 18.

Lydia Ko

2015 was dominated by the young Lydia Ko. Ko became the youngest golfer, of either gender, to reach world No. 1 ranking in February 2015. The 2015 Evian Championship saw the crowning of the youngest golfer to win an LPGA major when Lydia Ko won at 18 years old. Ko was a few months younger than Morgan Pressel was when she won the 2007 Kraft Nabisco Championship. Ko continues to set records in 2015 as she wins her 10th career LPGA tournament to become the youngest golfer, male or female, to achieve 10 professional victories.

In 2016 Ko began strong by winning the first major championship that year at the ANA Inspiration, her second consecutive major making her the youngest two-time major champion. Brooke Henderson would claim her first major championship at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. Another first-time major winner, Brittany Lang, was crowned at the U.S. Women’s Open. Ariya Jutanugarn became the first golfer, female or male, from Thailand to win a major at the Ricoh Women’s British Open and ascended to the World No. 1 spot the next year in June 2017. Jutanugarn would earn the Money winner and Player of the Year honors for 2016. Chun In-gee shot the lowest winning score, 21 under par, in a major tournament at the final major of 2016 at the Evian Championship to capture her second major. In-gee earned the Rookie of the Year distinction.

Park Sung-hyun

Golf returned to the Olympics in 2016 and Inbee Park became the first gold medalist in golf since the 1900s. The 2017 LPGA season saw a first in LPGA history, with Sung Hyun Park and So Yeon Ryu sharing the Player of the Year distinction. Park Sung-Hyun also earned the Money winner and Rookie of the Year title. Park Sung-Hyun is the first golfer since Nancy Lopez to earn both Rookie and Player of the Year honors in the same year. Lexi Thompson was the scoring leader for the year. Ryu So-yeon won the ANA Inspiration for her second career major. Park Sung-hyun won the U.S. Women’s Open to claim her first major and reached the World No. 1 spot in November 2017.

Header Image Sources: “Mary Queen of Scots Golfing” from National Library of Scotland & “Early LPGA Group Photo” from South Dakota Sports Hall of Fame

Categories: Golf History

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History of Women’s Professional Golf