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LPGA
The Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) is an American organization for female golfers. The organization is headquartered at the LPGA International in Daytona Beach, Florida, and is best known for running the LPGA Tour, a series of weekly golf tournaments for elite female professional golfers from around the world. Organization and history Other "LPGAs" exist in other countries, each with a geographical designation in its name, but the U.S. organization is the first, largest, and best known. The LPGA is also an organization for female club and teaching professionals. This is different from the PGA Tour, which runs the main professional tours in the U.S. and, since 1968, has been independent of the club and teaching professionals' organization, the PGA of America. The LPGA also administers an annual qualifying school similar to that conducted by the PGA Tour. Depending on a golfer's finish in the final qualifying tournament, she may receive full or partial playing p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kathy Whitworth
Kathrynne Ann Whitworth (September 27, 1939 – December 24, 2022) was an American professional golfer. During her playing career she won 88 LPGA Tour tournaments, more than anyone else on the LPGA or PGA Tours. Whitworth was also a runner-up 93 times, giving her 181 top-two finishes. In 1981, she became the first woman to reach career earnings of $1 million on the LPGA Tour. She is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. Early life and amateur career Whitworth was born on September 27, 1939, in Monahans, Texas, the youngest of three daughters of Morris Whitworth, a hardware store owner and later mayor in Jal, New Mexico, where she grew up. She attended Odessa College. Initially a tennis player, Whitworth began playing golf at 14. After working with Hardy Loudermilk, she won the 1957 and 1958 New Mexico State Amateur Championships. At 19, she changed coaches to Harvey Penick and turned pro, joining the LPGA in December 1958. Professional career In 1962, Whitworth won her fir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patty Berg
Patricia Jane Berg (February 13, 1918 – September 10, 2006) was an American professional golfer. She was a founding member and the first president of the LPGA. Her 15 major title wins remains the all-time record for most major wins by a female golfer. She is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. In winter times she was also a speed skater. Amateur career Berg was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and expressed an interest in football at an early age. At one point, she played quarterback on a local team that included future Oklahoma Sooners head football coach Bud Wilkinson. At the age of 13, Berg took up golf in 1931 at the suggestion of her parents; by 1934, she began her amateur career and won the Minneapolis City Championship. The following year, Berg claimed a state amateur title. She attended the University of Minnesota where she was a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority. She came to national attention by reaching the final of the 1935 U.S. Women's Amateur, losing to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Louise Suggs
Mae Louise Suggs (September 7, 1923 – August 7, 2015) was an American professional golfer, one of the founders of the LPGA Tour and thus modern ladies' golf. Amateur career Born in Atlanta, Suggs had a very successful amateur career, beginning as a teenager. She won the Georgia State Amateur in 1940 at age 16 and again in 1942, was the Southern Amateur Champion in 1941 and 1947, and won the North and South Women's Amateur three times (1942, 1946, 1948). She won the 1946 and 1947 Women's Western Amateur and the 1946 and 1947 Women's Western Open, which was designated as a major championship when the LPGA was founded. She also won the 1946 Titleholders Championship which was also subsequently designated as a women's major. She won the 1947 U.S. Women's Amateur and the next year won the British Ladies Amateur. She finished her amateur career representing the United States on the 1948 Curtis Cup Team. Professional career After her successful amateur career, she turned profe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Babe Didrikson Zaharias
Mildred Ella "Babe" Didrikson Zaharias (; Didrikson; June 26, 1911 – September 27, 1956) was an American athlete who excelled in golf, basketball, baseball and track and field. She won two gold medals in track and field at the 1932 Summer Olympics, before turning to professional golf and winning 10 LPGA major championships. Biography Mildred Ella Didrikson was born on June 26, 1911, the sixth of seven children, in the coastal city of Port Arthur, Texas. Her mother, Hannah, and her father, Ole Didriksen, were immigrants from Norway. Although her three eldest siblings were born in Norway, Babe and her three other siblings were born in Port Arthur. She later changed the spelling of her surname from Didriksen to Didrikson. She moved with her family to 850 Doucette in Beaumont, Texas, at age 4. She claimed to have acquired the nickname "Babe" (after Babe Ruth) upon hitting five home runs in a childhood baseball game, but her Norwegian mother had called her "Bebe" from the time s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marilynn Smith
Marilynn Louise Smith (April 13, 1929 – April 9, 2019) was an American professional golfer. She was one of the thirteen founders of the LPGA in 1950. She won two major championships and 21 LPGA Tour events in all. She is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. Amateur career Smith was born in Topeka, Kansas. She started playing golf at age 12. She was a three-time winner of the Kansas State Amateur from 1946-48. She won the 1949 national individual intercollegiate golf championship while attending the University of Kansas. Professional career Smith turned pro in 1949 and joined the Spalding staff. She was one of the thirteen women who founded the LPGA in 1950. She won her first tournament in 1952 at the Fort Wayne Open. She would go on to win a total of 21 events on the LPGA Tour, including two major championships, the 1963 and 1964 Titleholders Championships. She finished in the top ten on the money list nine times between 1961 and 1972, with her best finishes bein ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marlene Hagge
Marlene Hagge (née Bauer; born February 16, 1934) is an American former professional golfer. She was one of the thirteen founders of the LPGA in 1950. She won one major championship and 26 LPGA Tour career events. She is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. Amateur career Hagge was born in Eureka, South Dakota and had a progressively successful amateur experience. She started playing golf at age 3. At age 10, she won the Long Beach City Boys Junior. At age 13, she won the Western and National Junior Championships, the Los Angeles Women's City Championship, the Palm Springs Women's Championship, Northern California Open and the Indio Women's Invitational. In 1947, at age 13, she became the youngest player to make the cut at the U.S. Women's Open and finished eighth. In 1949, at the age of 15, she became the youngest athlete ever to be named Associated Press Athlete of the Year, Golfer of the Year and Teenager of the Year, and she won the U.S. Girls' Junior and the WWGA ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Epson Tour
The Epson Tour, previously known as the LPGA Futures Tour, and known for sponsorship reasons between 2006 and 2010 as the Duramed Futures Tour and between 2012 and 2021 as the Symetra Tour, is the official developmental golf tour of the LPGA Tour. Tour membership is open to professional women golfers and to qualified amateurs. History The Futures Tour was founded in Florida in 1981 as the "Tampa Bay Mini Tour". It officially became the ''Futures Golf Tour'' in 1983 and in 1999 become a national tour designated as the "official developmental tour" of the LPGA Tour (the U.S.-based professional women's golf tour). Grace Park, Marilyn Lovander and Audra Burks were the first players to receive automatic LPGA Tour exempt status by finishing one, two, and three on the Futures Golf Tour Money List. The minimum age for participation was lowered to 17 prior to the 2006 season. On July 18, 2007, the LPGA announced that it had acquired the Futures Tour effective immediately, "bringing ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Betty Jameson
Elizabeth May Jameson (May 9, 1919 – February 7, 2009) was an American professional golfer. She was one of the thirteen founders of the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) in 1950. She won three major championships and a total of thirteen events during her career, one as amateur and twelve as a professional. She is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. Amateur career Jameson was born in Norman, Oklahoma and graduated from Dallas' Sunset High School in 1939. She started playing golf at age 11. According to her obituary in the ''New York Times'', her mother gave her 50 cents for a greens fee and another 50 cents to rent a set of clubs at a public golf course in Dallas when she was 11 years old. She won the 1932 Texas Publinx title at the age of 13 and the Southern Championship when she was 15. She won the U.S. Women's Amateur in 1939 and 1940. She won the Women's Western Amateur in 1940 and 1942. In 1942, she also won the Women's Western Open, a major at the time, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shirley Spork
Shirley G. Spork (May 14, 1927 – April 12, 2022) was an American professional golfer and one of the founders of the LPGA Tour. Spork finished second at the 1962 LPGA Championship. She worked as a teaching professional for many years and was recognized as LPGA Teacher of the Year in 1959 and 1984. Spork also taught golf with the National Golf Foundation and was an educator at Bowling Green State University. As a player, she started in her early teens and continued to play golf into her nineties. Early life Spork was raised outside Detroit in Redford, Michigan, the only child of a father who was an electrical engineer and a mother who was a clerk in a pharmacy, both did not play golf, but the family home was adjacent to the Bonnie Brook Golf Course. As a child, she began to collect, wash and resell golf balls and at age 13, used these funds to buy her own golf clubs. She began to practice after hours. She played in tournaments in Detroit as young as age 14 and the ''Det ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Professional Golf Tours
Professional golf tours are the means by which otherwise unconnected professional golf tournaments are organised into a regular schedule. There are separate tours for men and women; most are based in a specific geographical region, although some tours may hold tournaments in other parts of the world. At least 95% of professional golfers make their primary income as club or teaching professionals rather than from competition. A small elite in the profession who obtain income from prize money and endorsements are called "touring professionals", "tournament golfers", or "pro golfers". The best golfers can make up to 8-figure incomes in U.S. dollars from tournament play. Including endorsement income, pro golfer Tiger Woods was the highest earning sportsman for much of the first decade of the 21st century, according to '' Forbes'' magazine. But making a living from tournament golf can be difficult. Tournaments have entry fees and the associated costs of travel and lodging, plus the hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
LPGA International
LPGA International is a golf club located in Daytona Beach, Volusia County, Florida, United States, and the main golf facility used by the Ladies Professional Golf Association ( LPGA). The golf facilities are owned by the City of Daytona Beach and operated under agreement with the LPGA. The golf club offers two 18-hole courses, Champions and Legends. In 2013, these were renamed to the Jones and Hills courses, reflecting the architects who designed them. Overview In addition to the two Bermuda grass golf courses, the facility offers a driving range, practice putting green, and full-service restaurant. The complex is owned and operated by Fore Golf Partners. History When the Ladies Professional Golf Association was looking for a new headquarters in the late 1980s, the City of Daytona Beach made an effort to attract them to this city. Daytona Beach renamed Eleventh Street to ''LPGA Boulevard'' and offered to build a new golf course for the LPGA on undeveloped land near the wester ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alice Bauer
Alice Bauer (October 6, 1927 – March 6, 2002) was an American golfer. One of the founders of the LPGA, she played professionally and finished as high as 14th on the LPGA Tour money list, in 1956. Bauer had several top-10 finishes in major championships, including fourth place in the 1958 U.S. Women's Open. Biography Bauer was born in Eureka, South Dakota and took up golf; her father was a course owner. Her sister, Marlene, had already been playing golf by the time Bauer was approximately 10 years old, and according to Marlene, Alice followed once she saw her sister gaining attention from locals. When she was 11 years old, Alice began devoting time to golf. At the age of 14, she won the South Dakota amateur championship in 1942, becoming the youngest winner of the event. After her family relocated to California, Bauer became the 1949 Southern Cal Amateur winner, and posted other victories in the state. By 1950, Bauer had played in the U.S. Women's Amateur three times, and had ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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