Golf
Before 1800
1552 - Mary, Queen of Scots coined the term “caddy” by calling her assistants cadets.
1800's
1811 - On January 9, the first known women’s golf tournament was held at Musselburgh Golf Club, Scotland, among the town fishwives.
1867 - St. Andrew's in Scotland was the first ladies golf
club.
1890 - golf's first mixed foursome match occurs.
1893 - Formation of the Ladies Golf Union.
1894 – October 1-18 the first ladies golf tournament
was held in NJ.
1894 - The first Australian women's national golf championship
was held.
1895 - The first Women's Amateur Golf championship was
contested among thirteen golfers at the Meadow Brook Club, Hempstead,
N.Y., on Nov. 9.
1900's
1922 - Glenna Collett holds the record for the most times in the finals (eight). The Vare Trophy for the lowest scoring average is named in her honor.
1932 - The first Curtis Cup Match was staged in May at
England's Wentworth Golf Club.
1934 - Virginia Van Wie was named the Associated Press
Female Athlete of the Year for golf.
1938 - Patty Berg, won the National Women's Amateur Golf
title.
1946 - The Women's Professional Golf Association was
formed.
1948 - Patty Berg became the first president of the Ladies'
Professional Golf Association.
1949 - Wilson Sporting Goods agreed to sponsor the Ladies
Professional Golf Association (LPGA).
1949 - Marlene Bauer, won the first US Golf Association
Girls' Junior Championship. She became the youngest athlete ever to be
named AP Athlete
of the Year, Golfer of the Year and Teenager of the Year.
1950 - Six women were selected as charter members of the
Women's Golf Hall of Fame.
1951 - Babe Zaharias set a one-year earnings record for
women golfers with $14,800 in winnings.
1951 - Louise Suggs, became the association's first inductee
to the Hall of Fame.
1955 - The first LPGA championship was held.
1957 - Louise Suggs won the Vare Trophy for the best
scoring average for a woman golfer.
1959 - Patty Berg hit the first "hole-in-one" for
a woman in a golf tournament.
1960 - Betsy Rawls became the first woman to win the
US Women's Open golf title four times.
1961 - Mickey Wright won the first woman's golf "grand
slam," with
the LPGA championship, the US Open, and the Titleholders tournament.
1961 - On February 15, golfer Louise Suggs defeated ten
men at the $10,000 Palm Beach par-3 invitational.
1963 - the LPGA championship tournament was televised
for the first time.
1964 - Althea Gibson became the first black woman
to earn her LPGA player's card.
1965 - The Women's Golf Open was televised nationally
for the first time.
1968 - Sandra Post became the first non-US player
and rookie to win the LPGA Championship.
1975 - Amy Alcott became the youngest winner
on the LPGA Tour at nineteen.
1977 - At thirteen, Lise Ann Russell became the
youngest amateur to qualify and compete in a LPGA event.
1978 - Nancy Lopez was the first female golfer
to win Rookie of the Year and Player of the Year in the
same year.
1982 - Kathy Whitworth had eighty-eight career victories,
more than any other American, male or female.
1986 - Pat Bradley became the first
woman golfer to win over $2 million in a single year.
1990 - Juli Inkster became the first
woman to win the only professional golf tournament
in the world
in which
women
and men
compete head-to-head.
1992 - Golfer Nancy Lopez was honored
as the recipient of the Women's Sports Foundation's
Flo Hyman
Award.
1998 - Se Ri Pak became the youngest
woman to win the LPGA Championship.
1999 - Aree Wongluekiet became
the youngest U.S. Girls' Junior Golf Championship
at thirteen.
1999 - The LPGA celebrated
its fiftieth birthday.
2000's
2000 - Judy Rankin, became the first woman to break the $100,000 barrier.
2000 – Kathy Holzhauer hit two holes-in-one in the
same round of golf.
2001 - Kerrie Webb, became the youngest LPGA player in
history to win a Career Grand Slam.
2002 - twelve-year-old Michelle Wie, qualified for the
LPGA Tour's season opening. Wie became the first female to qualify for
the Hawaii
Pearl Open in February.
2002 - Se Ri Pak became the youngest player in LPGA history
to win four major championships.
2003 - Chako Higuchi was the first golfer from Japan to
be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame.
2004 – At fourteen, Michelle Wie was the youngest
athlete to win one of the laureus world sports academy honors.
2004 - Liz Johnson, became the first woman to qualify
for a PBA Tour event.
2005 - For the first time, a rules change allowed
women to play in British Open.
2005 - Annika Sorenstam became the first player in
LPGA Tour history to win a tournament five straight times.