Babe Zaharias
Groundbreaking Athlete, Pioneer Professional
Nominate anyone you like: Serena Williams, Caitlin Clark, Simone Biles, Lindsey Vonn —Babe Zaharias could give any of them two a side and still win comfortably as the greatest female athlete in history. For Southern Californians who only associate the name Babe Zaharias with a golf course named for her at Industry Hills, there is so much more to know about this remarkable figure.
Born Mildred Ellis Didrikson in 1911, she supposedly earned the nickname “Babe” after aBabe Ruth-like performance in a sandlot youth baseball game when she smashed fivehome runs. By the early 1930s, she was nearly as famous as the Yankees’ Sultan of Swat.
OLYMPIC STAR
As a child in Beaumont, Texas, Babe Didrikson displayed unusual athleticism, jumping hedges for fun. Concurrent with a successful amateur basketball run that included winning a national championship as a teenager, Didrikson began track and field training in1930. She dominated the 1932 AAU Championships, winning five of eight events, and this catapulted her to Los Angeles and the Summer Olympics.
Unfortunately, Olympics rules then in effect limited women to three events. It was nearly aclean sweep. Babe won gold in the 80-meter hurdles and javelin and barely missed gold inthe high jump. At 21, she was an American hero.
TWO DECADES OF GOLF GREATNESS
Babe Didrikson didn’t truly catch the golf bug until those 1932 Olympics, when America’sleading sportswriter, Grantland Rice, took her to play at Brentwood CC alongside threefellow scribes. She smashed her first tee shot 240 yards, outdriving her companions. Shewas hooked.
In the spring of 1933, Babe ventured back to Los Angeles set on becoming the national women’s amateur golf champion. She met top area professional Stan Kertes, who molded her game — for free. Even at that price, her money soon ran out and it was home to theLone Star State.
Struggling during the Depression, her luck finally changed at the 1938 Los Angeles Open, contested at Griffith Park. With no rule that stated she couldn’t play, Didrikson simply filed an entry and was admitted into the field — the first woman ever to tee it up in a men’s professional event.
Perhaps distracted by flirtations from celebrity playing partner George Zaharias — a renowned professional wrestler — Babe posted rounds of 84 and 81. She missed the cut but hung around with her new friend. They were married that December.
Now known as Babe Didrikson Zaharias, or Babe Zaharias, she continued to play golf exhibitions, many in Southern California. On Jan. 21, 1941, she teamed with Patty Berg to defeat fellow SoCal Golf Hall of Famers Bing Crosby and Bob Hope at San Gabriel CC. In October 1942 she shared the Army Emergency Relief Fund stage at Santa Ana CC with Crosby, Hope and Sam Snead. In the Long Drive Contest, Babe knocked one 275 yards.
At Riviera in 1945, Babe actually qualified for the L.A. Open with rounds of 76-76. She opened the main event with another 76, putting her ahead of 84 male competitors. She added a second-round 81 to make the 36-hole cut but a 79 in round 3 left her outside the 54-hole cut line.
After regaining her amateur status in 1943, Babe convincingly captured the 1946 U.S.Women’s Amateur and the 1947 British Ladies Amateur. She again turned professional inAugust 1947, immediately winning a women’s major. She won the U.S. Women’s Open in 1948, an event she helped create. In 1950, Babe became one of the 13 co-founders of the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA); that same year, she won eight tournaments, including all three major championships.
TRIUMPH AND HEARTBREAK
In 1951, Zaharias lifted nine more trophies. What truly elevated Babe, however, was her singular charisma, at times bordering on swagger. “She never doubted her own abilities, and because of that, she offended some people,” wrote fellow LPGA founder Shirley Spork in 2017. “She would walk up to us and say, ‘Well, The Babe is here! Who’s going to be second?'”
A cancer diagnosis early in 1953 momentarily slowed her. Against every medical prediction, she resumed tournament golf 14 weeks after a painful colostomy operation.
Zaharias entered only 17 tournaments in 1954, winning five. Most impressive was her performance at the U.S. Women’s Open. Wearing a colostomy bag, and battling Boston’s sticky summer heat, Salem CC’s dense rough and a 36-hole final day, Babe improbably waltzed to a 12-shot victory, still a record margin. Her 10th major would be the final time she competed in that tournament. Ultimately, she succumbed on September 27, 1956, at age 45.
Although Babe Didrikson Zaharias was only a Southern California resident for a few months, her historic visits, along with her unparalleled contributions to women’s sports and to amateur and professional golf, clearly make her a cherished member of the SoCalGolf Hall of Fame.
