Babe Didrikson

Babe Didrikson (Mildred Didrikson) , 1913-56, American athlete, generally considered the greatest woman athlete of modern times, b. Port Arthur, Tex. At an early age Babe Didrikson excelled in basketball, baseball, and track. In 1932 she won five events, tied for first in another, and finished fourth in still another event in the National AAU track and field championships. Two weeks later she won two events in the Olympic games in Los Angeles with record performances and was disqualified in a third while tied for first. From 1934 on she devoted herself to golf. In 1938 she married George Zaharias, a wrestler. She gained wide notice as Babe Didrikson Zaharias. She won the U.S. Golf Association amateur competition (1946) and 15 tournaments in 1946-47. She was the first American woman to win the British amateur title (1947), and after turning professional in 1947 she won 33 tournaments (including the U.S. Open in 1948, 1950, and 1954) before succumbing to cancer. She wrote Championship Golf (1948).

Zaharias, Mildred Didrikson (“Babe”) (1911–1956), athlete.Considered the most versatile female athlete of the twentieth century, she began her sports career as an industrial‐league basketball player in her hometown, Beaumont, Texas, leading her team to national championships. In the 1932 track and field Olympic trials, she won six gold medals and set four world records in one afternoon. At the Olympic Games in Los Angeles, she set world records in the javelin and 80‐meter hurdles (winning two gold medals) and she gained a silver medal in the high jump. At baseball she once hit seven home runs in seven times at bat, pitched exhibition innings with major league teams, and was nicknamed “the Babe” (after Babe Ruth). She won tennis and bowling tournaments and toured the United States giving billiards exhibitions and in 1938 married the wrestler George Zaharias. Her greatest fame came in the sport of golf where she revolutionized the game, won a record eighty‐two tournaments, and helped create the Ladies Professional Golfers' Association. The Associated Press named her “Female Athlete of the Year” six times and “Best Female Athlete of the First Half Century” in 1951. She received numerous other honors and awards and appeared on a commemorative U.S. stamp in 1981.

Zaharias defied convention, and manipulated the media image to enhance her celebrity. Crude, crass, and controversial, she created a persona that both captivated the public and perpetuated the stereotype of female athletes as “unnatural” in a period when delicacy and femininity were revered. A sports legend and role model, “the Babe” symbolized pure athleticism, and she lived for competition. She died at forty‐five of cancer.
See also Gender; Popular Culture; Sports: Amateur Sports and Recreation; Sports: Professional Sports.

Bibliography

Betty Hicks , The Legendary Babe Didrikson Zaharias in Women in Sport: Issues and Controversies, ed. Greta L. Cohen, 1993, pp. 38–48.
Susan E. Cayleff , Babe: The Life and Legend of Babe Didrikson Zaharias, 1995.

Greta Laquia Cohen