You are looking at the most flawless section of muscle harmony, of complete mental and physical coordination the world of sport has ever known.
—GRANTLAND RICE, SPORTSWRITER
It was Babe’s first basketball game playing for the Golden Cyclones, a semiprofessional team. They were playing the national champions, the Sun Oil team, and her teammates were nervous. But Babe wasn’t nervous. She ran and passed and shot the ball, again and again and again. By the end, the Golden Cyclones had won the game, and Babe had scored more baskets than the entire Sun Oil team combined! The other girls were amazed by the super-athlete, but they had no idea that Babe would become one of the greatest athletes of all time. She excelled at almost every sport she tried, including golf, track, baseball, archery, skeet shooting, swimming, diving, horseback riding, and billiards, to name just a few. Her life set an inspiring example for all female athletes who followed in her footsteps.
Mildred Ella Didrikson was born on June 26, 1911, in Port Arthur, Texas. Her family was very poor, and she and her six brothers and sisters all had to help out. Mildred picked figs and sewed potato sacks for money. Sports were her way of having fun. Early on she decided that she would be the greatest athlete ever.
As a young girl, she was such a powerful home-run hitter that kids nicknamed her “Babe” after the famous slugger, Babe Ruth. Her father built a gym in the backyard, and out of all her brothers and sisters, Babe used it the most. She worked out on the gym’s chin-up bars and weightlifting equipment. She also played baseball and basketball with the kids in the neighborhood.
In high school, Babe went out for every sport open to girls. She earned a spot on the basketball team and soon became a star. Her athletic ability attracted the attention of Melvin McCombs, the manager of a company-sponsored women’s basketball team. He recruited Babe to play on his team, the Golden Cyclones, and she led them to a national championship. In 1930 she was selected All-American Forward.
Babe decided to try track and field next. In 1932 she competed in the Amateur Athletic Union women’s national championship. Out of eight events, Babe won five, tied for first in another, and took second in another. Babe earned enough points to win the team title all by herself!
Her outstanding track victories at the national championship led Babe to the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles. As she left for the games, she told reporters that she planned “to beat everybody in sight.” And beat them she did. Babe won a gold medal and set the world record in the javelin throw, won another gold medal in the hurdles, and won a silver medal in the high jump!
While she was in Los Angeles, Babe played her first round of golf. Her natural ability was impressive. A few years later, Babe decided to make a career out of the sport. She practiced hard, sometimes for fifteen or sixteen hours a day, and her hard work paid off when she won the Texas Women’s Invitational golf tournament in 1935. She remembered:
Weekends I put in twelve and sixteen hours a day on golf. . . . I’d drill and drill and drill on the different kinds of shots. I’d hit balls until my hands were bloody and sore. . . . After it got too late to practice any more, I went home and had my dinner. Then I’d go to bed with the golf rule book.19
In 1938 Babe met wrestler George Zaharias at a golf tournament, and the two were married in less than a year. Babe continued her golf career, winning an incredible seventeen tournaments in a row! She was the first American to win the Ladies’ British Amateur Championship. But Babe’s biggest impact on women’s golf was yet to come. In 1949 she helped to found the Ladies Professional Golf Association. This organization sponsored professional women’s golf tournaments, which attracted more and more women to the sport. Today, LPGA tournaments offer millions of dollars in prize money for professional woman golfers.
Babe wrote this in her autobiography:
Before I was even into my teens, I knew exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up. My goal was to be the greatest athlete that ever lived. I suppose I was born with the urge to get into sports, and the ability to do pretty well at it. . . . Now there’s nobody who wants to win more than I do. I’ll knock myself out to do it. But I’ve never played rough or dirty. To me good sportsmanship is just as important as winning. . . . You have to play the game the right way. If you win through bad sportsmanship, that’s no real victory in my book.20
In 1953 Babe was diagnosed with cancer. She fought the disease with her usual determination, and after undergoing surgery, Babe recovered and miraculously won the US Women’s Open Golf Tournament in 1954. Babe persevered like a champion for two more years, but in 1956 the cancer returned. The world’s greatest female athlete died at the age of forty-two.
Throughout her life, Babe earned prestigious awards and honors. She was the only woman to be named the Associated Press’s Female Athlete of the Year six times! She was also voted the Woman Athlete of the Half Century in 1950 and was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1951. Sports historians ranked her as the second most outstanding and influential athlete in American sports history, just after Babe Ruth. Babe Didrikson’s legacy has passed on to today’s female athletes. Her talent and determination opened doors for women to compete and succeed in the world of sports.