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By ART STRICKLIN
The passing last week of the legendary Mickey Wright prompted an outpouring of tributes to the 82-time LPGA winner, who led a famously private life after her days as a full-time competitor ended in 1969 at age 34.
During the past few decades, few knew Wright as well as her fellow Hall of Famer Kathy Whitworth, who competed against her throughout the 1960s and ultimately surpassed her with 88 LPGA victories.
Though saddened by Wright’s death, Whitworth was heartened by the testaments to her friend that emerged in the days that followed, she told GGP in an interview last Thursday.
“I think Mickey would be very pleased and a bit surprised by all the attention,” said Whitworth, 80.
GGP+: Mickey Wright, 1935-2020
Although Whitworth and Wright were too busy competing to forge a bond early on, their friendship blossomed in the wake of their groundbreaking partnership in the 1985 Legends of Golf, the first women to compete in the tournament that launched what’s now the PGA Tour Champions for senior male pros. Whitworth recalled the pairing, and they way it came about, as one of the greatest honors of her career.
It began with a phone call from tournament promoter Fred Raphael, Whitworth remembered.
“Fred called me and asked if I would play in the Legends with Mickey Wright,” she said. “I told him I would be thrilled, but knowing how Mickey was with attention and notoriety, I told him you really should ask Mickey first.”
“I already have,” Whitworth said Raphael told her. “She said she would only play with you.”
Noting that she almost dropped the phone in shock, Whitworth recounted: “I was so surprised, just floored. I had no idea she felt that way about me.”
The duo ultimately competed from the same tees as the men in the tournament at Onion Creek Country Club in Austin, Texas.
“Fred really got into some hot water for that. Some of the men were really mad, others were just not happy at all we were playing,” Whitworth said. “We played pretty well, up near the front after the first round and finished near the middle of the pack. We were certainly not last, not last at all.”
In a tournament won by Gene Littler and Don January, Wright and Whitworth finished T19 in the 28-team field, beating teams that included four previous U.S. Open champions in the process.
But more important was the friendship that was cemented there and continued until Wright’s passing with occasional visits and almost daily e-mails, according to Whitworth.
Their association had begun when Whitworth debuted on the LPGA Tour in 1959, four years after Wright. By the time Whitworth won her first tournament in 1962, Wright already had established herself as the tour’s dominant player.
“Mickey was really nice to me,” Whitworth recalled. “When I started on the tour, we didn’t have many players to start with, so you got to play with the good players right away and Mickey was the best.
“It wasn’t that we didn’t want to be friends back then, but we were so busy playing golf and at the end of the day, I was just tired and wanted to go back to my room and rest. There wasn’t a lot of time for socializing or getting together.”
Still, the two developed a rapport, and Whitworth said she occasionally visited Wright at her Florida home after Wright stepped away from competing full time. Whitworth often invited Wright to visit her in Texas, and following their Legends of Golf partnership Wright finally accepted.
“She was headed in this direction and decided to stop for a few days, just to visit a while and rest,” Whitworth recalled.
Whitworth remembers inviting a group of friends to meet Wright. During the visit, Wright showcased her classic swing for the guests, hitting ball after ball into Whitworth’s backyard lake.
“The girls were thrilled to see Mickey’s swing and to (see her) hit balls into the lake and, of course, so was I,” Whitworth said.
A few years earlier, Whitworth had surpassed Wright’s LPGA victory total, an achievement she recounts as bittersweet because of the friendship they ultimately forged.
“I had mixed emotions, I really did because Mickey could have kept winning if she hadn’t retired early,” Whitworth said. “In the early days of the LPGA, everybody had to pull their weight, that’s for sure, but Mickey pulled more than anybody. She did it all and that is what made golf great.”
Top: Mickey Wright and Kathy Whitworth at the Women's Western Open in 1966.