With Lydia Ko now only one point away from the LPGA Hall of Fame, here’s a look at the 34 players who have already earned their place.
The LPGA Hall of Fame was established in 1967, but players already in the Hall of Fame of Women’s Golf (est. 1950) were automatically included. The inaugural class included Patty Berg, Betty Jameson, Louise Suggs and Babe Zaharias (all 1951), Betsy Rawls (1960) and Mickey Wright (1964).
While the LPGA Hall of Fame criteria has changed over the years, current players must have won or been awarded at least one of the following: LPGA major, Vare Trophy for lowest scoring average or Rolex Player of the Year.
They must also amass 27 points with:
- one point for each LPGA official tournament win
- two points for each LPGA major tournament win
- one point for each Vare Trophy or Rolex Player of the Year honor earned
- an Olympic gold medal is also worth one point as of last year
Inbee Park was the most recent player to earn 27 points. She was inducted in 2016.
Here’s the complete list of LPGA Hall of Fame members:
1951: One of America’s top ranking professional golfers Patty Berg practicing at Sunningdale. (Photo by Central Press/Getty Images)
Part of the inaugural class in 1951, Berg won 60 LPGA titles over the course of her career, including 15 majors. She topped the money list three times and won the Vare Trophy three times.
1951: Betty Jameson was a pioneer of women’s golf. (Getty Images)
Jameson, one of the LPGA’s 13 founders, won 13 times on the LPGA, including three majors. She became the first female professional break the 300 scoring mark in a 72-hole tournament at the 1947 U.S. Women’s Open.
Louise Suggs was known for her smooth swing, now on display at the World Golf Hall of Fame.
Suggs won 61 times on the LPGA, ranking fourth all time on the LPGA list, behind Kathy Whitworth (88), Mickey Wright (82) and Annika Sorenstam (69). Eleven of those titles were majors. Suggs also won the 1957 Vare Trophy.
1951: Babe Didrikson Zaharias was one of the greatest female athletes of the 20th century and a dominant force in golf. She won two gold medals in track and field at the 1932 Summer Olympics, and winning 10 LPGA major championships. (Getty Images)
While Zaharias’ LPGA career was cut tragically short, she still won 41 times, including 10 majors. The Babe won the 1954 Vare Trophy. Colon cancer took her life at age 45.
Betsy Rawls smiles after charging from behind with a final round to win the $36,000 Ladies Professional Golfers’ Association’s tournament at Kiamesha Lake, New York, July 28, 1969. (AP Photo/Ron Frehm)
While not an LPGA founder, Rawls still had a tremendous impact on the game. She won 55 times, including eight majors, four of which were U.S. Women’s Open titles.
Mickey Wright holds trophy after winning U.S. Women’s Open.
Wright won 82 times on the LPGA, including 13 majors. Only Berg won more majors. She retired from playing golf full time at age 34.
Kathy Whitworth is the winningest player in pro golf with 88 tournament victories.
Whitworth’s 88 titles leads the way for all of golf. She won the LPGA Player of the Year title seven times and the Vare Trophy seven times. Whitworth became the first LPGA player to earn $1 million in 1981.
Sandra Haynie won 42 times on the LPGA Tour, including four majors. She ranked in the top ten on the LPGA Tour money list every year from 1963 and 1975. (Getty Images)
A 42-time winner on the LPGA, Haynie was inducted into the Hall in 1972. She won four majors and was Player of the Year in 1970.
Carol Mann at the 2017 World Golf Hall of Fame Induction Ceremonyin New York City. (Photo by Cindy Ord/Getty Images)
Mann’s first LPGA title was a major in 1964. She won 38 times on tour, including two majors, as well as the Vare Trophy in 1968.
Joanne Carner watching her tee shot at the 12th hole during a practice round at the 2021 U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Brooklawn Country Club in Fairfield, Conn. on Wednesday, July 28, 2021. (Darren Carroll/USGA)
Carner didn’t turn professional until the age of 30, winning once on tour as an amateur. She amassed 43 LPGA titles, two of which were majors. Carner won the Vare Trophy five times and was LPGA POY three times.
Nancy Lopez smiles as she holds the trophy after winning the LPGA Championship in Mason, Ohio, Sunday, June 2, 1985. Lopez shot a final round of 65, 7-under-par for the day, to give her a total of 273, 15-under-par for the tournament.
Inducted in 1987, Lopez won 48 times on the LPGA, including nine times as a rookie. A three-time major winner, Lopez was LPGA Player of the Year four times and won the Vare Trophy on three occasions.
Pat Bradley was fixture in the winner’s circle on the LPGA Tour in the 1980s. She won 31 Tour events, including six major titles.
Bradley won 31 events from 1976 to 1995. A six-time major winner, Bradley won three of those majors in 1986. She won both the Vare Trophy and POY in 1986 and 1991.
LPGA Hall of Fame member Patty Sheehan reacts to sinking a long putt at No. 16 during an exhibition 18 holes in Round 1 of the RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup. Sheehan won 35 LPGA tournaments in her career.
Inducted in 1993, Sheehan also won six majors among her 35 LPGA titles. She won Rookie of the Year (1981), LPGA Player of the Year (1983) and Vare Trophy (1984).
Dinah Shore holds the trophy alongside Helen Alfredsson, winner of the 1993 Dinah Shore Classic. (Photo: Stephen Dunn/Allsport)
Shore remains the only non-player to be inducted into the Hall. The popular entertainer was a great )champion of the women’s tour. She was inducted in 1994.
Betsy King won 20 LPGA events between 1984-89, more wins than any other golfer in the world, male or female, during that time period. She won at least one event for 10 years starting in 1984. (Getty Images)
It took King several years to win on tour, but once she did the titles came in a landslide. King won 20 times in a five-year stretch. In total, she amassed 34 LPGA titles, including six majors. She was a three-time LPGA POY and two-time Vare Trophy winner.
Amy Alcott holds the trophy alongside with Dinah Shore after winning the 1988 Nabisco Dinah Shore at the Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California. (Photo: David Cannon/Allsport/Getty Images)
The woman responsible for the biggest tradition in women’s golf — the jump into Poppie’s Pond — won 29 times on the LPGA, including five majors. She’s a three-time winner of what’s now known as the Chevron Championship.
Beth Daniel during the Chico’s Patty Berg Memorial Golf Tournament.
Daniel won 33 times on the LPGA, including one major. She won both the POY and Vare Trophy titles three times and was inducted in 1999 alongside Alcott and Juli Inkster.
Juli Inkster fired a tournament-low, 4-under 66 to vault into contention at the U.S. Women’s Open.
A seven-time major winner and mother of two, Inkster won 31 titles on the LPGA. She won four different major titles, completing the career Grand Slam before the British Open and Evian were majors.
Judy Rankin in action during tournament play circa 1978. (Photo: Focus on Sport/Getty Images)
While Rankin never won a major, she did collect 26 career titles in a career that was curtailed by back injury. The trailblazing television broadcaster won the Vare Trophy three times and POY twice.
Donna Caponi in action during tournament play circa 1990. She became a member of the tour in 1965 and won four major championships and 24 LPGA Tour career events. (Photo by Focus on Sport/Getty Images)
Caponi won 24 times, including four majors. Her first title came at the 1969 U.S. Women’s Open. She’d go on to enjoy a second career in television.
Marlene Bauer Hagge was one of the 13 founders of the LPGA in 1950. A young golf star along with her sister, Alice, she was named the Associated Press’ Woman Athlete of the Year in 1949 at the age of 15. (Hy Peskin/Getty Images)
A 26-time winner on the LPGA, Bauer Hagge was one of the LPGA’s 13 founders. She turned pro in 1950 at age 16 and won her first and only major, what’s now the Women’s PGA, in 1956.
Annika Sorenstam watches her tee shot on the 12th hole during the first round of the 77th US Women’s Open Championship at Pine Needles Lodge and Golf Club on June 2, 2022 in Southern Pines, North Carolina. (Photo: Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images)
A 72-time winner on the LPGA, Sorenstam’s 10 major championships include three U.S. Women’s Open titles. An eight-time POY, Sorenstam won the Vare Trophy six times and had two seasons in which she won 10 and 11 times. She was inducted in 2003.
Karrie Webb of Australia holds the Women’s British Open trophy on August 20, 1995. Webb a tour rookie won Europe’s richest prize Sunday after scoring a three under par 70 for a 14-under par four-round total of 278.
Webb reached the 27-point threshold at age 25 with her victory at the 2000 U.S. Women’s Open but had to wait until age 30 to reach the now defunct 10-year requirement. Webb won 41 times on the LPGA, including seven majors.
Seri Pak on the 18th green during the first round of the 2016 LPGA KEB-Hana Bank Championship at the Sky 72 Golf Club Ocean Course in Incheon, South Korea. (Photo: Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)
Pak’s victory at the 1998 U.S. Women’s Open stirred an avalanche of talent in South Korea and across Asia. She won 25 times on the LPGA, including five majors and retired from the tour in 2016.
Inbee Park poses with the Vare trophy after winning the scoring title for 2012 at the CME Group Titleholders at the TwinEagles Club in Naples, Florida. (Photo: Scott Halleran/Getty Images)
Park became the second South Korean to enter the LPGA Hall of Fame. A seven-time major winner, Park has 21 titles on the LPGA. She won the first three majors of 2013, culminating in POY honors. Park also won the Vare Trophy in 2012 and 2015. She is currently on maternity leave and is not expected to play in 2024.
Lorena Ochoa has a laugh on the putting green during the first round of the 2010 Lorena Ochoa Invitational at Guadalajara Country Club Guadalajara, Mexico. (Photo: Michael Cohen/Getty Images)
Ochoa amassed the 27 points in short order, but retired before she reached the 10-year mark on tour. She had to wait until the LPGA changed the Hall of Fame rules to take her place. Ochoa won 27 times on the LPGA, including two majors. She won both the LPGA Player of the Year and Vare Trophy on four occasions. The Mexican star played only seven full seasons on tour.
LPGA Founders Shirley Spork and Marilynn Smith attend the the RR Donnelley 2013 LPGA Founders Cup at Wildfire Golf Club in Phoenix. (Photo: Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
In 2022, the LPGA inducted the eight founders who weren’t previously in the Hall in an honorary category: Alice Bauer, Bettye Danoff, Helen Detweiler, Helen Hicks, Opal Hill, Sally Sessions, Marilynn Smith and Shirley Spork.
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