7 Golfers Who Won Both the U.S. Women's Amateur and U.S. Women's Open

Louise Suggs won both the US Womens Amateur and US Womens Open
The U.S. Women's Amateur Championship has been around since 1895, but the U.S. Women's Open wasn't first played until 1946. So, since 1946, how many golfers have won both of the two most prestigious USGA championships for women? Only seven.

Note that so far there are zero golfers who have won at least three of the four biggest USGA championships for women — U.S. Girls' Junior, U.S. Women's Am and Open, U.S. Senior Women's Open — in any combination. The next golfer who achieves that will be the first.

The List: Women Who've Won the USGA's Amateur and Open Championships

1. Patty Berg: Berg won the Amateur in 1938 and the Open in 1946. So in the first year the U.S. Women's Open was played, the first golfer to achieve the Amateur-Open double did it.

2. Betty Jameson: After winning the Amateur back-to-back in 1939 and 1940, Betty Jameson won her Open title in the second year that tournament was played, 1947.

3. Babe Didrikson Zaharias: After winning the U.S. Women's Amateur in 1946, the Babe was a three-time U.S. Women's Open champ (1948, 1950, 1954). Her 1954 win came after she missed the tournament in 1953 following surgery for colon cancer. She won the 1954 Open by 12 strokes. It was Zaharias' final appearance in a U.S. Women's Open.

4. Louise Suggs: "Miss Sluggs," as Bob Hope nicknamed her, earned her Amateur title in 1947. She won the Open twice, in 1949 and 1952.

5. Catherine Lacoste: The amateur from France stunned the American golf scene by winning the U.S. Women's Open in 1967, becoming the first — and so far only — amateur to win the Open. Her U.S. Women's Amateur victory followed two years later in 1969. She is the only golfer who won the Open first, and then the Amateur.

6. JoAnne (Gunderson) Carner: Known as "the Great Gundy" when she began racking up U.S. Amateur victories in the late 1950s. She eventually won five of those: 1957, 1960, 1962, 1966 and 1968. By the time Carner was winning U.S. Women's Opens in 1971 and 1976, her nickname was "Big Mama."

7. Juli Inkster: Inkster won three consecutive Amateurs in 1980, 1981 and 1982. Then she won a pair of U.S. Women's Opens in 1999 and 2002.

Photo credit: Louise Suggs by LPGA / Public domain

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