Phyllis Preuss: Big Winner Who Suffered a Record-Big Loss
Full name: Phyllis Ann Preuss
Date of birth: February 9, 1939
Place of birth: Detroit, Michigan
Date and place of death: July 27, 2024, in Southern Pines, North Carolina
Nickname: Tish, which is what she was called by all her friends, and it is not unusual to find her called "Tish Preuss" in golf recordbooks and print sources from her career.
Her Biggest Wins
- 1961 Women's International Four-Ball (partnered by Barbara Williams)
- 1962 Doherty Tournament
- 1963 Women's Eastern Amateur
- 1964 Women's North and South Amateur
- 1965 Women's Southern Amateur
- 1967 Women's North and South Amateur
- 1967 Women's Eastern Amateur
- 1968 Women's Southern Amateur
- 1976 Women's International Four-Ball (partnered by Cindy Hill)
- 1991 U.S. Senior Women's Amateur
In the Curtis Cup
Phyllis Preuss played for Team USA in the Curtis Cup five times, each time the tournament was held from 1962 through 1970. And after that last appearance, she held a couple all-time Curtis Cup records for success. Later, she served as Team USA captain.- 1962 Curtis Cup: In her debut, Preuss played only in the singles and beat Jean Roberts, 1-up.
- 1964 Curtis Cup: On Day 1, Preuss and Barbara McIntire lost in foursomes. On Day 2, they lost again (both times to Angela Bonnalack/Marley Spearman). Then Preuss lost her singles match against Julia Greenhalgh, finishing 0-3. But she lost only one Curtis Cup match after this.
- 1966 Curtis Cup: Preuss won two foursomes matches, and in singles defeated Liz Chadwick to go 3-0.
- 1968 Curtis Cup: Preuss earned 3.5 of the maximum four points. Two of those points were for two foursomes wins. In singles, she halved Dinah Oxley on Day 1, then beat Bridget Jackson on Day 2 to finish 3-0-1.
- 1970 Curtis Cup: In her final appearance, Preuss again won both her foursomes matches. In singles, she lost to Mary McKenna on Day 1, then defeated Belle McCorkindale Robertson on Day 2 to finish 3-1.
Preuss' 10 match victories overall in the Curtis Cup was, after her final appearance in 1970, the most by anyone in Curtis Cup history. At the time of this writing (2025), it still ranks third-best in Curtis Cup history for match wins. Her 10.5 career points earned was also a Curtis Cup record in 1970, and still ranks fourth today.
The United States Golf Association (USGA) selected Preuss to captain Team USA in the 1984 Curtis Cup. The Americans won that won by a score of 9.5 to 8.5.
The USGA Record She Didn't Want
Before Tish Preuss set those Curtis Cup records mentioned above, she set another USGA record. It's just one she never wanted. Preuss lost in the championship match of the 1961 U.S. Women's Amateur by the whopping score of 14-and-13.Preuss beat some other big names on her road to the final. She eliminated GB&I Curtis Cup stalwart Elizabeth Price, 1-up in 21 holes, in the third round. In the quarterfinals she ousted Barbara McIntire, 3 and 2. And in the semifinals, Preuss beat Roberta Albers, 2 and 1.
That set up the championship match against Anne Quast Sander (known as Anne Quast Decker at the time). Preuss was described in newspapers as a "22-year-old who summers in Michigan and winters in Florida." Sander was already a U.S. Women's Amateur champ, having won in 1958. She eventually won it three times, plus the British Ladies Amateur once and the U.S. Women's Senior Amateur four times.
The title match was scheduled for 36 holes. But it didn't last nearly that long. The more-powerful Quast outdrove Preuss by as much as 40 yards per hole, and was consistently putting her approaches tight to the flagstick. Preuss was 12-down after just 18 holes. And she did not win a single hole in the match.
The final score was 14-and-13, and that was the largest winning margin (largest losing margin in Preuss' case) in the history of the U.S. Women's Amateur. The previous record was Glenna Collett's 13-and-12 win in the 1928 final. Collett was 10-up at the 18-hole break, another record that Quast broke against Preuss.
But it gets worse. Because 14-and-13 is not just the record loss for the U.S. Women's Amateur. It remains today tied for the worst loss by anyone, man or woman, in any USGA match-play match, in any of the USGA championships. It's a score that's been seen only two other times. In the 1915 U.S. Amateur, Jerome Travers beat George Crump, 14 and 13, in the first round. And in the 1928 U.S. Amateur, Bobby Jones won by that score over John Beck in the third round.
More About Phyllis Preuss
Tish Preuss competed successfully on a national level for four decades, playing in 21 U.S. Women’s Amateurs between 1959 and 1981. She never won one — the U.S. Women's Amateur was the one that got away.Preuss was a semifinalist in 1962, but lost to JoAnne Gunderson (Carner), who went on to win the title, 3-and-2. In the 1967 USWA, Preuss earned medalist honors in the stroke-play qualifying. She beat Jane Bastanchury in the quarterfinals, but lost in the semifinals to Jean Ashley.
Preuss went out in the quarterfinals in 1968 and 1977, and in the Round of 16 in 1973 and 1980. She also made the semifinals once in the British Women's Amateur, in 1964.
A lifelong amateur, Preuss came up during what women's golf historian Rhonda Glenn has called "the golden age of amateurs" (1950-68) in women's golf. It was a time when, in women's golf, "there were more serious amateurs than professionals." Preuss, Glenn wrote, "began to play (her) finest golf during the era's latter years."
The New York Times once described Preuss as "a willowy blonde." Sports Illustrated went with the description "slight blonde," one who "plays a hit-and-roll game."
Preuss finished as low amateur in the U.S. Women's Open three times, 1963, 1968 and 1969. In 1968 she finished tied for ninth place, her best showing in a women's professional major. She had one other Top 10 in a major, 10th place in the 1960 Women's Western Open.
Her biggest victories were in the stroke play Eastern Amateur and match play North and South Amateur and Southern Amateur, and she won each of them twice.
In the 1963 Eastern Amateur, Preuss won by seven strokes. In the 1967 Eastern Amateur, Preuss' final-round 68 broke the course record by three strokes and she won by five. The Associated Press story that year referred to her as a "28-year-old part-time women's wear shop worker."
She won the 1964 North and South Amateur by 7-and-6 in the 18-hole final, the largest winning margin to that point in the tournament's history. She won the North & South again in 1967. From 1963-67, Preuss reached the North & South championship match four out of five years.
In the 1965 Southern Amateur championship match, Preuss bettered Judy Eller-Street, 2-and-1. And she won the 1968 Southern Amateur over Nancy Roth Syms, 4 and 3.
That was her last big, individual title until she turned 50 and became eligible to play in the U.S. Women's Senior Amateur Championship. In her first appearance in the Senior Am in 1989, she finished eighth. In her second in 1990, she was sixth.
And in her third appearance in the U.S. Women's Senior Amateur in 1991, she won, finally earning that elusive USGA national championship. Her winning total of 221 established a new scoring record for the tournament, although one that only stood for one year. Her margin of victory was one over runners-up Belle Robertson and the defending champ Anne Quast Sander, who had inflicted that 14-and-13 defeat 30 years earlier.
Preuss moved to Colorado Springs, Colorado, in 1970, and today she is a member of the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame.
Sources:
(Book titles are affiliate links; commissions earned)
Alliss, Peter. The Who's Who of Golf, 1983, Orbis Publishing.
Colorado Golf Hall of Fame. Inductees, Phyllis "Tish" Preuss, https://www.coloradogolfhalloffame.org/person/phyllis-tish-preuss/.
Elliott, Len, and Kelly, Barbara. Who's Who in Golf, 1976, Arlington House Publishers.
Florida State Golf Association. Women's International Four-Ball, Past Champions, https://www.fsga.org/sections/content/Women's-International-Four-Ball---Past-Champions/390.
Glenn, Rhonda. The Illustrated History of Women's Golf, 1991, Taylor Publishing Company.
The (Harrisburg, Pa.) Patriot-News. "Miss Preuss Captures Eastern Amateur Golf," The Associated Press, June 9, 1967.
Scharff, Robert. Golf Magazine's The Encyclopedia of Golf, 1970, Harper and Row.
Steel, Donald, and Ryde, Peter. The Encyclopedia of Golf, 1975, The Viking Press.
United States Golf Association. Official USGA Record Book, 1895-1990, Triumph Books, 1992.
USGA. Curtis Cup Records, https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/media/online-media-center/usga-records/curtis-cup-records.html.
USGA. U.S. Senior Women's Amateur Championship History, U.S. Senior Women's Amateur Champions, https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/championships/2014/us-senior-womens-amateur-champions-21474864039.html.
USGA. U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championship Records, https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/media/online-media-center/usga-records/u-s--senior-women-s-amateur-records.html.
USGA. USGA Superlatives, Largest Winning Margin Any Match, https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/media/online-media-center/usga-records/usga-superlatives.html.
Women's Eastern Golf Association. About, Amateur Champions, List of Women's Eastern Amateur Champions, https://womenseastern.org/amateur-champions/.
Wood, Hal. "Decker Crushes Preuss 14 and 13," Medford (Ore.) Mail Tribune, August 27, 1961.