The field for this week’s McDonald’s LPGA Championship Presented by Coca-Cola feature the finest golfers in the world, all trying to create a bit of history. Fifty years ago almost to the day, the woman considered by many to be the greatest female player ever made some history of her own. On June 8, 1958, at Churchill Valley Country Club in Penn Hills, Pa. outside of Pittsburgh, Mickey Wright won the LPGA Championship. She finished the 72 holes at 4-under par 288 and left the field in the dust; Fay Crocker, the runner-up, finished eight shots behind her. It was the first major championship for Wright, who was 23 at the time, and her sixth career victory.

She went on to win a record 82 LPGA tournaments, 13 of them majors, including additional LPGA Championships in 1960, 61, and '63. Although she stopped playing in tournaments regularly at age 34, Wright is a legendary figure even today. Betsy Rawls, the tournaments Vice Chairman, recalls seeing Wright play for the first time when Wright joined the LPGA Tour in 1955. She was immediately impressed, although Rawls recalls didn't work much on her short game at first. "Golf for her was hitting fairways, tee to green," Rawls says. "When she emotionally accepted that golf was getting it into the hole, she started working on her short game a lot. She adapted, and when she did, she started winning." It was Wright's graceful swing and prodigious length however that made her a legendary figure. "She was the longest hitter on our tour," Rawls says, "and her ball striking was way above anybody else. Her trajectory, the way she could carry the ball a long way.

“There was no wasted energy, no compensating moves in her swing. She had a wide arc she hit the ball exactly at the right spot in the arc of the swing she just had the perfect golf swing. I loved playing with her, just to watch her play. "Wright stopped playing on a full-time basis after the 1969 season, but remained a force to be reckoned with when she did tee it up. Her last official win came in 1973 at the Colgate-Dinah Shore Winner's Circle. Six years later at age 44 she was part of a five-way playoff at the Coca-Cola Classic in Clifton, NJ that was won by Nancy Lopez. "She could have won 20 more tournaments," Rawls says. "Mickey was a high-strung person and lived and died with hr performance on the golf course. Winning was really important to her; she suffered when she played badly. "She would not hang around if she did not think she could be the best golfer. She could not accept anything less than being the best, so she went out on top."