LPGA founder, recent Hall of Fame selection Shirley Spork dies at 94

Shirley Spork, one of the LPGA Tour’s founders, died Tuesday morning. She was 94.

Spork was recently selected to join the LPGA Hall of Fame. The decision was announced March 29 to include all 13 of the founding members.

Spork was born May 14, 1927, in Detroit, Michigan. She grew up across from Bonnie Brook Golf Club and, at age 12, with money earned from collecting, cleaning and reselling golf balls, she bought her first club, a putter.

Spork attended college at what is now Eastern Michigan University and won the 1947 national women’s collegiate golf tournament. In addition to athletic pursuits, Spork trained to become a physical education instructor.

She graduated in 1949 and the following year was one of the 13 women to sign the initial charter of the Ladies Professional Golf Association. That fall, she was hired to teach physical education at Bowling Green State University, splitting time as both an instructor and a playing professional.

Teaching golf, more so than playing competitively, was Spork’s catalyst. In 1954, she began coaching at Tamarisk Country Club in Palm Springs, California, where she lived for nearly eight decades. Spork was also instrumental in the creation of the LPGA Teaching & Club Pro Division.

Spork was awarded the LPGA Teacher of the Year Award in 1959 and 1984. She is a member of the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame, Eastern Michigan Athletic Hall of Fame and, in 2019, was inducted into the PGA of American Hall of Fame.