President Donald Trump awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom posthumously to Babe Didrikson Zaharias and also presented the honor to fellow golfers Annika Sörenstam and Gary Player during a White House ceremony Thursday.
Zaharias, who died in 1956 of cancer at the age of 45, won two gold medals in track and field (hurdles and javelin) and a silver at the 1932 Olympics before turning to golf, where she won 41 women’s professional tour events including 10 majors — three of them U.S. Women’s Opens.
Babe Zaharias Foundation President W.L. Pate Jr. reportedly accepted the award in an East Room ceremony before about 50-60 people that was not open to reporters, thegolfchannel reported.
Sörenstam, 50, a Swede, and Player, 85, from South Africa, had previously been announced as winners of the award and received their medals Thursday.
The award is presented to "individuals who have made especially meritorious contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors."
The three joined former career grand slam winners Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods, and Charlie Sifford, the first Black to play on the PGA Tour, as the only golfers to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
The ceremony reunited Trump with Sörenstam and Player, who played golf with the president in 2019 along with South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham.
Sörenstam won 94 professional tournaments across the globe — including 72 on the U.S. LPGA Tour, third most in its history, and 10 major championships — before retiring at 38 following the 2008 season.
Player also won a career grand slams (victories in the Masters, U.S. Open, British Open and U.S. PGA Championship), winning the four tournaments nine times, fourth most in history.
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