By Dr. Tony Parker, World Golf Hall of Fame & Museum Historian
World No. 1 Lydia Ko made golfing history this past weekend when she became the youngest female golfer to win back-to-back Major Championships. At age 18 years, 4 months and 20 days she won her first Major at the Evian Championship in France on September 13, 2015. Now, just days before her 19th birthday, she again takes the Major crown after a playoff at the ANA Inspiration at the Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California.
Two of Lydia Ko’s wedges used in her historic win at the 2016 ANA Inspiration will soon be housed in the World Golf Hall of Fame & Museum as part of an upcoming exhibit on the women’s Major Championships, set to open this summer.
Having won her first professional tournament as a 15-year-old amateur at the CN Canadian Women’s Open in 2012, she has taken the professional women’s tour by storm. Ko has already amassed an amazing 17 wins on the professional circuit.
This dominance at such an early age is reminiscent of another young phenomenon from 150 years ago – World Golf Hall of Fame Member, young Tom Morris, Jr.
If Lydia Ko is golf’s young female sensation, then her male counterpart would have to be Tom Morris, Jr. He burst on the professional golfing scene when he played in his first Open Championship at age 14 in 1865. He claimed his first Open Championship title at age 17 years, 5 months and 3 days in 1868 and just a year later, at age 18 years, 4 months and 27 days, he secured his second Open Championship victory.
Morris would go on to win a third consecutive Open title in 1870, followed by a fourth at the age of 21 in 1872. He could have possibly won in 1871; however, there was no Open Championship that year.
If comparisons can be made between the careers of Ko and Morris, then the future looks exceptionally bright for the sensational Lydia Ko. She is already well on her way to a World Golf Hall of Fame career path. Could she mirror Young Tommy with his Major Championship victories in four consecutive years? Time will tell, but either way, she and Tom Morris, Jr. have already made history as the youngest female and male back-to-back Major Champions.
