Ethel Funches
| Ethel Funches | |
|---|---|
| Personal information | |
| Full name | Ethel Powers Funches |
| Born |
August 29, 1913 Owens, South Carolina |
| Died |
January 6, 2010 (aged 96) Washington, D.C. |
| Nationality |
 United States
|
| Residence | Washington, DC |
| Spouse | Eugene Funches |
| Career | |
| Status | Amateur |
| Major tour wins | 7 |
| Achievements and awards | |
| National Afro-American Golfers Hall of Fame |
1969 |
Ethel Funches was a champion amateur golfer from 1950 to 1980 who won a number of local, regional and national titles, including seven titles at the United Golfers Association National Women’s Open, fourteen wins at the Wake-Robin Golf Club Championships and over 100 local and regional titles and tropies.
Funches was born on August 29, 1913 in Owens, South Carolina. She moved to Washington, DC during the Great Depression in 1932. Funches husband, Eugene Funches, taught her to play golf after the couple moved to Washington, DC. Golf provided a social and competitive outlet for Funches and she devoted much of her free time honing her skills. During the day Funches was a cafeteria manager at Dunbar High School in the District of Columbia area until her retirement in 1970.
Funches joined the Wake-Robin Golf Club (WRGC) in 1943. The club was formed seven years earlier in the home of Helen Webb Harris along with 13 other founding members and is the oldest black women’s golf club in the United States.
At the time there was only one public, nine-hole course that was not segregated. The members of the club along with their husbands were able to convince the Federal Department of the Interior to create the Langston Golf Course, the second racially desegregated golf course in the District. The courses were not the only segregated aspect of golfing, the Professional Golf Association (PGA) had a standing by-law until the 1960s that prohibited African Americans from joining. In response, African American golfers established the United Golf Association (UGA) back in the 1920s. The UGA Championships were one of many competitions Funches dominated at. Funches became the only player to win 7 UGA Championships. To put this into perspective winning the UGA National Open Women’s Championship was equivalent to winning the United States Golf Association Women’s Open Championship, for a golfer to win one of these prestigious competitions is a sign of talent and a true accomplishment. To win more than once was unheard of since each year the event was held at a different course in a different city. Funches proved her golf prowess by not only winning 7 within a ten-year span, but with a consecutive reign in 1959 and 1960 .
Throughout her competitive years Funches faced many competitors and had a prolonged rivalry with fellow amateur golfer Ann Gregory. In 1957 Funches and Gregory both competed in the UGA National Open Championships, which was held in the Washington, D.C. area. Funches was playing on familiar territory and was confident she could take home the title. Instead, Gregory won her third Open Championship and Funches placed second. Another well-known competitor Funches teed off against was the tennis champion Althea Gibson in 1961 during the quarterfinals of the black women's golf national Championship
...
Wikipedia