Renee Powell, former LPGA player
As I look and see all those people throughout the country and in other parts of the world that are standing up for what’s going on now, there sometimes seems to be more white people out there than there are black people.
. . . The one (personal) incident that did happen that I can tell you about was when we were actually in Idaho (in the late 1960s or early 1970s). . . . (The LPGA players stayed in hotels) and in one instance I went in to register and they said, “Well, we don’t have a registration for you,” and I knew I’d made a registration just like everyone else had but when they saw my face it was a little different. So a player that was standing there at the same time went out and actually told Kathy Whitworth about the trouble I was having. And Kathy Whitworth was the one that came in and said, “Either we all stay or we all walk.”
. . . I remember my roommate on the tour for a long time was a Canadian golfer, Sandra Post, and sometimes we’d be in restaurants and they would serve everyone else around us except for us so we would just get up and leave. And it wasn’t because Sandra was Canadian, it was because I was there too. And there were incidents when I went into the locker room and there’s always security in the locker room and everyone shows their ID badge to walk in, and I would get stopped at different times.
. . . Marlene Hagge and I were talking today and she relayed this incident to me about Althea Gibson. Althea was the best-known player on the LPGA tour because she was a world-class champion in another sport, she had won Wimbledon, the French Open and the U.S. Open. . . . Althea went to register and Marlene came in and the guy behind the counter said, “Well, I’m sorry but what’s your name? We don’t have a reservation for you. So I’m sorry you can’t stay.”
And Marlene said she knew exactly what was going on and so she said, “Althea, just wait here for a second,’ and she told the guy behind the desk, “Oh actually I need two keys.” And so right in front of him she said, “Here I’ll see you in the room, Althea,” and gave her the other key. And she said they roomed together for, I don’t know, a year and a half, two years after that.