Golf Vic Vol 60 No 3 2019

Burtta’s winning years were 1947, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1954 and 1958. What a player – winner of multiple state titles, she held the Australian Amateur, the Victorian Amateur and the Victorian Champion of Champions concurrently over 1957-8 and would later go on to receive an MBE for her services to golf. Margaret Trounson (later Bladen), at five feet one inch height described by Don Lawrence in The Age as ‘the smallest topline player, male or female, in golf’ when she and Eric Routley won the Victorian Mixed Foursomes championship at Royal Melbourne in 1954, shared five of those team wins with Burtta, claiming another two with other partners in 1948 and 1952. An 11-time club champion at Commonwealth Golf Club, she is perhaps one of amateur golf’s least recognised champions. Both were ex-students from Presbyterian Ladies College, one of the strongest teams throughout the event’s long history. With 13 victories, it’s the winningest. Joan Fisher, Victorian Hall of Fame member who won the Victorian Amateur the four successive times it was played over the period 1939-1948 and added another four state titles – the last in 1967 – won as Joan Lewis with team-mates from Melbourne C.E.G.G.S. in 1938. Betty Kernot from Geelong C.E.G.G.S., two-time winner of the Australian Amateur and a 13-time winner of the Geelong Golf Club women’s championship, added the WIGCC team cup to her collection in 1934. Shirley Tolhurst, sister of Susie and a champion in her own right – winner of the 1934 Victorian Amateur and a state team player – achieved something her sister did not, being part of the winning St Catherine’s team in 1933. Shirley’s daughter Jenny Tilbrook would later join her mother, winning with Toorak College in 1998. And Bettine Burgess, 1966 Victorian Amateur champion, won with Melbourne C.E.G.G.S. in 1963. Other notables to have played in the event include the champion player and Victorian Hall of Fame member Mona Macleod, who won the Victorian Amateur five times and later became a leading administrator, Nellie Gatehouse, who won the inaugural state title plus another four titles and who became a formidable administrator of the game and Victorian Hall of Fame member, (Lady) Joan Lindsay, well-known artist and author of Picnic at Hanging Rock amongst other works, and Dame Elisabeth Murdoch. Modern winners (1980 onwards) have included life member Anne Woolridge (MLC, 1969 and 1978). The Kitty McEwan Trophy has been donated for many years by Anne, while fellow “lifer” Margaret Appleton donates the Nell Goff Trophy for the winner of B Division. There are names familiar to all in the women’s golf world: Victorian Hall of Fame member Jane Lock, who won the Victorian Junior Girls’ Championship a record five times in a row as well as the Victorian Amateur twice before moving onto a professional career; former Women’s Golf Victoria (WGV) president Anne Court (St Catherine’s, 1980); fellow former WGV president Judy Onto (Korowa, 1986), Victorian Hall of Fame member and former WGV president Rosemary Wakeham (Shelford, 1989) and former state player Simone McClure (Ruyton, 1991-2). Other modern notables include Judy Bull (Clarendon, 2011), who equalled the Commonwealth course record with her 76 in winning the 1976 Kitty McEwan Trophy and later penned a short history of the event highlighting Commonwealth’s strong involvement; Judy’s 2011 team- mates, sisters Kristine Vandertop and Simone Byrne (both of the wonderful Titheridge golfing family), and former state player Lorraine Clothier (Lowther Hall, 1993) who achieved everlasting fame when a newspaper photo of her playing in the 1956 Victorian Junior Girls Championship in a flaring skirt appeared with the caption ‘Skirt and petticoat swirl’. And the list goes on. Finally, the value of the event is also in the friendships made. Without exception, whenever asked, anyone who has participated in the event, winner or not, ventures mateship as one of the best things about it all. Anne Wooldridge and fellow WIGCC life member Jean Sedgman, both former presidents of WIGCC, have been close friends for nigh on 74 years, a bond cemented through the sport. Jenny Tilbrook reflected that, “I’ve made a lot of lifelong friendships with so many women from other schools”, while another life member Anna Mason said, “we’ve had a lot of fun over the years”. Perhaps the last word should go to Helen Smith: “I love the history of it. I think it’s extraordinary that it’s an annual event that has been played since 1929 and only not played during the war. “It’s a fun event. It’s a great example of women working well together to foster women’s golf. We feel very strongly about that and about supporting charity and we work hard to continue it.” 2019 WIGGC winners from Korowa (from left): Ann Mitchell, Meg Bowen and Julie Martin. Absent: Jesika Clark. 36 Golf Victoria