For Mary Bea Porter-King, recovering from replacements to both knees simultaneously is just another remarkable story in her life in golf that weaves its way through the headline names of the game and ends up in America’s Pacific paradise of Hawaii.
“After the first week, I was two weeks ahead of schedule, and after two weeks, my range of motion is close to where they want me to be,” Porter-King, a former LPGA champion, said of her surgery in early February. “I met a nice woman who was freaking out about my progress. She said: ‘How do you put your socks on?’ I guess it’s good to be a tough old lady.”
Mary Bea Porter, a gifted athlete as a youngster in southern California, was introduced to golf at age 7 by Betty Hicks, the 1941 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion. She and the other youngsters received pointers on the game, its etiquette, rules and care of equipment and the course and the general decorum, respect and discipline that is expected of all golfers.
Dottie Pepper, an LPGA major champion and CBS golf analyst, knows that those lessons have stuck.
“One of the most special things about MBPK is that, despite everything she has accomplished in the game, she never thought of herself as bigger than the game,” Pepper said. “And her motto has always been to leave things just a bit better than you found them. She has certainly done that.”
Porter-King and her fellow junior golfers were not allowed to play by Hicks until they passed a written rules test. The then-undiagnosed dyslexic Porter-King took four tests before she grinded her way to a passing score and a place on the course.
“Seven of us in the junior golf program turned professional: two touring pros and five club pros,” Porter-King said. “She had a huge impact on us. After that, I wanted to pay it forward, and you know that the more you give, the more you get back.”
Hicks also introduced Porter-King to LPGA legends Carol Mann, Mickey Wright and Kathy Whitworth. “It looked like a really cool thing to do,” said Porter-King, who also considered a career as a veterinarian.
The next poignant chapter in her life came when she was considering where to go to high school. Her physical education instructor was a friend of the admissions director at the prestigious Westlake School for Girls in Los Angeles. After summer school, she was admitted. Entering her sophomore year, Porter-King faced a quandary: Her father was offered a promotion in his company but with a required move to Omaha, Nebraska. She wanted to stay in Los Angeles where she was playing golf with the UCLA team (thanks to the late Eddie Merrins) and also playing Bel-Air Country Club with the likes of Hollywood entertainers such as Andy Williams. Porter-King was rewarded for her athletic ability with a scholarship (room and board). Of course, it was an offer she couldn’t refuse; she was tutored in math and science by future astronaut Sally Ride.
Upon graduation in 1968, she found Arizona State where she played softball as the starting second baseman, basketball, volleyball and golf, leading to a focus on playing professional golf for a living.
“I had never seen it, but when I went there I played four sports and loved every minute of it,” Porter-King said. “They let me go after five years. That’s all it took.”
After nationals in golf in her senior year, Porter-King was headed for qualifying school, as a family friend had agreed to sponsor her on the LPGA Tour. Tragically, her sponsor died of a heart attack, and she was without financial support until she received a phone call from Ping Golf founder Karsten Solheim and his wife Louise.
Porter-King had never met the Solheims, whose company was headquartered in Phoenix, but they knew her from nearby ASU and offered to be her sponsor.
“They just told me where to send the bills,” Porter-King said. “They are truly one of the most amazing families in the game for what they have done for others. I was one of the lucky ones. I wouldn’t be sitting here without Karsten and Louise Solheim.”
From 1973 to 1998, Porter-King lived the life of a touring golf professional, winning the 1973 Q-School title and, two years later, her only LPGA Tour title, the Golf Inns of America. She was divorced and in debt and fought a constant battle of the bills.
LPGA commissioner Ray Volpe sought her out and offered her a gig as a TV analyst with Jimmy Demaret. “That was the most amazing week of my life working with him,” she said. The tour later transitioned to NBC, where she worked with Fran Tarkenton, the former NFL quarterback. “He gave me the microphone and said, ‘You talk. I don’t know about this tour.’” For 12 years, Porter-King traded spots in the field for spots behind the camera because she said she “needed the money.”
In the late 1980s, she was a single mother and was constantly juggling child care with other chances to play. A good friend from Arizona State, Cathy Mant, lived in Oahu and invited Porter-King to take a swing at the events at Turtle Bay and Princeville.
During a practice round, her assigned caddie, “a surfer dude,” did not show, and there was only one caddie left in the yard, alone on a bench, reading.
“I’m telling Cathy all the gory details of my divorce and my woes, and he’s right behind me,” Porter-King said. “I’m training him for nine holes.”
At the turn, the caddie/surfer shows up and wants to take over. “I walked away and said, ‘You guys work it out.’ I turned around later and here comes Charlie King, my caddie who could read.”
King, a successful auto and auto service dealer, married the LPGA player two years later, and in 1989, she moved to Hawaii with her 6-year-old son, Joseph, whom Charlie soon adopted. Her beloved dogs came, too, signaling the permanence of the move.
The Mary Bea effect in Hawaii was about to begin as she enrolled her son in the Kauai Junior Golf Association at Wailua Golf Course, where she met Joy Matsumura, a former ASU player whose career was hampered by injuries, who was running the program.
In her second year in Hawaii, Porter-King took over the program and continued it with support from the parents and the golf professionals on Kauai, particularly David Ishii, who advocated for the children to play from distances that tested them. Reduced rates at the resort courses were widely accepted.
“They were little gritty, in-the-dirt kids who had never played anywhere but Wailua,” Porter-King said. “We needed to grow for the kids. My motto over the years is that my job is to make your kids uncomfortable, so they’ll grow.”
When Porter-King left the Kauai Junior Golf Association in 2002, it had grown to more than 250 youngsters, with greater playing opportunities.
Porter-King’s vision, with the opportunities of her past ringing in her ears, took the form of the Hawaii State Junior Golf Association (founded in 1998) which provided golf for youngsters throughout the islands. The other founders were Norman Asao, Merv Kotake, and Greg Nichols.
That coincided with her decision to retire from the LPGA, and the HSJGA benefited from it.
“That became a passion for me, kept me very busy and I was kind of a one-man show, running tournaments, educating kids, doing college workshops, bringing my friends in who had gone into college coaching. And people I know helped along the way. We helped create some amazing young golfers. We didn’t do it to make a profit but to provide opportunity. The kids worked hard to take advantage of that.”
Porter-King smiles when she lists the names of the USGA champions who have come through the HSJGA: Casey Watabu (2006 Amateur Public Links), Kimberly Kim (2006 Women’s Amateur), Kyung Kim (2012 Women’s Public Links), Michelle Wie (2003 Women’s Public Links and 2014 Women’s Open) and Allisen Corpuz (2023 Women’s Open).
The HSJGA now has approximately 300 kids in the program.
“It’s the pinnacle of where children want to be,” said Porter-King, who was inducted into the Hawaii Golf Hall of Fame in 2004. “And in 2021 we took over PGA’s First Tee and introduced over 2,100 kids to the game of golf.”
At the 2000 U.S. Open, she was asked by Reg Murphy, past president of the USGA, to join the association’s Executive Committee. Admittedly “blindsided” by the request, she nonetheless accepted and served from 2001 to 2006.
“I loved the five years that I served and felt that I had a voice for the players,” Porter-King said.
“When (young kids) are playing golf, just with other kids, they have the absolute best time. They are high-fiving; they are congratulating each other; they have their arms around them when they hit a bad shot.” — Mary Bea Porter-King
Jim Reinhart, a frequent golf partner who joined the Executive Committee with Porter-King in 2001, relates this story: “Several years ago, we were at an Open at St. Andrews and we were just planning to walk along the first fairway to the New Course clubhouse for an ice cream bar, a walk that should have been 10 minutes, but due to the fact that at least 20 different people stopped us to say hello to Mary Bea, it took close to two hours; much too long to go for an ice cream bar. But that’s just how she rolls; everyone loves her.”
In her time on the Executive Committee, her friend Cathy Mant, retired from the U.S. Girls’ Junior Committee and recommended Porter-King as her replacement.
That opened up the world of rules to Porter-King, who has earned a reputation as one of the world’s best officials. She has worked more than 100 USGA national championships, plus the Open Championship, Masters and PGA Championship.
She attends rules school every year and will work at the NCAA and Pac-12 tournaments but no USGA championships because of recovery from knee surgery.
Porter-King was invited to join the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews in 2020 and won the ladies medal on her first trip to the Old Course as a member in 2021. She was also the recipient of the PGA First Lady of Golf Award in 2011.
Porter-King lives for the joy she sees in her junior golfers.
“At a certain age, I don’t allow parents to spectate for little kids,” she said. “When they are playing golf, just with other kids, they have the absolute best time. They are high-fiving; they are congratulating each other; they have their arms around them when they hit a bad shot.”
And don’t forget how she saved 3-year-old Jonathan Smucker from drowning after her wayward tee shot landed near a pool at a home adjacent to the13th hole at Moon Valley Country Club in Phoenix at a 1988 LPGA Tour qualifier. She administered CPR until the paramedics arrived.
“He’s doing great,” she said. “I’m still trying to get him to name one of his kids after me, but that’s another story.”
Indeed.