Career
Black newspapers had called her "The Queen of Negro Women"s Golf." As stated in Arthur Ashe"s book, Hard Road to Glory, many observers called Gregory the best African-American female golfer of the 20th century. On September 17, 1956, she began competing in the United States. Women"s Amateur Championship, thus becoming the first African-American woman to play in a national championship conducted by the United States Golf Association. Because she was African-American, Gregory was denied entry into the player"s banquet at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda at the conclusion of the United States. Women"s Amateur in 1959.
Also, in Gary, Indiana, African-Americans were banned from playing the South Gleason Park Golf Course.
However, in the early 1960s, Gregory played that course, stating, "My tax dollars are taking care of the big course and there"s no way you can bar me from lieutenant" She was followed by other African-Americans who played the course soon after her, and the ban was ended. In 1963, Gregory was mistaken as a maid by Polly Riley, another contestant at the Women"s Amateur in Williamstown, Massachusetts.
In 1971, Gregory was runner-up at the United States Golf Association Senior Women"s Amateur, making her the first African-American to finish as runner-up in a United States Golf Association women"s competition. Gregory was also the first African-American appointed to the Gary Public Library Board, which occurred in 1954.
A granite marker in Gregory"s memory stands at the sixth hole of the South Gleason Park Golf Course in Gary, Indiana.
She was inducted into the United Golf Association Hall of Fame in 1966, the African American Golfers Hall of Fame in 2006, the National African American Golfers Hall of Fame in 2011, and the National Black Golf Hall of Fame in 2012. In 2000, the Urban Chamber of Commerce of Las Vegas began the Ann Gregory Memorial Scholarship Golf Tournament, which lasted seven years.
