Golfer Lynnette Landry is using her love of the sport to bring more Black women and girls to the golf course.
Landry, who is a pre-Title IX golfer, has been playing golf since she was young child growing up in South Minneapolis. Landry’s mother, father, and brother all played the sport.
The 71-year-old played golf as as student at Washburn High School and as a college student.
Landry played golf before the passage of Title IX — which banned sex-based discrimination in sports. This led Landry to regularly be the only female golfer of color playing the sport.
In an interview with MPR News for its North Star Journey series, Landry admitted that it wasn’t until she got to high school that she ever questioned her chances of becoming a professional golfer.
“It didn’t even occur to me that I couldn’t become a pro golfer until I got into high school and I didn’t see other golfers like me,” Landry said.
It was the experience of often being the only Black or Brown golfer on the course that has guided Landry’s career-long efforts to bring more Black women and girls into the sport. For more than a decade, she was a golf coach Central High School in St. Paul. She continues to visit the Hiawatha Golf Course of her youth to offer private golf lessons to Black women and Black girls.
“I think it’s just how it makes me feel,” Landry said. “Sunshine is my friend, I like being outside, the heat doesn’t bother me. It just fits. It’s hard to explain something that is just part of who I am.”
Landry was honored with the Special Merit Award at the 2023 National Girls & Women in Sports Day celebration in Minnesota in February on this year.
Landry’s work is part of a larger movement to see more Black people in the sport. This includes efforts by organizations like Black Girls Golf and Women of Color Golf.