When Sea World was completed in San Antonio in 1988, one of its features was a so-called Texas Walk containing 18 statues of people who had brought special distinction to the Lone Star State. There was only one sports figure: Mildred Didrikson Zaharias, known affectionately to her many friends and admirers simply as Babe.

During the difficult, last few years of Babe's career, her most supportive and loyal friend was golfing colleague Betty Dodd. So, as a special gesture, she was given the honour of unveiling the statue. And in a phone call at the time of the ceremony to British golf-writer, Liz Kahn, Dodd said excitedly: "When I arrived, the man who did the sculptures came up to me, introduced himself and asked me to unveil Babe's statue."

She added: "I did, and when I saw it I was amazed because it was so realistic. It looks exactly like her. It is wonderful." Five years later, after ending her career "teaching golf every damned day" as she put it, Betty Dodd died in 1993.

In those quiet, winter years in San Antonio, she retained vivid memories of the musical duets she (on the guitar) and Babe (on the harmonica) had enjoyed together, even to the extent of appearing on the Ed Sullivan Show. And she recalled 1954 and how Zaharias had announced in January that she would be resuming a full schedule on the LPGA Tour.

This was wonderful news to American sports fans, given that Babe had undergone surgery for colon cancer the previous April and had been out of action for the remainder of the 1953 season. The cocky exuberance and running conversation with galleries, which made her a great drawing card wherever she played, was greatly missed. All of which heightened the excitement at her return to competitive action.

In the event, she made a disappointing appearance in her first tournament of 1954, suffering from dizziness while carding rounds of 81, 82 and 83 in the Sea Island Invitational. But she gradually grew stronger, and the following week was seventh in the Tampa Women's Open.

February brought even further improvement, marked by an actual tie for the St Petersburg Women's Open, which she lost in a play-off. Then came emphatic evidence of her well-being with back-to-back victories in the Miami Women's Open and the Sarasota Open. "I feel wonderful," she enthused. "I think I'm here to stay."

Zaharias went on to win in Washington DC and, from there, turned her attention to the hilly stretch at Salem Country Club in Peabody, Massachusetts, the venue for the US Women's Open. And when the great occasion arrived, the champion of 1948 and 1950 proceeded to take the event by storm, shooting rounds of 72 and 71 for a six-stroke lead at the halfway stage.

But she was aware the toughest part had yet to come: 36 holes on the Saturday was certain to severely test her endurance. Still, the omens looked decidedly bright when, on a mild, cloudless morning, she shot a third round of 73 to extend her lead to a record 10 strokes after 54 holes.

Nothing could now stand between her and a stunning comeback, comparable even to that of the great Ben Hogan who returned to win the US Open at Merion four years previously, after he had sustained horrific injuries in a car crash. As a safeguard, however, Zaharias took a nap in the clubhouse between rounds.

She needed it. Late in the afternoon she began to tire and proceeded to bogey four holes on the way in. By that stage, however, her dominance was such that the only point at issue was the extent of her victory margin. As it happened, she was mobbed by well-wishers as she approached the final green on the way to an amazing, 12-stroke triumph.

With nothing left to prove to herself, she was noticeably subdued at the presentation ceremony. "My prayers have been answered," she said quietly. "I wanted to show thousands of cancer sufferers that the operation I had, a colostomy, will enable a person to return to normal life. This is my answer to them."

Though the 14-stroke winning margin by Louise Suggs at the Prince George's Club in 1949 remained the championship record, Zaharias had gained the distinction of establishing the next three biggest margins. Prior to Salem, she had won by nine strokes at Rolling Hills CC in 1950 and by eight at Atlantic City CC two years previously.

In the absence of a birth certificate, it is accepted from the record of her baptism that Mildred Ella was born in Port Arthur, Texas, on June 26th, 1911, the sixth of seven children to Norwegian immigrants Ole and Hannah Didriksen. Though her parents ended their name with "en", Mildred later changed hers to "on" in the erroneous belief that it was more Norwegian.

After the family had moved 17 miles to Beaumont, where they lived close to an oil refinery, Ole built his children a gymnasium in the back garden where the equipment included a weight-lifting device and a trapeze. It was there Mildred got her taste for athletic pursuits.

Meanwhile, in order to set up a sequence of hurdles, she would get the neighbours to cut their hedges down to an appropriate height and would then race her sister Lillie, who ran along the road while she negotiated the greenery. She was on every team at the local high school, notably volleyball, tennis, basketball, swimming and baseball.

She dabbled in golf for the first time as a teenager, but basketball became her dominant sport, leading her to the Olympics. Baseball also came easily to this remarkably natural athlete and her penchant for hitting home runs earned the sobriquet Babe, after the national hero of the day, Babe Ruth.

While working as a stenographer for a Dallas insurance company she was an outstanding member of the basketball team and became involved in field events, notably the javelin, shot putt, long jump and high jump. In August 1931, the Dallas Morning News declared Babe to be "probably the world's outstanding all-round feminine athlete". From there, it was a natural progression to the 1932 Olympic Games at Los Angeles.

But first, there were the American Olympic trials at Evanston, in which Babe really made her mark. Entering eight events, she won six gold medals and broke four world records, two of them her own. Then came the Olympics. Her first event was the javelin, in which she unleashed an amazing throw of 143 ft 4 in to break the world record by no less than 11 feet. She followed this by winning the 80-metre hurdles in a world record 11.7 seconds.

In the high jump, she and fellow competitor Jean Shiley both cleared 5 ft 51/2 in, but Shiley was awarded the gold on a technicality when Didrikson was deemed to have illegally rolled her head over the bar before the remainder of her body. On being awarded the silver medal, however, she was acknowledged as joint holder of the world record.

Babe had taken the nation by storm. Grantland Rice, a leading sportswriter of the time, proclaimed her to be: ". . . the Ultimate Amazon and the greatest athlete of all mankind for all time. An incredible human being. She is beyond all belief until you see her perform. Then you finally understand that you are looking at the most flawless section of muscle harmony, of complete mental and physical co-ordination the world of sport has ever known."

During the mid 1930s, she turned her attention seriously to golf, but had to endure some ridiculous rulings on her amateur status from the USGA, due to her involvement as a professional in other sports. So she went touring with Gene Sarazen, doing clinics and exhibitions. And she met her future husband.

George Zaharias was a professional wrestler of Greek origin who, from pretending to sob for mercy when he was beaten, was known as the "Crying Greek from Cripple Creek". When he and Babe met, they were both competing in the 1938 Los Angeles Open (both missed the halfway cut). They were married on December 23rd of that year. Babe would later remark in jest: "When I married him, he looked like a Greek god, and now he looks like a goddamned Greek."

Though George was making more than $100,000 per year and was by no means a kept man, it was a sometime tempestuous marriage which suffered through the absence of children. Much to her sorrow, Babe miscarried, and when they tried to adopt a child, agencies considered them to be unsuitable because of the amount of time they spent on the road.

Meanwhile, Babe regained her amateur status and began a domination of golf in 1946, though she failed to achieve the 17 successive victories with which she is often attributed. As it happened, after 13 successive wins, she lost in the first round of the inaugural US Women's Open; from there, she took the US Women's Amateur and the British Women's Amateur.

Her appearance in Scotland, where she coasted to the title, brought rave notices in the media. "Unless I had been at Gullane and seen Mrs Zaharias play, I would not have believed it humanly possible for a woman to hit a golf ball so far as she did," wrote Enid Wilson in Golf Illustrated.

"The ground was thoroughly sodden and there was none of the run on the ball that we normally expect on a seaside course in June. The 16th hole at Gullane is 550 yards, the last 160 yards being uphill. I saw Mrs Zaharias reach that with a drive and an iron - the ball pitched on the back edge of the green and finished in the rough beyond."

On her arrival home in the US, Babe did a highland fling, in a kilt, down the gang-plank of the Queen Elizabeth into the arms of her husband. She then turned professional and became a key figure in the launch and early development of the LPGA Tour, gaining three victories in 1948, two in 1949 and six in 1950.

When she contracted cancer in 1953, her mental toughness didn't desert here. Indeed she fought a heroic battle against the disease and doggedly kept playing into 1955, when she won her last two tournaments, the Tampa Open and the Peach Blossom Classic. By that stage, her body was ravaged by the disease and, with George unable to cope, it was in the generous care of Betty Dodd that she died on September 27th, 1956.

As a superb sportswoman, Babe thrived on competition and was accustomed to winning. But the final battle against illness was beyond even her extraordinary talents.