St. Cloud golfer Bernadette 'Bernie' Brown reflects on the 50th anniversary of Title IX

Bismarck, the capital city of North Dakota, got that eponym in 1873 from the German conservative statesman Otto von Bismarck (1815-98). Bismarck earned the sobriquet “Iron Chancellor” after 1871 when he unified all 39 of the independent Prussian states into what is today’s modern Germany.

Prior to North Dakota becoming a state in 1889, Bismarck was a railroad town started by the Northern Pacific Railway, and to cajole German immigrants to settle there, the name of the "Stadt" or town, was changed from Edwinton in 1872 to Bismarck a year later.

Out of this German occupied melting pot, St. Cloud’s Bernadette "Bernie" Brown was born to outlier French/Irish parents in December 1946. Brown’s father worked for the Soo Line Railroad and her golf odyssey started after a tragic railroad crash. At age 41, Brown’s mother was widowed when her 57-year old husband was killed in 1952 in Washburn, North Dakota, after the train he was the chief engineer on skidded off washed out railroad tracks. He was scalded from the steam engine and died three days later on Good Friday.

That accident left Brown’s widowed mother with seven children ages 3 to 14 impoverished. To keep the kids busy and “out of trouble” her now single mother, who loved all sports and especially excelled at high school basketball in the 1920s, encouraged the kids to play golf at the municipal golf course in Bismarck. Brown fell in love with golf and was the only girl who golfed at the course and she learned to play competitively in high school while on the boys’ team.

As Brown recalled, “I was allowed to attend two boys’ tournaments. Unfortunately, I wasn’t allowed to compete in the first one since the coaches said I was not a boy; in the second event, the coaches allowed me to play but my score couldn’t count.”

In 1960, 12 years before Title IX came into effect, the progressive North Dakota High School League started a state tournament for girls; it was played 135 miles east in Valley City. Brown captured the event as a sophomore in 1962 and won again as a high school senior in 1964.

She recalled both state tournaments fondly, “My mother took me to the state and to save money we slept in a tent under a large train bridge near the golf course. My mother was a selfless and loving parent who would do anything for her kids.”

After her superb play, colleges were recruiting her and she was offered a scholarship at Arizona State University in Tempe; she had to decline since the stipend was too little for a family with financial challenges.

Leaving North Dakota after marriage and three children, Bernie and her husband Jack moved to St. Cloud in 1971 when he accepted a job as a clinical psychologist at the Veterans Hospital. Brown continued college at St. Cloud State and received an undergraduate degree in counseling psychology in 1977 and a year later added a master’s degree in the same field.

She spent 25 years in school administration at area schools with the last nine years at St. Cloud Cathedral where she coached the girls’ golf team. Prior to that, she spent three years as women’s golf coach at the College of Saint Benedict in St. Joseph.

This year is the 50th anniversary of the passage of Title IX which stated, “no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”

Brown was elated when Title IX was passed in 1972 so that girls and women were finally given the opportunity to participate. As she concluded, “let’s celebrate and give thanks to 50 years of Title IX. Girls now have equal opportunities to showcase their athletic skills.”

Golf notes

Brown has won 10 club championships at Wapicada GC in Sauk Rapids and recently won the Wapicada senior women’s championship. She was medalist in two MWGA senior golf championships.

Her current handicap is 6.9. She has scored six aces in her illustrious career. She felt a desire to give back to the game of golf as she served on the Minnesota Golf Association (MGA) as a director for nine years.

She and her husband Jack have been married 56 years. That union produced three children. A boy and a girl have become lawyers and a girl is a teacher. She has taught her five grandchildren to play and love golf.

While her husband is a non-golfer, he has been a devoted husband and a big booster of her golf career. He has dutifully been her caddy when she played prestigious courses at St. Andrews in Scotland, Ballybunion in Ireland and at iconic courses in the United States such as Pebble Beach in California and Doral in Florida.

— This is the opinion of Times golf columnist John Lieser. Contact him at Jgl1943@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on St. Cloud Times: St. Cloud golfer Bernadette Brown reflects on 50 years of Title IX