When finally, after gaps where courses lacked history or any sense of awe, women were extended the chance to play their national golf championship on our most treasured stage, a sun-splashed Pebble Beach Golf Links greeted them with all its glory.

The women deserved nothing less, of course, and good cheer to all.

But what the Golf Gods also provided was a U.S. Women’s Open ending that was saturated in symmetry, one that served as a testament to the utter wonder of this game. Everything about the 25-year-old winner, Allisen Corpuz was fun to watch – her composure, her focus, her engaging smile.

Yet, there was more. What put a bow around the 78th U.S. Women’s Open was the presence of the woman who had helped ease Corpuz into golf some 18 years earlier.

That Mary Bea Porter-King was at Pebble Beach was no surprise; she is a heralded rules official who has worked a long line of national championships. That she was there to greet Corpuz just off the 72nd hole was several levels above surreal.

“I can’t say I totally believed she could win,” said Porter-King. “But the more I watched her play, the more I felt like Ben Crenshaw wagging that finger . . . I have a feeling.”

When on the par-3 fifth hole in Sunday’s final round Porter-King was called in to give a ruling to Corpuz, “I saw the look in her face. She was calm. I left there thinking, ‘She could do this.’ ”

She did, too, thanks to a 3-under stretch over the first seven holes of her back nine that paved the way to a closing 69 to finish at 9-under, three clear of her nearest challenger. Now you could focus on it being Corpuz’s first LPGA victory and for many that is the starting point to the story.

Ah, but not for Porter-King, whose starting point is 1989 when she moved to Hawaii after calling it quits to her life on the LPGA. She did not call quits on golf, however. Quite the opposite, she jumped head first into founding and running the Hawaii State Junior Golf Association.

You want hurdles? Start with this. “We’re about 2,500 miles to the first land mass,” said Porter-King. “We’re 100 to 400 miles between the four Hawaiian islands (with notable populations – Oahu, Maui, Hawaii, and Kauai). So, yes, we have challenges.”

But guess what? Porter-King is a force of nature when it comes to her passion for golf and the more she got young boys and girls to sign up, the more relentless she became.

“She’s an institution. She’s trying to show young kids that there is a great value to golf. It brings you joy. It provides exposures that help you with what lies ahead in life,” said Olin Browne, three-time PGA Tour winner.

“There’s a progression line and a timetable with golf,” said Browne. “Unfortunately we live in a world of immediacy and golf is long-term.”

That is the glory of Porter-King, suggested Browne. She sold the kids on a commitment and to use golf as a compass to get direction in life. While the Hawaiian islands are a huge destination point for tens of millions of travelers, Porter-King advocated to her junior golfers that they widen their horizons and find their destinations.

It took much more work for young boys and girls in Hawaii to get to USGA championships and other qualifiers, but they did it with uncanny success and the credit must be shared by so many golfers and so many parents.

But let’s fall in line to start dishing out the massive respect for the person who got it all going. Mary Bea Porter-King.

Against wide challenges to get from Oahu to Maui or Hawaii to Kauai, let alone those times when Hawaii kids qualified for USGA championships in the mainland, Mary Bea Porter-King stood tall and never wavered. Never did mom and dad have the option of pouring their young golfer into the family SUV and driving hundreds of miles down I-95 or across I-70.

No, the task in Hawaii demanded resiliency, commitment, passion, and, above all, a captivated audience. Check all the boxes and understand this about Mary Bea Porter-King: She contributes endlessly to make golf a better game and we should be in awe of her.

When she arrived at Pebble Beach, Porter-King was thrilled to see that four golfers who came through the HSJGA were in the field – Corpuz, who played at Southern California; Allysha Mae Mateo, who played at Brigham Young University; Marissa Chow, who played at Pepperdine; and the iconic Michelle Wie, who played at Stanford and at 33 had announced that her 18th U.S. Women’s Open would be her final one.

“I couldn’t be more proud to see the four of them,” said Porter-King.

That it often gets overlooked how Wie won the 2014 U.S. Women’s Open or that another HSJGA player, Kimberly Kim, won the U.S. Women’s Amateur in 2006, doesn’t faze Porter-King.

She knows how a line of young girls from Hawaii took advantage of what was offered to them and fared well in the game. Stephanie Kono, Lehua Wise, Cassy Isagawa, Mari Chun, Ayaka Kaneko, and Dr. Miki Ueoka are just a sampling. All went to college, some gave the pro game a try, none of them forget how Porter-King poured her heart into their efforts.

In another time and another tournament setting, Porter-King and Corpuz were focused on the annual Hawaii-Japan Junior Match. When the youngest player on Team Hawaii, 11-year-old Corpuz, rose to the challenge late in Day 1 to post a 2 and 1 victory, Porter-King had an inkling that this then-sixth-grader was something special.

Fourteen years later, Corpuz proved it yet again, this time in the grandest stadium the women’s game has ever seen. Rightfully so, bottles were popped and Corpuz was showered in a celebratory manner.

Gloriously, Porter-King felt she had been given yet another gift by golf. She savored the emotional scene and kept thinking how this game has blessed her.

“That is why, no matter how much I give to the game,” said Porter-King, who gives selflessly and massively, “I will never be able to repay golf for what it has given me.”