There have been so many indelible moments in Mary Bea Porter-King’s golf life it is impossible to choose the most memorable.

Was it in 2011, when a junior golfer she mentored asked her innocently if she received the PGA’s First Lady of Golf Award because she was “the first lady to ever play golf?”

Or was it last year, when Hawaii State Junior Golf Association alum Michelle Hee Sue Condry wrote a note after accepting a job offer from KPMG Silicon Valley. Condry said signing the offer reminded her of five years earlier, when she signed a National Letter of Intent to play golf for the University of San Francisco.

“Both times, I couldn’t have done it without HSJGA,” Condry said. “HSJGA helped me develop necessary skills to succeed on and off the course. To all the parents of junior golfers: I know golf is expensive, but it truly is an investment for your child’s future.

“Because of golf, I was able to complete both my bachelor’s degree in finance and my MBA with a finance concentration, debt free. As a first-generation college student I wasn’t completely sure what an MBA was let alone thought I would obtain one.”

Or was it last week, when John Kihl, another HSJGA alum, wrote Porter-King to tell her he was heading to Harvard Business School.

“Over the past few months I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on my experiences and think about how I’d like to grow as a leader,” Kihl wrote. “The values instilled in me as a junior golfer at HSJGA continue to inform who I am today and will serve as a strong foundation going forward.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done to promote the HSJGA and golf’s values. I am a grateful beneficiary of the organization’s mission and generosity.”

There are many, many other memories dating back long before Porter-King helped found the HSJGA 20 years ago. But now, nearly 300 Hawaii kids have received college golf scholarships largely because of it. The HSJGA has also awarded 18 of its own scholarships the past three years.

Parker McLachlin, who played for UCLA and won on the PGA Tour, knows precisely why Porter-King, Norman Asao, Merv Kotake and Greg Nichols founded the HSJGA the year after he graduated from Punahou.

“Mary Bea has told me part of her idea to unite the junior golf scene came from watching Anna (Umemura) and I struggle to put together a hodgepodge schedule to try and compete and attract college coaches,” McLachlin recalls.

Now coaches come here to find players. Next weekend’s Michelle Wie Tournament of Champions at Wailea Emerald closes the 2017 HSJGA schedule. It had some 30 qualifiers, tournaments and national and international events.

When Porter-King married Charlie King and moved to Kauai in the late 1980s, there was nothing close.

“When I took the temperature of junior golf in Hawaii, I felt our kids needed more opportunities,” she recalls. “I grew up in Southern California and we played two or three tournaments a week. Our kids were playing three tournaments a year.

“I felt for us to be able to compete with our counterparts on the mainland we needed more opportunities. We had to figure out creative ways to do that that didn’t cost an arm and a leg.”

The focus has become to help create kids of character with the confidence to achieve their dreams, then help them fulfill their golf potential, whether it is to play for fun, earn a college scholarship and/or play professionally. And, bottom line, out here in Hawaii’s isolation, make it possible for them to achieve those goals without breaking the family bank.

It has been complicated, but with Porter-King as president since the second year (the late Dennis Rose was the first president), along with a vast group of loyal supporters, it has happened.

“I’m not doing it to create professional golfers,” says Porter-King. “It’s just the opportunity to get a better education and bring that education back to Hawaii and make it a better place.

“The nice part is to see that our successes through the years are not just the Michelle Wies and Tadd Fujikawas, but the Dr. Miki Ueokas and Alex Chings.”

And Hee Sue Condrys and John Kihls and John Odas and the thousands of kids who came through HSJGA — often getting penalized by Porter-King for rules, dress-code or time violations along the way — and have come out so much better off.

Porter-King has inspired a huge number of supporters, but it took her unique background to bring it together.

She is in the Arizona State and Southern California Golf Association Halls of Fame.

Two moments stand out in her 25 years on the LPGA Tour — her lone victory, in 1975, and that day in 1988 when she hit an errant shot over a fence. Porter went into that backyard and found a little boy at the bottom of the swimming pool. She saved his life.

That boy — Jonathan Smucker — and his wife were there in 2011 when she received her First Lady of Golf honor. The Metropolitan Golf Writers Association also created the Mary Bea Porter Humanitarian Award after her heroic act.

She served on the USGA Executive Committee from 2001 to 2006, the PGA of America’s Board of Directors from 2006 to 2009 and was a member of both the USGA and PGA Rules Committees. She has officiated more than 80 national championships.

It is all immensely important to her, but Hawaii’s kids have touched her like nothing else.

“I can’t believe it’s been 20 years,” she says. “I look back at all the young people who have come through the program and what they are doing now.

“Every year at the TOC I hear them speak about what they have learned through golf and playing in the HSJGA and being on teams and competing for Hawaii.

“That, to me, is why I do what I do. I get the biggest kicks watching my little kids going to the 18th green and taking their hats off and shaking hands. I’m a sucker for that.”

Then she adds, “This is my time to give back. Golf has given me more than I could ever repay.”

That feeling has become mutual over the past 20 years.

“Mary Bea is one of the most unselfish people I have ever met in my life,” says golf broadcaster Mark Rolfing, the HSJGA vice president. “She also loves the game dearly. From the beginning, the HSJGA provided the perfect initiative for her to make a difference, by not only giving back, but also investing in the future of golf, the kids.”

For that, especially this week, we are thankful.

“It’s astonishing how many lives she has made better through the game of golf,” McLachlin says. “And, at the end of the day, isn’t that what should be at the top of all our résumés?”