Celebrating the one hundredth Anniversary of Gertrude Ederle and Her English Channel Crossing
Now that 2026 has arrived, we will embark on a year-long celebration of Gertrude Ederle, who turned the primary lady to cross the English Channel a century in the past.
100 years in the past, Gertrude Ederle turned the primary lady and sixth particular person to swim the English Channel. Her 1926 time of 14 hours and 39 minutes crushed the earlier pace report of 16 hours and 33 minutes. When Ederle returned to New York Metropolis, she loved a ticker-tape parade, celebrated by an estimated two million supporters on August 27, 1926. She was a media darling with nicknames of “Queen of the Waves” and “America’s greatest lady.”
Ederle broke a number of boundaries together with her swim. Previous to her achievement, girls have been usually not accepted in sport and positively not in endurance sports activities. She turned a media star for a few years. Ederle was deaf from childhood measles – and maybe one of many first well-known sporting heroes with a bodily incapacity. On the technical facet, she wore a revolutionary two-piece bathing swimsuit and personally designed wrap-around goggles, which have been saved watertight with molten candle wax. Lastly, she was born within the USA to a German immigrant butcher and her fame, so quickly after World Conflict I, served as a therapeutic second for each the nation and the world.
Ederle’s swimming journey, within the New York Metropolis space, benefited from a number of key initiatives within the sport. The Girls’s Swimming Affiliation was pretty new and sanctioned occasions allowed her succeed at an early age. Swimming had progressed from breaststroke to trudgen to the brand new freestyle. Her success began in 1917 at age 12, with the 880-yard freestyle. She turned the youngest world-record holder in swimming, and within the ensuing years, she set eight extra world data and held 29 U.S. nationwide and world data from 100 meters to 500 meters.
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Females have been allowed to swim within the Olympics beginning in 1912 in Stockholm. Ederle certified for the 1924 Paris Olympics and gained three medals: gold and a world report because the leadoff swimmer on the 400-meter freestyle relay; bronze within the 100-meter and 400-meter freestyle races. Johnny Weismuiller was the one swimmers to prime her three medals with 4 – together with one in water polo. The USA Olympic group loved its personal ticker-tape parade in New York Metropolis, two years earlier than Ederle had her personal.
Ederle determined to show skilled in 1925 earlier than her Channel swims, a standard resolution within the period of business sporting promotions. An early occasion was her 22-mile (35 km) swim from Battery Park (New York) to Sandy Hook in 7 hours and 11 minutes. This report time held for 81 years. That yr, the Girls’s Swimming Affiliation sponsored two girls, Ederle and Helen Wainwright, for English Channel makes an attempt. Ederle joined a choose group of swimmers and coaches on the Channel who have been planning and coaching. Her coach was Jabez Wolffe (Nice Britain) and her help crew was Ishak Helmy (Egypt) – each later inducted into the Worldwide Marathon Swimming Corridor of Fame. Jabez made no less than 22 unsuccessful English Channel makes an attempt between 1906 and 1913 and was the main skilled on the “waters” whereas Ishak, after a number of unsuccessful makes an attempt, lastly crossed in 1928.
Ederle’s first crossing try was on August 18, 1925. Within the curiosity of security, Wolffe was frightened about her situation and ordered Helmy to tug her out of the water in the course of the swim. Maybe the coach was proper to finish the swim or probably her listening to was a problem. There was additionally an accusation that she had been poisoned. In any occasion, Ederle vehemently disagreed with the choice to tug her out of the Channel.
She returned the following yr, in 1926, with totally different sponsors and coach/crew. This time, she accomplished the 21-mile (33 km) swim from France to England. Already well-known, the media consideration exploded.
Her fame led to a starring function in a film, “Swim Woman, Swim.” She competed, amongst a area of 53 females, within the 10-mile (16.1 km) 1928 Canadian Nationwide Exhibition. It was the most important race of the period in chilly, eel-infested waters. Ederle positioned sixth. Within the longer 15-mile (24 km) males’s race, not a single swimmer accomplished the robust course. As knowledgeable, Ederle exhibited her abilities in theatres, vaudeville circuits, and aquacades. Her final identified occasion was a cameo look at Billy Rose’s Aquacade on the New York World’s Honest in 1939.
Ederle, who by no means married, taught deaf kids throughout her post-swimming profession. Her affect on the game was acknowledged via induction into the inaugural courses of the Worldwide Marathon Swimming Corridor of Fame (1963) and Worldwide Swimming Corridor of Fame (1965). They proceed to immortalize her achievements. She handed away in 2004 on the age of 98 and there are a number of different reminders of her greatness:
The annual Ederle Swim in New York.
The Gertrude Ederle Recreation Middle in New York Metropolis.
A park and amphitheatre in Highlands, New Jersey, the place the Aquacade was held.
A New York Metropolis sidewalk marker on Broadway simply north of Beaver Road, on the left when touring south.
Kingsdown, England plaque within the pub, “Rising Solar.”
Two annual English Channel Awards: The Channel Swimming Affiliation World Report Two-Manner Swim; and the Channel Swimming & Piloting Federation – For essentially the most meritorious swim of the yr by a lady.
Gertrude Ederle additionally was the primary feminine to set an total pace report in a serious marathon. This paved the way in which for extra girls to perform the same feat:
Florence Chadwick and Tina Bischoff – English Channel.
Arianna Bridi – Capri to Naples.
Tamara Bruce – Rottnest Channel.
Karen Burton Reeder – Catalina Channel.
Grace “Gracie” van der Byl and Suzanne Heim-Bowen – a number of pace data.
Marcia Cleveland – Triple Crown.
Penny Lee Dean, EdD – English and Catalina Channels.
Ida Elionsky – Manhattan Island.
Brenda Fisher, BEM – Morecambe Bay
Irene van der Laan – Two-Manner English Channel
Michelle Macy – Oceans Seven
Judith de Nijs – Lac St. Jean
Shelley Taylor-Smith – Manhattan Island and Sydney to Wollongong
The game of marathon swimming has exploded prior to now 20 years. Hundreds of ladies who’ve accomplished marathon swims will take particular discover of 2026, the centennial anniversary of Gertrude Ederle’s report setting English Channel swim.
