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Article: The swimmers' Everest.(Editorials)(First woman to swim English Channel dead at 98)(Editorial)
- Article from:
- The Register Guard (Eugene, OR)
- Article date:
- December 2, 2003
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 The Register Guard. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: The Register-Guard
It's not likely that many Americans remember Gertrude Ederle, who became an international celebrity of the 1920s as the first woman to swim the English Channel. She performed her feat in rugged seas in August of 1926, and made the swim in a record time of 14 hours and 39 minutes - besting the records of five men who had made the 35-mile crossing between 1875 and 1923.
Ederle, who had chosen to remain out of the limelight for years, died Sunday, two years shy of her 100th birthday, in a New Jersey nursing home.
At the time, swimming the English Channel was a nearly unattainable athletic feat, akin to climbing Mount ...