Miss Gertrude Ederle (with Burgess & Helmi)

Miss Gertrude Ederle (with Burgess & Helmi)

Gertrude Ederle at a Dover hotel after her successful swim, previous Channel swimmers Burgess on left and Helmi on right. Also pilot Joe Costa and her sister Margaret. Outside the Granville Gardens Pavilion, Camden Crescent reflected in glass.

Gertrude was the first woman to swim the English Channel, on the 6th of August 1926, in a new record time of 14hrs 39mins. She was the first person to swim front crawl.

She had one unsuccessful swim in 1925 on August 18th. She swam for 8 hours 50mins She was trained by Jabez Wolffe and swam Breast stroke on her first swim. On her successful swim she wore a two piece costume and used an eight leg beat crawl. She was one of six children. She held world records for 300yds. 500yds, 880yds, 400m.440m, 500m. She played herself in the film Swim girl Swim.

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