Ethel Catherwood

Ethel Catherwood ( born April 28, 1908 Hannah, North Dakota, † September 26, 1987 in Grass Valley, nicknamed The Saskatoon Lily ) was a Canadian athlete. At the Olympic Games in Amsterdam in 1928 she became the first Olympic champion in the high jump of the women.

Catherwood moved in 1925 with her family from the province of Ontario to Saskatoon. There she attended the Bedford Road School, where she was able to train. Athletic made ​​it for the first time in 1926 attracted attention when she equaled the Canadian national record in the high jump during the athletics competition in her hometown. On September 6, 1926, she improved to a month earlier established a world record of British Phyllis Green by three centimeters to 1.58 meters. A year later, she lost the record of the South African Marjorie Clark, but could on July 2, 1928 at the Canadian Championships in Halifax equalize with skipped 1.60 m Clarks record.

Your athletic achievements made ​​the philanthropist Teddy Oke from Toronto attentive, who took over the cost of their training. Along with her coach Joe Griffiths decided Catherwood, 1928 to participate in the Summer Olympics in Amsterdam, to which women were admitted to the athletics competitions for the first time. In cold, windy weather, Catherwood won against their rivals and won with 1,595 m gold medal in front of the Dutch Lien Gisolf and the US-American Mildred Wiley. Catherwood is to date the only female Canadian athlete who was able to win a gold medal in an individual competition.

Upon her return to Canada she was, not least because of their beauty much described a movie contract offered. However Catherwood embarked on a career as a business woman and later moved to California.