Young Woman and the Sea: How Trudy Ederle Conquered the English Channel and Inspired the World (36 page)

Pegler, who at the time was writing for the
Chicago Tribune
and just beginning to gain a national reputation, later aptly dubbed the 1920s the "Era of Wonderful Nonsense." Although he appreciated athletes such as Trudy, he looked disdainfully at stunts like flagpole sitting and dance marathons and couldn't understand their attraction. His acerbic, somewhat jaundiced, world-weary view would one day make him one of the most famous American journalists of his era. A muckraking columnist who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1941 for an exposé of racketeering in Hollywood labor unions—the first columnist ever to win the award—Pegler finished third in reader nominations as
Time's
1941 Man of the Year, behind President Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin. After World War II Pegler grew increasingly vindictive, and, particularly after Julia's death from heart disease in 1955, he became consumed by his own vitriol and personal prejudices. In his later years Pegler, who had been an early critic of Hitler and Mussolini, became an anti-Semite who eventually ended his career writing for
American Opinion,
an organ of the uberconservative John Birch Society. Yet when he met Harpman (who, ironically enough, was Jewish) during the Elwell investigation he had not yet become the jaded and embittered journalist of his later years—it was love at first sight and the two married in 1922. Pegler was a
Tribune
sports columnist at the time and was soon named the paper's East Coast sports editor.

Harpman may not have quite been Pegler's equal as a journalist, but in an era in which few women earned bylines in the daily press, Harpman was one of the best, a dogged reporter who knew how to tell a story and turn a phrase—her review of the Louise Brooks film
American Venus
included the memorable line, "has small plot—also few clothes." By 1926, Hartman, not unlike the Rosalind Russell character in the classic newsroom comedy
His Girl Friday
whom she vaguely resembled, was ready to put her writing career on hold for her husband. When Patterson asked her to accompany Trudy and ghostwrite her accounts of the swim, she agreed only because of the understanding that it would be her final journalism assignment—and that Pegler could accompany her on the trip. Although he wasn't assigned to cover Ederle's Channel attempt per se, Pegler was still a journalist, and he knew a good story when he encountered one. His periodic dispatches from Cape Gris-Nez would prove to be revealing.

For Trudy, everything was now in place. While her second assault of the English Channel would cost more than her compensation from the syndicate, if need be Henry Ederle could afford to make up the difference. Besides, in the previous year Trudy's eyes—and, more acutely, her father's—had been opened to the potential financial windfall that being the first woman to cross the English Channel could deliver. If Helen Wainwright, a mere Olympian, could earn five figures endorsing cigarettes, what would the first woman to swim the English Channel be worth?

The Ederles were not alone in making that kind of calculation. Joseph Corthes, described as the "magnate who cornered the seagoing tugs of Boulogne" and the "czar of Channel swimming" told a reporter, "I look for the busiest season in history." He was right, for a record number of swimmers of both sexes were making plans to spend the summer in the Channel, and in the case of the women, they were not doing so for their health. On the opposite shore they expected to find the proverbial pot of gold. In addition to Trudy and Lillian Cannon, Jeanne Sion and Lillian Harrison were likely to take on the Channel once more and were expected to be joined by Clarabelle Barrett of the United States, who had originally competed as a member of the WSA, Eva Morrison of Nova Scotia and Boston, Mille Gade Corson, Suzanne Wurtz of France, Mercedes Gleitze of England, and a host of lesser-known swimmers of little credibility.

Things were just as busy in the men's camp. Helmi was planning to return, and he was likely to be joined by several American men—Norman Ross of Detroit and Dick Howell of Northwestern University—Omer Perrault of Canada, Georges Michel and Georges Polley of France, and Colonel Freyburg. As summer wore on others were certain to enter the surf. Corthes, who had witnessed Trudy's attempt in 1925, gave her the best chance of the bunch and said, "Followers of the sport expect to see Miss Ederle cross successfully this summer ... She knows something about the coldness of the water and the treachery of the tides."

If Trudy was looking for a portent for her second attempt to swim the English Channel, as she made her way to the pier with her father and sister to board the
Berengaria
en route to Cherbourg, the sun shone bright and warm and the waters of the Hudson River were a dazzling blue. Before the boat even left the dock Trudy already felt better and far more confident than she had one year before.

This time, she would be in control, staying where she wanted, training with Burgess, and with her father and sister Meg, whom Trudy referred to as her "rock" and "inspiration," for support and company. As Trudy posed for pictures on the deck of the ship, receiving a kiss goodbye from friends like Aileen Riggin and from her mother, she absolutely glowed, resplendent in her serge suit, clutching a bouquet of flowers, a smart cloche hat perched on her head, and a rare extravagance, a fox stole wrapped around her neck.

The ship left the dock at 11:00
A.M.
and steamed out of New York Harbor under near-perfect conditions. Even the trip aboard the
Berengaria
was an improvement on Trudy's journey a year before. Her name led the passenger manifest published in the New York papers, ahead of such luminaries as Mrs. Zane Gray, wife of the author and adventurer, Prince and Princess Basil Mirski of Russia, and Vicome-tress dejonghe of Belgium. As soon as the
Berengaria
left the dock the crew of the British-based liner distributed champagne, something not widely available in the United States during Prohibition, lending a festive air to the journey. Although Trudy did not drink she was treated as a celebrity as she and her father and sister received the best of everything from the boat's crew.

There were no demands on Trudy's time during the six-day journey to France. She did her best to stay in shape, walking the deck, knocking golf balls into the North Atlantic, swimming in the ship's pool, even giving swimming demonstrations and posing for pictures boxing with the ship's athletic director. She spent much of her time with Meg and with Harpman, getting to know her ghostwriter.

Harpman liked her young subject. She found Trudy full of personality, even if she was a bit shy at the outset and it took a bit of effort to become accustomed to talking with her. Like others who spent much time in Trudy's company, from the volume of her voice Harpman couldn't help but notice that Trudy's hearing was deteriorating, but in every other way she was a typical young woman of the era. Although Trudy was no flapper, she used the latest slang, was fashion conscious to a fault, and together with her sister Meg practiced all the latest dances. She could be a bit moody, and her moods often depended on her superstitions, which were many. Trudy disliked the number thirteen and much preferred the color red. Most of her bathing caps and hats and dresses were, in fact, red, and her father promised her a red roadster if she successfully crossed the Channel, a prize she chattered about constantly. She believed it was good fortune to see the new moon over the right shoulder and that after one spilled salt it had to be thrown over the left shoulder or else it was certain to cause a quarrel.

Good luck was indicated by broken glassware and rain, as Trudy accurately told Harpman, "Whenever I entered a swimming competition on a rainy day, I won." But as Harpman got to know Trudy even better, another characteristic stood out.

Trudy, wrote Harpman later, "seems to withdraw herself from the world and drift into some personal sphere," particularly when she was in the water, swimming. Harpman assumed that it was because of her deafness, but as Harpman spent more time in Trudy's company she found it astounding that Trudy could swim for hours without ever stopping, not saying a word, apparently oblivious to everything else.

Harpman was an acute observer. Trudy did, in fact, "withdraw from the world" in the water, but it was not so much an escape from the world as a journey to another place. In the water, Trudy truly felt completely at peace. As she herself later said, when swimming she always felt that she could go "on and on ... when we're in the water, we're not in this world." In a sense, she had developed a real relationship with the water, once saying about swimming in the open ocean, "To me, the sea is like a person—like a child that I've known a long time. It sounds crazy, I know, but when I swim in the sea I talk to it. I never feel alone when I'm out there."

Together, Trudy and Harpman produced the first few of what would eventually be several dozen dispatches recounting her quest to swim the Channel. They hardly qualified as literature—the WSA had taught Trudy well and she generally measured her words. Trudy was not drawn to hyperbole and rarely spoke in terms that were anything but modest—even if she had, Harpman knew her job was to present Trudy to the her readers as a subject worthy of their interest and sympathy. As Trudy "wrote" in one early dispatch, "I am determined to swim the Channel. I want to do so more than anything in the world. I hope I will swim across this time and I feel that I am going to do it." Still, Harpman occasionally managed to write some more lively copy. In one ghostwritten dispatch Trudy wrote, "Every day is Christmas afloat," and went on to describe in copious detail her diet aboard the vessel, which consisted of eating as many as five meals a day. She weighed 149 pounds upon her departure and intended to gain at least an additional ten pounds to protect her from the cold water, writing, "Some trainers probably would have hysterics seeing the amount of food I consume ... Most girls fear gaining an ounce worse than they do a mouse; but I'm not worrying about my figure."

The ship reached Cherbourg on June 8, and the Channel welcomed Trudy as if reminding her she wasn't in the Highlands anymore. The sea was choppy and rough and the sky hung low, the color of a mollusk. It wasn't chilly—it was cold, and Trudy and her entourage immediately boarded a train to Paris, where they stayed for a day before taking another train to Cape Gris-Nez.

Unlike her previous attempt, this time Trudy would spend all her time in France, at Gris-Nez. Her father had booked several rooms in the rustic, almost primitive Hotel du Phare—the Hotel of the Lighthouse—under the shadow of Cape Gris-Nez.

The headland—Cape Gray Nose—topped by a lighthouse built in 1837, dominated the landscape, and the name belied the Channel itself, for on dank gray days the headland, indeed, vaguely resembled a gray nose sitting just above the waterline sniffing the salt air. Although today the area is primarily a tourist destination due to its raw natural beauty, when Trudy first visited Cape Gris-Nez it was known more for its desolation and poverty. The cape and the small village tucked in its shadow to the east barely drew enough visitors to keep the two hotels in business, and peasants who lived in the few dozen homes scattered along the main road up from the beach eked out a meager existence, primarily from farming. Residents regularly scavenged the cape itself for goods that washed ashore from shipwrecks, and abandoned gun batteries dating from the Great War dotted the headlands. A generation before it was not unknown for the local peasants to be seen gathering seaweed, which they used as fertilizer during times of plenty and sometimes consumed during tougher times. Although nearby towns and villages along the shore supported a vibrant commercial fishery, only a few fishermen were based in and around Cape Gris-Nez itself. The waters were rough, and the rock-strewn shores of the cape lacked a safe harbor suitable for large vessels.

Still, the area's rough beauty held a certain exotic charm. Julia Harpman was absolutely captivated, waxing rhapsodic over the "cluster of stone houses, all neatly whitewashed," some with thatched roofs, and the "gardens which are dark with undergrowth and dotted with beds of beautiful flowers."

Accommodations at the hotel, which was situated almost a mile from the beach on the road that ran to the sea from the village, were Spartan at best. The three-story stone and stucco building didn't have electricity, but Trudy was pleased to note in her initial dispatch from Cape Gris-Nez that Monsieur Blondeau, the proprietor, "had acquired modern ideas since last year. The Hotel now has a wash basin and plumbing in each room and a community bath tub," all improvements designed to accommodate the growing number of Channel aspirants coming to Gris-Nez each summer. Unfortunately, these items, as yet, were for show only—none of the plumbing was connected to a water source.

Under Burgess's direction, Trudy began training on June 11 with a brief swim to reacquaint herself with Channel waters. But all was not well between Trudy and her trainer.

Even before leaving New York, Trudy had heard that Burgess was training another swimmer, Lillian Cannon. Cannon had told her as much when Trudy, as a courtesy, saw her off when she had left New York for France in mid-May. That nugget of information left Trudy "greatly surprised," and over the next few weeks press reports had confirmed that it was true.

Immediately upon arriving in Cape Gris-Nez, Trudy and her father confronted Burgess. He was not only under contract for ten thousand francs, but months before he had been sent a retainer to train Trudy and Trudy alone.

Burgess reacted sheepishly. When he had signed the contract to train Trudy he had not foreseen that the summer of 1926 would be the busiest Channel season yet, and with all the questions surrounding Wolffe after Trudy's swim, other swimmers were steering clear of the Scotsman, making Burgess everyone's first choice. When Lillian Cannon, flush with cash from her newspaper deal, had contacted him, he had been unable to resist either her charms or her checkbook. Reluctantly, he admitted to the Ederles that he had also agreed to train Cannon, and tried to convince them there was little harm in that.