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If it made any pretense at listing all the pastimes at
which Miss Didrikson is about as expert as anyone of her sex, it would
have to include weightlifting, wrestling, fencing, croquet, field
hockey, soccer, polo, shooting, rowing, skating, bowling, pool,
lacrosse, cooking. She holds the women's world record for throwing a
baseball. She got her first newspaper publicity when, in a Dallas
store "One look at its trim beauty and you know it has
class." two years ago, she hoisted a 50-lb. weight over head. A
physical freak in her ability to co-ordinate her actions with her eye,
Miss Didrikson is not freakish in appearance. Now 19, she weighs 126
lb., has slim hard wrists and ankles, long spatulate hands. No one
person is greatly responsible for her proficiency in heterogeneous
sports. Her manager and coach, Melvin J. McCombs, is director of
athletics for Dallas Employers' Casualty Co. Her father. Ole Didrikson,
is Scandinavian, a onetime sailor. Beyond a tendency to use explicit
language and to despise small girls who play with dolls, Wonder Girl
Didrikson's demeanor during intervals between her physical exertions is
not unfeminine. She likes to cook, dance, sew. Last year she
constructed for herself a box-plaited dress. It won first prize at the
Texas State Fair.
