Career
The American relay team set a new world record of 5:11.6 in the event final. She was born in Waterford, New New York She started swimming to help recover from polio, which she contracted in 1917.
In 1919, she was arrested for "nude swimming" — she removed her stockings at a pool where it was forbidden to bare "the lower female extremities for public bathing." The subsequent public support for Bleibtrey led to the abandonment of stockings as a conventional element in women"s swimwear.
Bleibtrey was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame as an "Honor Swimmer" in 1967. She died in West Palm Beach, Florida in 1978.