Myrtle Cook

Competitor for 🇨🇦 Canada



Myrtle Alice Cook (also competed as Myrtle McGowan) (January 5, 1902 –March 18, 1985) was a Canadian athlete who won the gold medal in the women's 4 x 100 metres at the 1928 Summer Olympics.

Career
Born in Toronto, Ontario, she competed for Canada at the 1928 Summer Olympics held in Amsterdam, Netherlands where she won the gold medal in the women's 4 x 100 metres with her team mates Fanny Rosenfeld (also 100 m silver medallist), Ethel Smith (100 m bronze medallist) and Jane Bell.

In 1929, Cook began a career writing for the Montreal Star, where she contributed the column "In the Women's Spotlight" for the next 40 years.

Cook was involved in ice hockey and served as president of the Dominion Women's Amateur Hockey Association prior to 1937.

Cook equalled Betty Robinson's Women's 100m World Record on August 1, 1931.

Cook contributed significantly to women's sports in Canada, helping to establish the Toronto Ladies Athletic Club, serving as director of athletics for the Canadian Ladies Athletic Club, and founding a branch of that club in Montreal. During the Second World War, she was active in fundraising and assisted in training military recruits. She died in Elora, Ontario on March 18, 1985.