Holm, Eleanor G.
Swimming
b. Dec. 6, 1913, New York, NY
The original glamor girl of swimming, Holm once turned down a chance to join the Ziegfeld Follies in order to continue competing. She won her first national championship in 1927, when she was thirteen, her last in 1936.
Holm was the AAU national outdoor 300-meter individual medley champion from 1927 through 1930 and the 220-yard backstroke champion from 1929 through 1933. She won the indoor 100-yard backstroke title from 1930 through 1932 and from 1934 through 1936 and was the indoor 300-yard individual medley champion from 1928 through 1932.
A member of the U. S. Olympic team in 1928, when she finished fifth in the 100-meter backstroke, Holm won a gold medal in the event in 1932. She was also selected for the 1936 team, but was suspended after being found, according to the team doctor, "in a deep slumber which approached a state of coma" after an all-night drinking party.
Holm was involved in show business beginning in 1932, when she signed an acting contract with Warner Brothers. The following year, she married musician Art Jarrett, a fellow alumnus of Brooklyn's Erasmus Hall High School, and sang with his band. In 1938, she played Jane in the movie Tarzan's Revenge, with Olympic decathlon gold medalist Glenn Morris as Tarzan.
After divorcing Jarrett, she starred in Billy Rose's Aquacade and she married Rose in 1939. They were divorced in 1954 after a messy court battle, called the "War of the Roses" by the press. Holm later worked as an interior decorator and retired to Miami Beach.