Never Too Late.

America's greatest woman bowler in the 1930s was thirty-five before she even bowled her first game in 1923 — but Colorado's Floretta Doty McCutcheon kept getting better and better at it. By 1927 she was beginning to secure her reputation with a series of high-scoring games and exhibitions, and on 18 December she defeated world champion Jimmy Smith in a challenge match, making sports headlines across the country. When she went on tour for the Brunswick Corporation a year later, she was already something of a legend. She told women that they could begin bowling at almost any age and in any physical shape.

Role Model.

Throughout the 1930s she continued to bowl professionally; she also gave free lessons at bowling alleys across the country and through the Mrs. McCutcheon School of Bowling, sponsored by local newspapers. She toured from 1930 until her...