Portrait of Mary Peters (athlete)

Birthday profile

Mary Peters (athlete)

Mary Peters, English-Irish pentathlete and shot putter

Born
July 6, 1939
Age in 2026
87
Zodiac sign
Cancer
Birth year
1939

About Mary Peters (athlete)

Lady Mary Elizabeth Peters is a Northern Irish former athlete and athletics administrator. She is best known as the 1972 Olympic champion in the pentathlon, for which she won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award. Peters was named as Lady Companion of the Order of the Garter on 27 February 2019. She was installed in St. George's Chapel, the chapel of the Order, on Garter Day, 17 June. After her victory, a death threat was phoned into the BBC by a man with an Irish accent: "Mary Peters is a Protestant and has won a medal for Britain. In the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Peters competing for Great Britain and Northern Ireland and won the gold medal in the women's pentathlon.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Mary Peters (athlete) timeline

  1. She is best known as the 1972 Olympic champion in the pentathlon, for which she won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award.
  2. In the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Peters competing for Great Britain and Northern Ireland and won the gold medal in the women's pentathlon.
  3. Peters was named as Lady Companion of the Order of the Garter on 27 February 2019.

The world when Mary Peters (athlete) was born

Mary Peters (athlete) was born in 1939. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1939

  • #1 song"Over the Rainbow" – Judy Garland
  • Top movieGone with the Wind
  • Best-selling bookThe Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentLou Gehrig delivers his "Luckiest Man" farewell speech
  • Top headlineGermany invades Poland — World War II begins
  • Technology milestoneFirst regular television broadcasts in the US (NBC)
  • Defining fadThe Wizard of Oz mania
  • Notable inventionNylon stockings
  • World population2.30 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderFranklin D. Roosevelt
  • Sports championNew York Yankees (World Series)
  • U.S. population130.9M

1939 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Mary Peters (athlete)'s birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19392026
Gas$0.19$3.45/gal
Average home$5,200$435,000
Average income$2,900$67,500
Minimum wage$0.30$7.25/hr (federal)
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.03$0.73
Population130.9M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, International Olympic Committee, Olympedia. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.