Meyer was born Constance Cycil Ralph in
St Martin's,
England on 17 September 1882, to Charles A. Ralph and Theresa Davies. Her family moved to
Portland, Oregon during her childhood and she found employment at a box factory in her late teens. On 18 September 1900, she married William N. Meyer at Forbes
Presbyterian Church in Portland. The couple had two children, Charles F. Meyer and William R. Meyer. Meyer first learned how to swim at the Portland
YWCA in 1912. She joined the diving and swimming program at the
Multnomah Athletic Club in 1913 under the instruction of
Jack Cody. In June 1913, she took first place in a 50-yard swim meet. The first competitive diving event Meyer competed in occurred on 23 August 1913, at a swimming meet at Peninsula Park. She took first place in the women's senior diving open, which was open to entrants 16 years and older. In March 1915, Meyer joined a fledgling women's
ice hockey team in Portland. The Multnomah Athletic Club was invited to send competitors to the
Amateur Athletic Union Diving and Swimming Championships in 1915, which were being held in conjunction with the
Panama–Pacific International Exposition in
San Francisco,
California. Meyer was one of three competitors that represented Multnomah. Meyer won the AAU title by default on 19 July 1915, since there were no other entries. Following her AAU title victory, crowds would gather to watch Meyer practice. In January 1916, Meyer rejoined the Portland women's hockey team and served as
team captain. Meyer took up
tennis for the first time in June 1916. That month, she was the runner-up in a Multnomah Athletic Club tennis tournament. Meyer went to the
Los Angeles Athletic Club in
Los Angeles, California to defend her AAU diving title on 29 June 1916. She had just five days notice before the event and was originally scheduled to play a tennis match in
St. Helens, Oregon on the date of the AAU meet. Meyer placed second, with a score of 351 points, to Los Angeles diver
Aileen Allen, who scored 370 points. Meyer petitioned the AAU to strip Allen of the title on the grounds she performed at
Vaudeville shows and should be considered a professional athlete, but the AAU took no action. Meyer performed in several diving exhibitions in 1916 including the
Astoria Regatta, the
Happy Canyon Round-Up in
Pendleton, Oregon and
Frontier Days in
Walla Walla, Washington. During the Multnomah Athletic Club's Christmas Day swim in 1916, Meyer was scheduled to dive from the
Morrison Bridge to the
Willamette River. If the river was iced over, the club would to perform the third act of ''
Uncle Tom's Cabin'', in which Meyer would play "Eliza" crossing the ice on the Willamette. . In January 1917, Meyer played a match of
ice tennis against Irene Campbell, which was the first of its kind in Oregon. The match was conceived by William F. Scott, manager of the
Portland Ice Arena, who intended to make the sport a regular fixture of pre-game festivities at
ice hockey games. Campbell defeated Meyer, 6–3. The Multnomah Athletic Club was awarded the hosting duties of the AAU Women's National Diving Championships in 1917. During her training for the event, Meyer broke an
ear drum. To prevent further injury Meyer packed her ear with cotton and sealed it with
paraffin wax. No national diving competitors made the trek to Oregon so the AAU title meet—which took place on 19 May—was staged exclusively with state-wide participants, most of them who represented the host club. Meyer placed first in the event ahead of second-place finisher
Helen Hicks and third-place finisher
Thelma Payne. Meyer followed-up her AAU title victory with a second-place finish during a diving meet at the 1917
Rose Festival in Portland. Meyer took first place at the 10 foot
springboard event during the 1917 Pacific Coast Indoor Diving Championships on 27 July at Idora Park in Oakland, California. During the event, she introduced a new diving form called the "
volplane". On 3 September 1917, Meyer won a diving contest at the Astoria Regatta. Meyer's first diving competition of 1918 was the Oregon State Diving Championship, which was held at the Multnomah Athletic Club on 12 January. She placed first with a score of 133.5. In March 1918, Meyer moved to
Tacoma, Washington, but continued to compete under the auspices of the Multnomah Athletic Club. Two months later, a notice of separation was published in
The Oregonian by Constance's husband, William N. Meyer. On 21 March 1919, he was granted a divorce on grounds of "desertion". Meyer returned to competitive diving in May 1918 to train for the upcoming AAU Women's Diving Championship, which was scheduled for 20 July at the Multnomah Athletic Club. Thelma Payne won the AAU Championship, with Meyer coming in second. Meyer and Payne represented the Multnomah Athletic Club at the 1918 Pacific Coast Diving Championship in
Victoria, British Columbia on 24 August. Payne again bested Meyer for the title. Meyer trained for the 1919 AAU title meet, but bowed out when the venue was switched from the Los Angeles Athletic Club to the
Detroit Athletic Club. The only diver the Multnomah Athletic Club sent to 1919 AAU Diving Championship was Thelma Payne, who was the reigning title holder. Meyer was struck on the heel by an
automobile at the corner of Third avenue and Alder street in Portland on 23 March 1919. The driver, N. J. Braunstein, was arrested after Meyer went to the police. During the court case, Meyer attempted to show the judge her injury and in doing so removed her stocking. According to
The Oregon Daily Journal, Judge Rossman was notably embarrassed and dismissed the charges on the agreement that Braunstein donate $10 to the
American Red Cross. On 3 May 1919, Meyer competed at the Pacific Northwest Indoor Diving Championship at the Multnomah Athletic Club. During the 1919 Rose Festival in Portland, Meyer performed a diving exhibition. Her next competitive diving meet came on 4 July 1919, during the Far West Diving Championship at
Neptune Beach in
Alameda, California. She placed second in the event behind Aileen Allen, who represented the Los Angeles Athletic Club. A later review of the scores by
The Oregonian contended that one of the judge's score was tallied wrong, which cost Meyer first place. Meyer returned to Victoria, British Columbia on 22 September 1919, to perform for
Edward VIII,
Prince of Wales, during
his tour of Canada, but the event was scrapped when the prince left for a hunting trip. On 23 December 1919, Meyer married Lou C. Dressler in
Vancouver, Washington. Meyer, who was eight years older than Dressler, declined to give her age on the marriage documents. Instead she listed her age as "legal". Lou C. Dressler was a
labor organizer for the
International Association of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers. Meyer took first place in the diving qualifying event for the
1920 Summer Olympics, but was not invited to join the United States team. She competed in the 1920 Far West Diving Championship on 26 June at Neptune Beach in Alameda, California, where she placed third. Meyer continued to compete sporadically in diving events until at least 1922, including that year's Oregon State Outdoor Diving Championship at the
Oaks Natatorium in
Sellwood, Portland, Oregon. She placed first in the Oregon State Indoor Diving Championship at the Multnomah Athletic Club on 11 March 1922. Meyer was also the first pupil of
Jack Cody to win a national title. Cody, who went on to train several
Olympic swimmers and divers, is in the
International Swimming Hall of Fame as a coach. In 1922, DeWitt Harry for
The Oregonian called Meyer the "grittiest and most daring amateur woman divers". She was critical of the excessive clothing women divers and swimmers were required to wear for
modesty. She would wear a
one-piece swimsuit when the event permitted its use instead of the traditional skirt swimsuit that were ubiquitous at the time. In 1918, Meyer told the publication
Sweater News: The Journal of the Sweater and Fancy Knit Goods Trade, "Were it not for the handicap of too much clothing, more women would be heard from in this sport. [...] Public opinion has hampered the popularity of the skirtless bathing suit more than anything else. I think women would generally accept it were it not for criticism." Meyer designed her own swimsuit and it was manufactured by the Olympia Woolen Mills in
Olympia, Washington. In 1930, Meyer made it into the finals of a
golf tournament at the Ingleside Golf Course in
San Francisco, California. According to her husband, Meyer had only taken up golf five days prior. She won the San Mateo Women's Golf Club Tournament on 21 October 1952. At 72 years of age, she was still golfing. Meyer and her husband moved to
San Mateo County, California where they lived together until his death in 1946. She died at her San Mateo apartment on 3 January 1967, at the age of 84. Her death was described as "
natural causes". She was interred at
Cypress Lawn Memorial Park in
Colma, California.
Record ;Bowling ;Swimming ;Diving ;Tennis ==References==