History is full of life stories - after all you have to know the people to understand the past. Until recently though, reading those stories filled the past with men, and the women too often just looked on. Not any more. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, how women tell the stories of their lives - and sometimes live their lives to create the stories they want to tell.

SEGMENT 1

Volume two of Jill Ker Conway 's anthology of women's memoirs - "Written by Herself" - features writers from Great Britain, North America, Africa and Asia. Conway tells Steve Paulson that there are striking differences between writers from different countries and different times. Also, novelist Margaret Atwood talks with Steve Paulson about the notorious murder case at the heart of her new book "Alias Grace."

SEGMENT 2:

Babe Didrikson Zaharias made athletic history as a track and field star and as a professional golfer. Her biographer, Susan Cayleff , tells Judith Strasser how Babe dealt with society's ambivalent attitudes towards vigorous female athletes. The book is called "Babe: The Life and Legend of Babe Didrikson Zaharius."

SEGMENT 3:

Novelist Mary Gordon tells Jim Fleming about the shocking surprises she encountered when she researched her father's life. He'd been born Jewish in Lithuania, not Catholic in Ohio, and had siblings and a previous marriage about which she had never been told. Gordon's memoir of her father is "The Shadow Man: A Daughter's Search for Her Father."

Distribution dates:

• week of 03/09/97 - hour 3
• week of 08/09/98 - hour 3