Betty Danko, stunt double for the Wicked Witch in Wizard of Oz

Her best-known job was doubling for Margaret Hamilton as the Wicked Witch of the West in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz. For the Wicked Witch's fiery entrance into Munchkinland, a catapult had been rigged up under the sound stage and the opening through which the Witch would spring out was covered by a thin aluminum cover painted the same color as the yellow brick road. While Danko waited in the pit, the choreographer was instructing the actors playing the Munchkins how to avoid the circular piece of metal, and fell through the opening onto Danko's shoulders. She was treated by a chiropractor at the studio's expense.[10]

Danko sustained a more serious injury while enacting the Witch's skywriting scene, where she flies on her broomstick spelling out "Surrender, Dorothy!". Hamilton had refused to do the scene after suffering serious burns from descending into the opening in the stage floor amid fire and smoke.[11] The production crew rigged up a broomstick suspended from wires, with a steel saddle for Danko to sit on. Underneath the saddle lay a pipe that would emit smoke when she pushed a button. At first Danko's cape was pinned down to hide the pipe, but the director wanted the cape to blow in the wind, so the pipe was concealed under Danko's body. Danko noticed that the crew coated the pipe with asbestos. On the first two takes, the pipe emitted smoke perfectly, but on the third take, the pipe exploded.[12] Danko was blown off the broomstick and sustained a 2 in (51 mm)-deep gash around the circumference of her leg, landing her in the hospital for eleven days.[13] According to Scarfone and Stillman, damage to her internal organs from the explosion required a hysterectomy.[14] Her total earnings from her work on the film came to $790, plus $35 for the broomstick stunt.[15]