June Krauser To Receive the 2016 R. Max Ritter Award

FORT LAUDERDALE – United States Aquatic Sports (USAS), the organization that represents America’s Olympic aquatic sports internationally, will recognize June Krauser posthumously, for her extensive contributions to the sport of swimming with the 2016 R. Max Ritter Award.  The Award will be presented to her children, Larry and Janice, at the organization’s annual convention, on Friday evening, during the International Masters Swimming Hall of Fame Induction Ceremonies, on September 23^rd at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia. 

The R. Max Ritter Award is presented annually by United States Aquatic Sports to the organization or individual of a FINA member country who has contributed the most to the advancement of understanding and good will among nations through international participation in amateur aquatic sports.

This year’s award honors the memory of a woman whose selfless contributions bolstered the aims of U.S. Masters Swimming, the Amateur Athletic Union, the Special Olympics, and provided inspiration and support for thousands of individual swimmers around the country.

Born in 1926 in Indianapolis, Krauser née Fogle, learned to swim in Lake Michigan and grew up as a competitive swimmer. By age 16, she was a national champion in the 200-yard breaststroke, representing the Riviera Swim Club of Indianapolis at the AAU Senior National Championships every year from 1941 through 1943. Krauser swam at Purdue University and was a 1944 Olympic hopeful until the games were cancelled because of World War II.

After graduating from Purdue with a home economics degree in 1948, Krauser took a little over 20 years off from racing to get married and raise two children, but stayed involved in aquatics in various capacities. In 1955, Krauser and husband Jack moved to Florida where she eased into the role of swim mom to daughter Janice and son Larry. Krauser soon took up officiating at her children’s meets and eventually helped found the Florida Gold Coast Association of the AAU, leading the organization as secretary, treasurer, and registration Chairman for nine years. She produced a monthly newsletter called Sporty for the Association throughout the 1960s, which gave her the idea for the SWIM MASTER publication she would later establish for U.S. Masters Swimming. In 1959, Krauser was named a delegate for the AAU Convention and represented South Florida at AAU, USS, and USAS conventions every year for the next 40-odd years.

Krauser earned national recognition for her superior swimming administrative skills and in 1964, she was appointed to the United States Olympic Women’s Swim Committee. Also in the early 1960s, John Spannuth—in his role as International Director of the Special Olympics—tapped Krauser to help him establish competitive rules and regulations as well as organizational policies and procedures for the nascent organization. Of her work with the Special Olympics, Spannuth said: “If you needed something done right, you called June Krauser.”

Krauser’s most enduring contributions to swimming began in the 1970s when she joined Ransom J. Arthur, MD and John Spannuth in pioneering U.S. Masters Swimming. She helped establish the first organization to govern and encourage adult swimming in the United States in a number of capacities, most notably by contributing her sharp eye for details to writing rules and communicating with members. Spannuth said that when the group was trying to get the AAU to “take in Masters Swimming, we needed rules. I put all of the ideas together, but had no ideas regarding how to do them ‘the official way.’ June did! So I gave her pages of ideas and she prepared them for the AAU National Convention. She did a super job, and that paved the way for Masters Swimming to become part of the AAU.”

In addition to writing USMS’s first rule book, Krauser also edited and published the organization’s primary membership communication vehicle, SWIM MASTER, for more than 20 years. She also helped develop USMS’s first website in the late 1990s and created a standard of excellence in membership communication. For her extensive efforts in building and growing U.S. Masters Swimming, Krauser was the second recipient of the prestigious Ransom J. Arthur Award, USMS’s highest honor. As Spannuth noted, Krauser “literally wrote the book when it came to competitive swimming for adults and for the Special Olympics, and did more to kick start those two programs than anyone will ever know.”

While working to build U.S. Masters Swimming on dry land, Krauser simultaneously roared back to prominence in the water, establishing herself as a force to be reckoned with in the pool and on the podium. She never missed a USMS National Championship meet between 1972 and 2000, nor a FINA Masters World Championship through 2006. Along the way, she set an astonishing 154 USMS records and 73 FINA Masters world records.

For this vast body of watery work, Krauser was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1994, the International Masters Swimming Hall of Fame in 2003, and the Broward County Sports Hall of Fame in 2007. In 2005, USMS created the June Krauser Communications Award in her honor, and she was the first recipient of this annual accolade.

Krauser passed away from complications of Parkinson’s disease on August 2, 2014, at the age of 88. Shortly after Krauser’s death, Debbie Cavanaugh, boy’s and girl’s swimming, diving, and water polo coach at Fort Lauderdale High School told the Miami Herald, “We always called her the ‘Mother of Masters Swimming’ because if it wasn’t for June, there wouldn’t be Masters Swimming. She was the backbone of the whole organization.”

Krauser was a powerful and talented swimmer with an unparalleled depth of skill, passion, and dedication to the sport of swimming. U.S. Masters Swimming is forever grateful for her lifelong commitment to building a vibrant framework for Masters swimmers to pursue their passion for swimming and share the life-changing gifts our sport has to offer.

For additional information, please call Meg Keller-Marvin at (570) 594-4367 or ISHOF at (954) 462-6536, or visit http://www.ishof.org

About the ISHOF

The International Swimming Hall of Fame & Museum was established in 1965 as a not-for-profit educational organization in the City of Fort Lauderdale, Florida and was recognized by FINA, the international governing body for the Olympic aquatic sports, in 1968. The Mission of ISHOF is to PRESERVE and CELEBRATE aquatic history, to EDUCATE the general public about the importance of swimming as the key to water safety, drowning prevention, better health and a better quality of life, and to INSPIRE everyone to swim. ISHOF’s collection of swimming memorabilia, art, photos and films, along with archival documents and rare books in the Henning Library, make ISHOF the premier repository and academic research resource for swimming and aquatic history in the world. www.ishof.org

Gloria Callen Jones died peacefully at home at sunrise on September 2, 2016

Original article published in Charlston Gazette Mail on September 4th, 016.

Gloria Callen Jones died peacefully at home at sunrise on September 2, 2016, attended by her four children.

Mrs. Jones and her husband, Herbert E.Jones, Jr., who died in 2010, resided in Charleston since 1951. Gloria Callen Jones was born in Freeport, Long Island, NY, on December 21, 1923, the daughter of Casper Robinson Callen and Florence Mooney Callen. She began swimming at age 7, quickly finding it an outlet for her energy and competitive spirit.

"Glorious Gloria" Callen was voted the USA's Outstanding Woman Athlete of 1942. Beginning in 1938 as a long-distance freestyle swimmer, she went on to become a backstroke champion, setting 35 American swimming records. She won 13 National titles and set one World Record. A member of the Metropolitan Swimming Association of New York, Miss Callen won a place on the US Olympic Swimming Team at trials in Portland, Oregon in August 1940, at the age of 17. The outbreak of World War II, and fear of Nazi submarines stalking the Atlantic led to the cancellation of the Olympics scheduled for Helsinki, Finland.

In June 1942, she became the first woman to be elected president of the senior class at Nyack, (NY) High School. At age nineteen, she won the New York Fashion Academy Award as one of America's thirteen best dressed women.

With the cancellation of the Olympics, Miss Callen joined the war effort as a member of the American Women's Voluntary Services in New York City, and entered Barnard College at Columbia University in the fall of 1943.

At a Coffee Dance at Barnard, Miss Callen met Herbert E. Jones, Jr. of Oak Hill, WV, and a recent Princeton graduate, then training for the submarine service on the U.S.S. Prairie State docked on the Hudson River. They were married in St. Paul's Chapel at Columbia University on October 14, 1944. After living briefly in San Francisco, Mrs. Jones continued her studies at Connecticut College, and in the summer of 1944 was still making public appearances in support of the Red Cross. When Mr. Jones was discharged from the Navy, the couple moved to Amherstdale, Logan County, WV, where Mr. Jones worked for Amherst Coal Company.

After six years, and with three children, Herbert and Gloria Jones moved to Charleston, W.Va. in 1951. Mrs. Jones became an active community volunteer with the Junior League, and taught swimming at the YWCA. She was particularly enthusiastic about the cultural life of Charleston, working to support the Town Hall series of public lectures. She loved the West Virginia Symphony, the Juliet Art Museum in the Clay Center, and The University of Charleston Women Builders. She and Herbert were long-time members of St. Johns Episcopal Church.

Beginning in 1967, Mrs. Jones joined the Kanawha Garden Club, serving in several leadership capacities and as President during 1978 and 1979. During those years the KGC worked on the preservation and maintenance of historic Ruffner Park along Charleston's scenic Kanawha River.

In 1981, Mrs. Jones became Chairman of Zone VII of the Garden Club of America, an area encompassing garden clubs in Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina. In 1985 she became co-chairman of the Archives of American Gardens, an effort to preserve visual documentation of historic American gardens and landscape design from the Colonial Period to the present. The collection, considered a "national treasure," was given to the Smithsonian Institution in 1992 for the benefit of researchers and scholars.

From 1986 to 1993, Mrs. Jones held numerous positions at the Garden Club of America as a member of the Executive Committee, as one of six Vice-Presidents, as Chair of the Policy Committee, and as an Advisor to the Archive of American Gardens, Garden History and Design Committee. She won the Creative Leadership Award for her zone from the Garden Club of America in 1995.

Mrs. Jones was a Trustee of Barnard College from 1986 to 1991, which, in addition to her duties at the Garden Club of America, required her to divide her time between West Virginia and New York City.

Mrs. Jones is survived by her brother, Robinson Callen of Savannah, Ga.; his 14 children; 32 grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

Her children include Christine Jones Huber (Joel) of Durham, N.C., Herbert Jones (Hollis Hampton) of Nashville, Tenn. and Paris, France, Callen Jones McJunkin (the late Thomas) of Charleston, and Adelyn Jones (Mercury Roberts) of Boulder, Colorado.

"Nana" adored her seven grandchildren, Jameson Jones McJunkin (Kasey Craig) of Truckee, Calif., Allison McJunkin Stalzer (Kenneth) of Lakewood, Colo., Jennifer McJunkin Schwartz (Brian) of Chicago, Ill., Mary Huber Cooley (Joseph) of Durham, N.C., Amanda Huber Klein (Howard) of Brooklyn, N.Y., Deirdre Jones Sadad (Azam) of Paris, France and Logan Blake Jones of Nashville, Tenn.

Her great-grandchildren are Hayden Callan and Reece Wynn McJunkin, McKenzie Callen Stalzer, William Jasper and Jordan Eleanor Cooley.

A team of dedicated caregivers managed Gloria's last years with great warmth, generosity, skill, excellent humors, and extraordinary dedication. They include Mary Mitchell, Donna Sturgill, Brenda Fields, Leslie Lively, Debbie Robinson, Angie Sturgill and Lois Akers.

Friends may call at Barlow-Bonsall Funeral Home, 1118 Virginia Street East, Charleston, from 4 to 6 p.m. Friday, September 9.

Memorial service will be held at 11 a.m., Saturday, September 10, at St. John's Episcopal Church, 1105 Quarrier Street, Charleston, WV 25301.

The family asks that in lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be made to Kanawha Hospice Care, 1606 Kanawha Boulevard, West, Charleston, WV 25387 - 2536; St. John's Episcopal Church,1105 Quarrier Street, Charleston, WV 25301; The West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, 110 Wyoming Street, Suite 100, Charleston, WV 25302.

Barlow-Bonsall Funeral Home is handling the arrangements.

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Legendary Water Polo Coach Monte Nitzkowski Passes Away

Monte Nitzkowski passed away Thursday night. The legendary water polo coach at Long Beach City College and with the U.S. National Water Polo team was considered the most innovative coach in the sport’s history.

Nitzkowski coached the 1972 Olympic team to a bronze medal and the 1984 squad to a silver. In 1980, the U.S. men’s Olympic team was a gold medal favorite but was stymied by the Jimmy Carter boycott of the Games.

He also swam the 200 breaststroke in the 1952 Olympics.

In recognition of his successes, Nitzkoski has been inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame and the UCLA Athletic Hall of Fame. Later this summer, he will also become an inaugural member of the Aquatic Capital of American Hall of Fame.

USA Water Polo’s annual Distinguished Men’s Coaching Award (Elite) is also named in Nitzkowski’s honor.

His recognition to the International Swimming Hall of Fame notes, “His love and support for water polo has made an impact on every player with whom he has come in contact.”````

Forbes Carlile, Innovative Coach Who Studied Science of Swimming, Dies at 95

Article published in NY Times by Frank Litzky on August 2nd, 2016

Forbes Carlile, the Australian whose innovative ideas about sports physiology made him one of the world’s best-known swimming coaches and authorities on the sport, died on Tuesday in Sydney. He was 95.

The Australian Olympic Committee announced his death on its website.

Carlile, whose coaching career reached back to the 1940s, was credited with producing a sparkling string of Olympic swimmers for Australia, among them Shane Gould, who at 15 became a national hero when she won three gold medals as well as a silver and a bronze at the 1972 Olympics in Munich.

Carlile’s coaching methods shook swimming traditionalists. He believed swimmers should start high-level competition at a young age, a radical notion at the time. “It is better to be a has-been than a never-was,” he said.

Pupils like Gould and Jenny Turrall gave credence to his theories. From April to December 1971, Gould, at 14 and 15 years old, broke world records in all five women’s freestyle distances recognized at the time, from 100 to 1,500 meters.

From August 1973 to August 1974, Turrall, also at 14 and 15, broke the world record for the 1,500-meter freestyle five times. She looked like a human windmill in the water, churning it with 62 arm strokes for every 50-meter lap.

Until Carlile’s time, swimmers used six leg kicks for every two arm strokes. Carlile introduced a two-beat kick that saved energy. Although many other coaches ridiculed it, Gould and Turrall showed how effective it could be.

In Carlile’s early years of coaching, many other coaches believed hot baths or showers before a race would drain a swimmer. Carlile put himself through tests and found that after an eight-minute shower in water as hot as he could stand, his times improved by 1.5 percent.

He then persuaded 16 Olympic prospects to alternate swims with and without hot showers and found that 13 of them swam an average of 1 percent faster after one. For a 100-meter race, that meant almost a second, and in top competition it almost always meant the difference between first and second place. Of his four swimmers who went to the 1948 London Olympics and heated themselves up, three swam personal-best times.

By the mid-1940s, Carlile had encouraged other Australian coaches to use interval training — alternating between activities requiring different rates of speed and levels of exertion. He advocated year-round training that emphasized long-distance workouts rather than repeating shorter distances. He championed the concept — new then but standard now — of tapering training in the two or three weeks before a major competition.

Carlile also made many contributions to the science of training swimmers. He and his wife, Ursula Carlile, also a celebrated coach, conducted tests showing that significant changes in a cardiogram could be a sign of a breakdown under training stress.

His 1963 book, “Forbes Carlile on Swimming,” is widely considered the first modern study of competitive swimming. It was translated into six languages, including Chinese.

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Innovations and discoveries aside, he insisted that the most important assets of a swimmer were physical and not mental.

“A swimmer has got to have attributes — body build, the right type of muscles,” he said. “You use psychological techniques, yes, but they are mostly intuitive. They’re not programmed. Physiological and anatomic makeup are primary in a young swimmer. Psychology is secondary.

“Swimming is an endurance-type sport. If you don’t have it physically, psychology doesn’t matter.”

Carlile was born on June 3, 1921, in Melbourne. He was not a particularly good student, he once said, citing a grammar school spelling test in which he scored 3 out of 50. At the private high school he attended, he was a good swimmer, rugby player and rifleman but an undistinguished mile runner.

At the University of Sydney, he planned to study medicine but, he later said, changed his mind as a freshman when he became sick watching film of an operation. He eventually studied human physiology under Frank Cotton, who collaborated with Carlile on research into the science of swimming.

Carlile was a swimming coach for Australia at the 1948 London Olympics. Four years later, in Helsinki, he became the first Australian to compete in the modern Olympic pentathlon: cross-country running, equestrianism, swimming, shooting and fencing. Out of 52 competitors, he finished 25th.

He was also on the Olympic staff for the 1956 Games in Melbourne, where Murray Rose and Dawn Fraser helped Australia win eight gold medals. From 1962 to 1964, he was the head coach of the Dutch national and Olympic swimming teams, and in 1973 he served as the Australian head coach at the first world championships.

Carlile was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in 1976.

He and his wife produced technical films on swimming and ran swimming schools in Sydney (where the pupils were as young as 2 months old) as well as swimming clinics all over the world. She survives him. The Carliles did not have children.

As vice president of the World Swimming Coaches Association, Carlile led a movement, starting in 1995, to expel China from international swimming because of the many positive findings there of the use of anabolic steroids. While China escaped a ban, its incidence of drug violations dropped significantly.

Carlile became a lecturer in human physiology at the University of Sydney and was an outspoken writer and commentator.

“Mellow he is not,” Coles Phinizy wrote in Sports Illustrated in 1975. “He is the same Carlile, still up there on the barricades he helped to erect defying the established order, catching brickbats and waving the flag of tomorrow.

“He is a challenging target. He is a rare and curious bird, at times prominent as a peacock, but never an easy mark.”

A version of this article appears in print on August 3, 2016, on page B13 of the New York edition with the headline: Forbes Carlile, Science-Minded Coach Who Changed Swimming, Is Dead at 95. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe