Diver Lilybet MacRae ’13 sets a new A-E record.
Coaches past and present: front, Belinda Canavan (current, diving); kneeling, Paul Murphy ’84 (current, girls’), Loring Kinder Strudwick, and Diane Souvaine; standing, David Fox (current, boys’), Dick Lennon, P’90, Steve Purington, Chuck Willand ’70, and Sally Fischbeck
that until the 1920s it was considered risky, as an early account states, “for the boys to remain too long in the pool, lest they weaken their physical constitutions and render themselves liable to catch colds and other more serious diseases.” For this reason practice sessions were restricted to one-half hour. In addition, meets likely were abbreviated due to the fact that there were no diving events (not added until 1949) and no long distance, let alone any official, differentiated strokes. As Wetmore notes, “Every event was just a dash: the 50-yard dash, the 200-yard dash, the Plunge, the 100-yard dash, and the 200-yard relay. A contestant swam any way he wished, just as long as he finished his event without touching bottom.” The Plunge, eliminated in 1923, garners special, if not politically correct mention from Wetmore: “The event measured how far a swimmer could glide with just a dive and no
breath. It was a real fat boy’s event for all a heavy guy did was fall in, and his momentum would keep him blopping along almost forever, until he had to take a breath. The Plunge was greatly handicapped by the lack of fat men in the school until Neil Stilwell ’21 pushed the event to its climax in 1919 by breaking the world’s record and floating 74½ feet; half a foot shy of the entire pool’s length.” In subsequent decades PA swimmers garnered attention for feats even more impressive than Stilwell’s epic Plunge. In March 1948, Andover won the first New England Interscholastic Meet at Amherst College by one point. This ushered in what became known as a Swimming Dynasty, with athletes like Jimmy McLane ’49, Bob Brawner ’48, Richard Thoman ’49, and Jim Carroll ’48 collectively garnering every conceivable accolade: Olympic, All-American Collegiate, NCAA, AAU, USA All-Star, Ando-
Records Broken Andover-Exeter Swim Meet, February 25, 2012 200 Medley Relay/1:35.64/Derrick Choi ’12, Didi Peng ’12, Tim Wynter ’14, Michael Camarda ’14/ pool record 200 Freestyle/1:42.60/Jun Oh ’12/pool record 50 Freestyle/24.15/Amy Zhao ’14 Diving/262.65 points/Lilybet MacRae ’13 100 Butterfly/51.81/Timothy Wynter ’14
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Andover | Spring 2012
200 Freestyle Relay/1:39.97/Amy Zhao ’14, Hailey Novis ’13, Emily McKinnon ’13, Danielle Liu ’14 100 Backstroke/50.68/Timothy Wynter ’14/school & pool record 400 Freestyle Relay/3:37.86/Danielle Liu ’14, Julia Smachlo ’13, Hailey Novis ’13, Amy Zhao ’14 400 Freestyle Relay/3:10.80/Joseph Faller ’14, Timothy Wynter ’14, Jun Oh ’12, Michael Camarda ’14/pool record
ver Athletics Hall of Honor, and International Swimming Hall of Fame. This being Andover, the school did its best not to let fame go to the swimmers’ heads. Reached at home in Ipswich, Mass., McLane, a spry octogenarian, recalls an afternoon more than 60 years ago when he was summoned into the chambers of Headmaster Claude Fuess, dignified and imposing with his pince-nez and three-piece suit. Even before his arrival at PA, McLane had won the Men’s National Championship at age 13, then two gold medals at the 1948 London Olympics the summer between his upper and senior years. (He also won another one four years later at Helsinki, where he captained the USA Swim Team). On this particular afternoon, Fuess explained to him that he had almost begrudgingly agreed to allow Life magazine to visit the Academy and do an article on McLane. “We get a lot of requests from publications to do stories on you, but I turn down most of them and wanted you to know that,” he told the boy. “James, there will probably never be another time in your life when you receive this much attention, and I don’t want it to ruin you,” Fuess continued. “You are at Andover for other reasons.” To this day, McLane is grateful for the advice, and applauds Andover for “the fact that it doesn’t have that fist-pumping mentality. It’s about academic achievement.” Conversations with current students, coaches, and recent alums suggest that PA swimming still espouses a philosophy of balance and