Gloria Marie Callen (December 21, 1923 – September 2, 2016) was an American

backstroke Backstroke or back crawl is one of the four swimming styles used in competitive events regulated by FINA, and the only one of these styles swum on the back. This swimming style has the advantage of easy breathing, but the disadvantage of swimm ...

swimmer. She was the 1942

Associated Press Athlete of the Year The first Athlete of the Year award in the United States was initiated by the Associated Press (AP) in 1931. At a time when women in sports were not given the same recognition as men, the AP offered a male and a female athlete of the year award t ...

.USA swimming awards table
usaswimming.org

Biography

Callen was born in 1923 in

Freeport, New York Freeport is a village in the town of Hempstead, in Nassau County, on the South Shore of Long Island, in New York state. The population was 43,713 at the 2010 census, making it the second largest village in New York by population. A settlem ...

. She married Herbert Erskine Jones Jr. in 1944. Callen set 35 American records and one world record in swimming, and won 13 American championships. Due to

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, she was never able to compete in world championships or

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a multi ...

, even though she qualified for the

1940 Summer Olympics The 1940 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XII Olympiad, were originally scheduled to be held from September 21 to October 6, 1940, in Tokyo City, Empire of Japan. They were rescheduled for Helsinki, Finland, to be held from ...

. She quit swimming when she went to college at

Barnard College Barnard College of Columbia University is a private women's liberal arts college in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a group of women led by young student activist Annie Nathan Meyer, who petitioned Columbia ...

and joined the American Women's Voluntary Services.International Swimming Hall of Fame
biography Callen was one in a row of glamorous swimming champions, and was voted one of America's 13 best-dressed women by the New York's Fashion Academy.

Honors

*1942:

*1976: inducted in the

Rockland County Rockland County is the southernmost county on the west side of the Hudson River in the U.S. state of New York. It is part of the New York metropolitan area. It is about from the Bronx at their closest points. The county's population, as of t ...

Sports Hall of FameInductee list
of the Rockland County Sports Hall of Fame *1984:

International Swimming Hall of Fame The International Swimming Hall of Fame and Museum (ISHOF) is a history museum and hall of fame, located at One Hall of Fame Drive, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, United States, operated by private interests and serving as the central point for the stu ...

Honor Swimmer

References

1923 births 2016 deaths American female swimmers Barnard College alumni 20th-century American women 21st-century American women {{US-swimming-bio-stub

Biography

Honors

See also

References