Clara "Clare" Dennis (7 March 1916 – 5 June 1971), later known by her married name Clare Golding, was an Australian

breaststroke Breaststroke is a swimming style in which the swimmer is on their chest and the torso does not rotate. It is the most popular recreational style due to the swimmer's head being out of the water a large portion of the time, and that it can be s ...

swimmer of the 1930s who won the gold medal in the 200-metre breaststroke at the

1932 Summer Olympics The 1932 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the X Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1932) were an international multi-sport event held from July 30 to August 14, 1932 in Los Angeles, California, United States. The Games were held duri ...

in Los Angeles, California.

Early life

Born in

Burwood, New South Wales Burwood is a suburb in the Inner West of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is west of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the Local government in Australia, local government area of Mun ...

(a suburb of Sydney) as one of six children of Alec Dennis, a policeman who acted as a police prosecutor, Clare and her siblings were taught to swim by their father, himself an amateur swimmer, after their family relocated from Burwood to Clovelly Beach. Dennis' sister Thora developed quickly into a competent competitive swimmer, and joined the Sydney Ladies' Swimming Club and was later selected for the

1928 Summer Olympics The 1928 Summer Olympics ( nl, Olympische Zomerspelen 1928), officially known as the Games of the IX Olympiad ( nl, Spelen van de IXe Olympiade) and commonly known as Amsterdam 1928, was an international multi-sport event that was celebrated from ...

in Amsterdam, but was prevented from going on the grounds of being too young to travel alone overseas. Dennis pleaded with her father to let her join, which he agreed to on the condition that she first swim the 33 yards (approximately 30 metres) across Clovelly Bay. She managed this by pushing off the bottom of the ocean, disguising this with extravagant stroking. Her first lesson and race at the club ended in her having to be fished out of the pool after her endurance failed and the bottom of the pool was too deep to push off. Dennis attended Randwick Primary School, where she acquired a reputation for being interested in sport rather than schoolwork. She spent large amounts of time playing

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

against the male students. Dennis initially swam as a freestyler, but converted to breaststroke at the age of 13. At her first

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

Championships in 1930, held at the Ramsgate Baths, she was disqualified after drifting out of her unmarked lane. The freestyle race was held four times due to multiple lane crossing. It was later discovered that the taps regulating the water flow had been accidentally left on. This created a current strong enough to push the swimmers towards one another. In the breaststroke event, held later, she set a State record, but was disqualified for a one-handed touch.

Swimming career

Australian 1932 Women's Olympic swimming squad

In 1931 she won her first state and national title in the 220-yard breaststroke. She repeated this in 1933, 1934 and 1935, with the championships not being held in 1932, remaining unbeaten until her retirement in 1936. After her 1931 victory, her father died from a leaking heart valve. Dennis considered retiring, but her mother convinced her to continue. In January 1932, Dennis broke the 110-yard Australian record and then the 200-metre world record, gaining automatic selection for the Olympic team at the age of 15. Due to financial difficulties caused by the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

, Dennis managed to attend the Olympics only after assistance was rendered by the Police Department for travel and uniform costs. On arrival, Dennis was hit by illness and then contracted a toe infection after gashing it on the starting platform. Her chances took a boost when Lisa Rocke, who had claimed her 200 m breaststroke world record, was not sent to represent Germany. Dennis won her heat of the 200-metre breaststroke, setting an Olympic record. She narrowly escaped disqualification when a protest was lodged against her "inappropriate" costume on the grounds that it exposed too much of her shoulder blade. Dennis changed her swimming style after the heats on the advice of American swimmer

Buster Crabbe Clarence Linden Crabbe II (; February 7, 1908 – April 23, 1983), known professionally as Buster Crabbe, was an American two-time Olympic swimmer and film and television actor. He won the 1932 Olympic gold medal for 400-meter freestyle swimmi ...

, who recommended she swim three strokes underwater after her starting dive before surfacing. Using her new technique, she touched in first place at every turn to claim the gold medal, 0.1 of a second faster than Japan's

Hideko Maehata was a Japanese breaststroke swimmer and the first Japanese woman to earn a gold medal in the Olympics. Maehata was born in Hashimoto, Wakayama, as the daughter of a tofu producer and as a child learned to swim in the Kinokawa River. In the fift ...

, improving on her previous Olympic record. In 1933, Dennis beat her own Australian 220-yard breaststroke record, and in 1934 she captured gold in the 220-yard breaststroke at the

1934 British Empire Games The 1934 British Empire Games were the second edition of what is now known as the Commonwealth Games, held in England, from 4–11 August 1934. The host city was London, with the main venue at Wembley Park, although the track cycling events wer ...

in London. Though she successfully defended her national title in 1935, she was controversially omitted from the team for the

1936 Summer Olympics The 1936 Summer Olympics (German: ''Olympische Sommerspiele 1936''), officially known as the Games of the XI Olympiad (German: ''Spiele der XI. Olympiade'') and commonly known as Berlin 1936 or the Nazi Olympics, were an international multi-sp ...

in Berlin, and subsequently retired. Clare Dennis 1934b

After swimming

Dennis met her future husband, George Golding, an Australian track and field athlete at the Olympics. He won gold at the 1930 British Empire Games and was the Australian 440-yard champion in 1934 and the 440-yard hurdles champion in 1932 and 1934. They were married in 1941. Dennis became a swimming coach and hairdresser, owning two salons. She died in 1971 in

Manly, New South Wales Manly is a beach-side suburb of northern Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is north-east of the Sydney central business district and is currently one of the three administrative centres of the Local government in Australia ...

at the age of 55 from

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

, and was posthumously inducted into the

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 ...

in 1982.

References

Bibliography

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External links

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Clare Dennis
at the

Australian Dictionary of Biography The ''Australian Dictionary of Biography'' (ADB or AuDB) is a national co-operative enterprise founded and maintained by the Australian National University (ANU) to produce authoritative biographical articles on eminent people in Australia's ...