Bowen Stassforth

Bowen Stassforth

Personal information
Full name	Bowen Dow Stassforth
National team	United States
Born	(1926-08-07) August 7, 1926 Los Angeles, California
Sport
Sport	Swimming
Strokes	Breaststroke
College team	University of Iowa
Medal record Men's swimming Representing the United States Olympic Games 1952 Helsinki 200 m breast Pan American Games 1951 Buenos Aires 3x100 m medley 1951 Buenos Aires 200 m breast

Bowen Dow Stassforth (born August 7, 1926) is an American former competition swimmer and Olympic medalist.

Stassforth was an eight-time All-American in swimming at the University of Iowa. Over the course of his career, he set 16 national breaststroke records in distances from 200 yards to 500 yards and one world record in the 200-yard breaststroke in 1952. Bowen was also Iowa AAU Athlete of the Year in 1952.

In his early life, Bowen had an intense fear of water, which was the result of having his head put under water by the family maid. After his parents discovered this, swimming lessons commenced and his athletic career as a swimmer began at Los Angeles High School.

In August 1944, while still in high school, Bowen joined the U.S. Navy. During his service in the Navy, he taught swimming and water survival skills to enlisted sailors on North Island in San Diego.

Bowen swam in the era when the accepted arm motion of the breaststroke was optional with either the underwater breaststroke as we know it today or the over the water arm motion now known as the butterfly. The leg movement was the frog kick. In 1954, the stroke was bifurcated into the breaststroke and the butterfly using a dolphin kick as commonly known today. As a result, any records he held were subsequently wiped off the record books.

At his first AAU National Championship meet in 1945, he placed second in the 200-meter breaststroke.

He enrolled at the University of Iowa in 1948, but was not allowed to compete as a freshman due to NCAA eligibility rules at that time. He did however participate in the U.S. Olympic Trials in July 1948 placing seventh in the 200-meter breaststroke.

Bowen earned numerous medals in Big Ten, NCAA and AAU championship meets over the course of his career.

He swam on the 1949 Big Ten Conference and NCAA Champion 300-yard medley relay team for Iowa.

In 1951, he won a bronze medal in the 200-meter breaststroke and a gold in the medley relay at the 1951 Pan American Games in Buenos Aires.

At the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finland, he placed second in the 200-meter breaststroke, losing to his Big Ten and NCAA rival John Davies of the University of Michigan who represented Australia. He finished his career later that year as the AAU National Champion and the American record holder in the 220-yard breaststroke.

Bowen was inducted into the University of Iowa Hall of Fame in 1996. Charles Roeser, the chairman of the U.S. Olympic men’s swimming committee, called him “one of the most cooperative athletes I have ever known in thirty years of teaching and coaching.” He also called him “America’s greatest breaststroke champion, but more than that, a real American and gentleman whose conduct is a worthy example for others to follow.”

See also

• List of Olympic medalists in swimming (men)
• List of University of Iowa people

External links

• Bowen Stassforth – Olympic athlete profile at Sports-Reference.com