Florence May Chadwick (November 9, 1918 – March 15, 1995) was an American swimmer known for long-distance open water swimming. She was the first woman to swim across the English Channel in both directions, setting a time record each time. She was also the first woman to swim the Catalina Channel, the Straits of Gibraltar, the Bosporus (one way), and the Dardanelles (round trip).
Biography
Florence May Chadwick was born in San Diego on November 9, 1918. Her parents were Richard Chadwick, a police officer, and Mary Lacko, a homemaker who later operated a San Diego restaurant. Chadwick grew up in the Point Loma neighborhood of San Diego and graduated from Point Loma Junior-Senior High School in 1936. She attended San Diego State College and studied at several law schools and a business college. She was married and divorced twice, and had no children.
Early swimming and instruction
Chadwick entered swimming competitions from a young age, scoring her first win at the age of ten, but she realized she preferred ocean events rather than pool swims. Chadwick first began instruction and competition with 1924 Olympian Florence Chambers, and the Florence Chambers Swim Club in San Diego at the age of 9, around 1927, and continued to swim with the Chambers Club through around 1932, when she switched to the Los Angeles Athletic Club.
At the age of 10, she became the youngest person to swim across the mouth of San Diego Bay. Starting at age eleven, she competed in rough water swims, winning an annual 2.5-mile race in the ocean off La Jolla, North of San Diego, 10 times in 18 years. On July 4, 1933, Chadwick handily won the 600-yard Venice Roughwater Swim for Women with a time of 15 minutes flat. Chadwick swam in Southern California ocean races as an amateur for several decades, but had her heart set to swim across the English Channel. Two months later, she tried again. The same thick fog set in, but she succeeded in reaching Catalina. She said that she kept a mental image of the shoreline in her mind while she swam. She later swam the Catalina channel on two additional occasions.
Distance swim highlights
During the summer of 1953, she successfully swam the Channel again (setting a new women's record), as well as the Strait of Gibraltar (setting an all-time record of 5:06), the Bosporus, and the Dardanelles. In 1955 she swam the Channel again, breaking her own record time.
Not all of her long-distance swim attempts were successful. In 1954, she tried to become the first person to swim across Lake Ontario but gave up after becoming ill a few hours into her swim. Other unsuccessful attempts included the Strait of Juan de Fuca and two tries at the Irish Sea (her last major swim attempt in 1960).
In 1962, Chadwick was inducted by the San Diego Hall of Champions into its Breitbard Hall of Fame.
In 1970, as a career highlight, she was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame.