Portland Olympian dives into memories

Published 11:00 am Thursday, February 16, 2017

Many people have written the Carolyn Wood story — except Carolyn Wood. Until now. With urging from her students and encouragement from her friends, she has changed that with a memoir “Tough Girl: An Olympian’s Journey.”

“Tough Girl” is the passage of a young girl who transcends the problems at home, her struggles with her sexual identity and who takes to the water with vigor and guts. It is a coming-of-age story of youthful dreams and the celebration of life through wisdom and age. It’s an honest book written with spirit, grit and drive.

Wood powered her way to break national records and win a spot on the 1960 U.S. Summer Olympic team. And though she is modest and humbled by her achievements, she has earned the bragging rights of being an Olympian.

Wood explains that her memoir started out as a simple telling of how she learned to swim — “got good, trained hard, went to the Olympics.” That was the intention, but other things happened. The book weaves together two stories — nearly 60 years apart — of struggles, determination and triumphs in achieving Olympic gold and recounting her solo pilgrimage along the Camino de Santiago in 2012.

For her reading on Feb. 4 at the Seaside Library, Wood focused on her Olympic journey, leaving her Camino de Santiago trek for another visit.

Growing up, Wood and her family spent summers visiting Seaside and Cannon Beach while staying with her aunt and uncle in Arch Cape. They would come to Seaside to swim in the Natatorium, which Wood called “creepy.” She recalled the riots in the ’60s as being “attractive but forbidden” and was recruited by her boyfriend to volunteer at Seaside’s first marathon in the ’70s.

Questions Wood is often asked are “How did you know about the Olympics?” “What made you different from other kids your age?” “How did you make the team?” “What was it like in the Olympics?” and “What happened during the butterfly?”

The book answers those questions and more about how this impetuous 14-year-old tomboy swam her way to Rome; the mouthful of water that cost her the gold medal in the 100-meter butterfly; her childhood friendship with swimmer Donnie Schollander; and her reason not to compete in the 1964 Tokyo Olympics or beyond.

After learning to race, make a turn and a start, Wood’s first race ended badly. She quit. “It just wasn’t fun to do all that work and not win a prize.” But not ready to give in, she gave it another shot with coach Tye Steinbach.

The beginning of the tough girl was born at a big meet held at Jantzen Beach in 1956, a junior competitor heat. Citing her book, this race went by fastest times only, no prelims or finals. Wood’s race was number eight on the docket: 55-yard freestyle. Steinbach pulled her aside and gave Wood final instructions to “go all out, not to slow down, not to look around, just go, go, go until I hit the end.” He told her to warm up, “Get herself mad and work up some steam.”

From the time Wood started to compete in swim heats, her mother kept every newspaper clipping, photo and correspondence. One day, she found an attic’s worth of memories: childhood clothes, records and scrapbooks her mom tediously crafted and saved. One of those photos became the cover of “Tough Girl.”

Wood raced nationally and internationally for the next three years. After her last season on the swim team, Wood left competition for good to attend the University of Oregon. After graduation, she began her 35-year career teaching high school English then substituted for the next 10 years before retiring.

She swam for the Multnomah Athletic Club and Beaverton High School, where she won seven individual state championships in butterfly, freestyle and the individual medley.

Her gold medal win was part of the women’s 4-x-100 meter freestyle relay team. Together with Chris von Saltza, Joan Spillane, Shirley Stobs and Wood, the relay team set a new world record in the event final by nine seconds.

In the annals of Portland sports, Wood was not forgotten. As a young athlete, Wood defied convention by out-gutting some of the best swimmers in the world. She swam an exceptional third leg of the 4-x-100 meter freestyle relay to chase down Australia’s star Lorraine Crapp and give Chris Von Saltza a 1-meter lead to win the gold.

Wood was inducted into the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame in 1992.

Wood remains rooted in Oregon and lives in her family home. Her journeys have taken her to far off places around the world. She spent a year as a governess for the Robert Kennedy family after his death, had an audience with Pope John XXIII before the start of the Olympics and has backpacked through the Oregon and Washington Cascades. These days, she spends her time practicing yoga and meditation, working in her garden and tending to her bees.

“I truly love the sport,” she said. “I love everything about swimming: teams, training, racing, age groups, pranks, pools, medals, trophies, time trials and pictures in the paper. I liked to train, the daily pattern of warm ups, exhaustion, cool downs, rest… the gun, the cheers, the lane counter, the coach’s whistles, the happy chaos of preliminaries and the posting of results. Looking to find your name and time and looking to find your main competitors.”

When asked if she still swims. She answers, “No.” With a second thought, “maybe I’ll compete in a senior heat one day.”