Swimmer set freestyle records

Alan Ford, 84, the first swimmer to break 50 seconds in the 100-yard freestyle race and a silver medalist at the 1948 Olympics, died Nov. 3 in Saratoga, Fla., his alma mater, Yale University, said. The longtime smoker had emphysema.

Ford was born Dec. 7, 1923, in the Panama Canal Zone, where his American grandfather and father worked on the canal. His family sent him back to the United States for school and swimming training when he was a teenager. At 5 feet 9, 170 pounds, he was called the Balboa Bullet at Yale.

Under the tutelage of Yale coach Robert Kiphuth, Ford swam 100 yards in 50.6 seconds in February 1943, breaking icon Johnny Weissmuller’s record of 51 seconds, which had stood for 16 years. A year later, Ford swam the distance in less than 50 seconds and by 1945 had improved his time to 49.4, a mark that stood until 1952.

Ford graduated from Yale in 1945 with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering and served in the Navy.

Having missed the 1944 Olympics, canceled because of World War II, and after taking a 2 1/2 -year hiatus from swimming, he resumed training with Kiphuth only months before the 1948 London Games. Ford finished second to U.S. teammate Walter Ris in the 100-meter freestyle, then retired from swimming. He was elected to the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1966. He went on to a career designing and building oil refineries as well as chemical, ore and food processing plants and petroleum and chemical storage facilities.