Kevin O'Halloran

Kevin O'Halloran (3 March 1937 – 5 July 1976) was an Australian freestyle swimmer of the 1950s who won a gold medal in the 4×200-metre freestyle relay at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne.

The first Western Australian to win Olympic gold, O'Halloran learnt to swim in his hometown of Katanning.

He moved to Perth to attend secondary schooling at Guildford Grammar School, where he became more committed to swimming.

Competitive swimming was not well developed in Western Australia; races were held in muddy river pools.

In 1952, at the age of 15, O'Halloran began to make his mark at the state level.

He played a major role in Guildford's win at the interschool championships, placing second in the individual points tally.

He won the 100 m freestyle, 50 m breaststroke and 400 m freestyle.

Competitive swimming was slow to develop in Western Australia; the Western Australian Championships second event was held in 1952.

And O'Halloran's state debut came in that year.

He won the junior 110 yd freestyle and butterfly and the 220 yd freestyle and was second in the open 110 yd freestyle.

The competition took place in a muddy pool on the Swan River in the Perth suburb of Crawley.

The arena was such that the bottom could not be seen and jellyfish lurked in the area, sometimes climbing onto the swimmers' bodies.

When O'Halloran returned to his home, he often trained in a muddy waterhole.

In 1953, O'Halloran placed second in the 110 yd and 440 yd freestyle events at the Western Australian Championships in the open division and won the 110 yd breaststroke and the 110- and 220 yd freestyle in the junior division.

In the process, he cut six seconds from the state record in the 440 yd event.

He was selected by the Western Australian team to compete in the Australian Championships, but his parents and headmaster decided that his schooling was more important, much to Gravenall's chagrin.

In 1954, O'Halloran was the state champion in the 110 yd and 220 yd freestyle, and in 1955 he added the 440 yd individual medley title to the successful defence of his freestyle crowns.

In his final year at Guildford, O'Halloran was the School Captain, led the swimming and shooting team, and was a member of the rowing eights in the Head of the River.

So in late 1955, O'Halloran moved to the east coast to support his attempt to qualify for the Olympics.

His new coach, Frank Guthrie, overhauled his training regimen, and within a year O'Halloran had reduced his times by approximately ten percent.

He gained Olympic selection in the relay and the 400-metre freestyle.

O'Halloran led off the Australian quartet on the way to a new world record, before placing sixth in the 400-metre.

O'Halloran made his national debut at the 1955 Australian Championships in Adelaide; he finished fifth in the 110 yd freestyle behind future Olympians Jon Henricks and John Devitt.

Upon the recommendation of his parents, O'Halloran moved to Sydney in late 1955 to train with Frank Guthrie in an attempt to qualify for the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia.

He boarded with a host family and worked in a wool store to pay his expenses.

But his initiation into Guthrie's training program was difficult.

After seeing O'Halloran's freestyle technique for the first time, Guthrie asked him, "Can you swim any other stroke? If you are going to swim for me, you'll have to learn all over again."

Thereafter, O'Halloran's career was beset by ear problems, and he retired in 1958 after failing to qualify for the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games.

In 1976, O'Halloran died after tripping and accidentally shooting himself.

Born in Katanning, O'Halloran grew up in Kojonup, 40 km to the west of his Katanning.

He had two brothers and a sister, and the family lived on a 9000 acre sheep farm established by his grandfather in 1900.

But after his father enlisted during the Second World War, his mother could no longer run the farm and raise the children by herself, so the family returned to Katanning and stayed there for seven years.

It was one of the few country towns in Western Australia that had a public swimming pool.

Along with his siblings, O'Halloran learned to swim there, often defeating local boys who were four years his senior.

At the age of eight, he was taught to swim competitively by his teacher at Katanning State Primary School.

She had been an age group champion in her youth.

The boom in wool prices at the time of the Korean War inflated his family's income, allowing them to send O'Halloran to Guildford Grammar School in Perth, the state's capital city.

At the age of 14, he won five events in the school championships and led the school to its first state championship in 29 years.

He also competed for his school in Australian rules football and rowing.

O'Halloran attracted the attention of the leading Western Australian coach, Don Gravenall, but his schoolwork limited him to a few weeks of intense training over Christmas.