Aileen Riggin

Who was Aileen Riggin?

Aileen Riggin Soule was an American competition swimmer and diver and Olympic champion.

Born in Newport, Rhode Island, she learned to swim at the age of 6, in Manila Bay, and she first started diving in 1919. She competed at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium in the women's springboard diving and won a gold medal, becoming America's youngest ever gold medallist at that time, later surpassed by Marjorie Gestring. She was also America's smallest Olympic winner, at only 4 feet 7 inches and 65 pounds. She later competed in the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris, and became the only woman to win medals in both diving and swimming; the silver medal in springboard diving and the bronze medal in the 100 meter backstroke.

She moved to Hawaii in 1957 with her husband, and in 1967 she was inducted in the Swimming Hall of Fame. She also helped found the Hawaii Senior Games Association. As a result of her fund raising and motivational presentations, she received further accolades in the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1988.

Aileen died in Honolulu, Hawaii of natural causes. At the time of her death she was the last surviving Olympic Champion from the 1920 Olympic Games.