Joan Harrison

Joan Cynthia Harrison, later Joan Breetzke, was a South African swimmer born in East London, Cape Province, on 29 November 1935 and died on 20 May 2025. At 13 she won the 220-yard and 500-yard freestyle events at the South African national championships, and at the 1950 British Empire Games she won the 440-yard freestyle by seven seconds in a competition record. At the 1952 Helsinki Olympics she won the 100 metre backstroke, becoming the first South African swimmer to win Olympic gold, and was greeted by thousands of people at East London city hall. At the 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games she won gold in the 110 yard backstroke and the 4x110 yard freestyle relay, silver in the medley relay and bronze in the 110 yard freestyle. She retired from international competition in 1956, was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1982 and has an aquatic centre in Clarendon named after her.