Wally O'Connor

James Wallace O'Connor, known as Wally, was an American competition swimmer and water polo player born in Madera, California on 25 August 1903, who died in Los Angeles in 1950. He swam and played water polo for Stanford University and was the only Stanford athlete to take part in four Olympics, in 1924, 1928, 1932 and 1936. At the 1924 Paris Games he won gold in the world record setting 4x200 metre freestyle relay with Ralph Breyer, Harrison Glancy and Johnny Weissmuller and a bronze in water polo, and he took a second water polo bronze in 1932 at Los Angeles. He carried the national flag at the opening ceremony in 1936, and many sports historians rate him the greatest American water polo player of all time.