The Bates Swim Team offers the Bates Bobcat Swim Lesson Program to area children twice yearly, teaching skills and a love of water. Here Dany Aupi ’12 demonstrates a stroke to his student in Tarbell Pool.

The Portland Press Herald chronicled the high drama surrounding senior diver Kelsey Lamdin’s final performance at the NCAA Division III Swimming and Diving Championships, held at the University of Minnesota in March. During a warmup dive, she struck the board. Head and hands bleeding, she departed for a hospital, where she got stitched up (without anesthesia) and returned to compete. She finished 10th, securing All-America honors. “”I couldn’t imagine a more amazing sequence of events,” said Bates head coach Peter Casares. “It was a phenomenal display of courage.” [Original story]

Bates senior Chris Berry (Augusta, Maine) finished his exceptional collegiate swimming career with the best weekend of his life last weekend at the NESCAC Men’s Swimming and Diving Championships. Berry broke or had a hand in breaking an astounding total of seven Bates event records at the meet, while the Bobcats set 13 new event records as a team.

Berry swam the leadoff leg in four relays for Bates that broke school records: the 200 free (1:25.46), the 400 medley (3:29.68), the 200 medley (1:35.64) and the 400 free (3:08.15). Berry also reset two program records he already owned, in the 50 back (24.11 seconds) adn the 100 back (52.29), and also claimed his first Bates freestyle record on the final day of the meet, swimming the 100 free in 47.52 seconds.

In his final event, the 200 backstroke, Berry passed the torch, in a sense, to first-year teammate Nathaniel Depew (Hudson, Ohio). While Berry broke his own former program record of 1:57.10 in the event, finishing in 1:56.30, Depew raced even faster, finishing 11th overall with a time of 1:54.82. It was a poignant way for the team captain to finish out an outstanding career.

Don’t pigeonhole John White ’39 as just another nonagenarian champion swimmer.

“Swimming’s not all I do, you know,” White says during a pause in his daily laps at Tarbell Pool.

For White, who turns 93 in April, there’s also a long-term project to hybridize a yellow Japanese iris, and genealogy work to trace the White family forebears further back than their arrival at Massachusetts Bay in the 1630s. And, it being winter, he’s got to clear snow from his Minot property riding his 17-horsepower garden tractor with snowblower

Around Tarbell Pool, though, White is known as the nonagenarian swimmer. Younger observers simply marvel at his ability, while older swimmers have a more complex reaction: “Jealousy,” smiles 80-year-old Professor Emeritus of Economics Ted Walther, another noonday swimmer.

A backstroke specialist since his days as Bates’ swim captain 70 years ago, White has been among the best masters swimmers in his age group for about a decade. In 2006, he was crowned the top U.S. swimmer in the 50 and 200 backstroke (yards and meters).

For obvious reasons, the older age groups draw fewer swimmers, and sometimes it’s not the speed of the event that’s remarkable but its mere occurrence. Like in 2007, when White and fellow oldsters Norman Seagrave, Everett Hanke, and John Woods swam a 200-meter relay in their masters combined-age group (360-399 years). It had never been done before.

Though slowed by eye troubles, aches and pains, and a cold, White swam the 100-yard backstroke in competition last fall, and his 2:20.60 was good for a second ranking nationally in U.S. Masters Swimming. A 90-year-old pup currently holds the 2:01.80 top spot.

As with any competitive athlete, White’s near-misses are as memorable as the triumphs. For a guy in his 10th decade, there’s a lot to consider, like the race a few years ago when his foot slipped during a turn. “I went right under the lane divider and had to start from a dead stop,” White recalls. “I lost 5 seconds, and the guy who won only beat me by a second.”

In short, White’s approach to life seems to mock the old saying attributed to the late Claude Pepper, the longtime congressman from Florida: “I’m so old I don’t even buy green bananas.”

Take White’s passions as a genealogist and iris breeder, both of which require an optimistic belief that time invested will yield a positive return.

Looking down the White family tree, he’ll tell you that in the 1900s, his mother was expelled from Bates for ice skating on Lake Andrews on a Sunday. In the 1800s, White relatives once owned Mount David, and in the 1700s his great-great-grandfather began the Whiteholm dairy farm in Auburn, where Wal-Mart is now. John White ran the family farm for many years and was later involved in real estate.

With iris breeding, meanwhile, White’s achievements include a pink iris hybrid, Dirigo Pink Milestone, seen below. In 2007, it won the Payne Medal from the Society for Japanese Irises, the highest award in its class.

White’s current project is to create a yellow variety of the species Iris ensata, the true Japanese iris. “Everybody says it can’t be done,” he says. “Even the Japanese have quit trying it. The trouble is, they didn’t think the problem through.”

“There are no known yellow I. ensata cultivars,” says Dennis Hager, president of the Society for Japanese Irises. True, there are yellow iris hybrids with I. ensata in their background, he says, but the yellow color “has never been attributed to the I. ensata parentage.”

Andrew Wheeler ’01 is a Ph.D. student at California’s Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden, home of the botany department of Claremont Graduate University. He’s known White for years, thanks to their mutual iris interest. “In many respects, John is one of the youngest people I know,” says Wheeler, who uses DNA sequencing to examine relationships among iris species.

He calls White’s efforts “remarkable.”

White is also trying to create a tetraploid iris, a plant with double the usual chromosomes. Such a genetic structure often yields desirable qualities like larger, thicker flowers with deeper colors.

“Japanese breeders have massive fields of iris but they don’t have tetraploid breeding lines because it’s difficult and frustrating,” Wheeler says. “They don’t think they have enough time to do it. But John doesn’t care about time.”

Beneath White’s photo in the 1939 Mirror is a telling quote: “Patience is not the least of the virtues.”

“I am now in my third generation, which will have the yellow gene on both sides,” he says. “So there’s a chance when those bloom this summer I will get a yellow. That will be a true Japanese yellow iris.

“And if I don’t get a yellow, I will cross some of them again. I’ll keep going until we get it. It’s a slow process and you need luck. But if you get lucky, you get what you’re after.”

By H. Jay Burns, photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen

This story used information from an oral history provided by John White ’39, part of the Muskie Oral History Project and now housed at the Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library.

Bates sophomore Charlotte Green was named Division III Women’s National Swimmer of the Week today by CollegeSwimming.com, the leading swimming Web site in the country. It is the first time a Bates swimmer has claimed the prestigious award.

The Web site singled out Green (New Canaan, Conn.) for her singular performances at last weekend’s tri-meet with Connecticut College and Wellesley College at Tarbell Pool, where she broke four pool records and set two school records. Her time of 51.58 seconds in the 100-yard freestyle was the third fastest in the country at the time, and automatically qualified her for her first trip to the NCAA Division III Championships, to be held at the University of Minnesota in March. Green also led off the 200 free relay in 24.26 seconds, another school record, personal best, and a national “B” cut time.

According to head coach Peter Casares, Green was mentioned first in the Web site’s article because out of all the winners of the National Swimmer of the Week award for Feb. 2-8 (i.e., males and females from all three NCAA divisions), hers was deemed the most impressive of all.

Green’s honor comes on the heels of junior teammate Katelyn Drake (Hudson, Ohio) claiming the NESCAC Women’s Swimming and Diving Performer of the Week award for the very same week.

See Green and the other National Swimmers of the Week at this link.

Bates College sophomore Charlotte Green had such an outstanding meet last weekend against Connecticut College and Wellesley that she was named Division III Women’s National Swimmer of the Week by CollegeSwimming.com, the leading swimming Web site in the country. It is the first time a Bates swimmer has claimed the prestigious award.

The Web site singled out Green (New Canaan, Conn.) for her singular performances at last weekend’s tri-meet with Connecticut College and Wellesley College at Tarbell Pool, where she broke four pool records and set two school records. Her time of 51.58 seconds in the 100-yard freestyle was the third fastest in the country at the time, and automatically qualified her for her first trip to the NCAA Division III Championships, to be held at the University of Minnesota in March. Green also led off the 200 free relay in 24.26 seconds, another school record, personal best, and a national “B” cut time.

According to head coach Peter Casares, Green was mentioned first in the Web site’s article because out of all the winners of the National Swimmer of the Week award for Feb. 2-8 (i.e., males and females from all three NCAA divisions), hers was deemed the most impressive of all.

Bates College junior Katelyn Drake set the pool record in the 200-yard backstroke during the Bobcat swimming and diving team’s tri-meet against Tufts and Wheaton last Saturday, with a time of 2:09.55, smashing the former mark of 2:11.15 set by Wesleyan in 1993.

Drake (Hudson, Ohio), a team captain and one-time All-American, also won the 200-yard individual medley in a lifetime-best time of 2:15.34.

It was the second pool record Drake has had a hand in breaking in two weeks. Two weeks ago against Bowdoin, Bates set the pool record in the 400-yard medley relay with a time of 4:06.27. In on the performance were Drake, first-year Kara Leasure (Los Alamos, N.M.), first-year Emily Tato (Chatham, N.J.) and sophomore Charlotte Green (New Canaan, Conn.). The previous mark of 4:07.57 was established in 2002 by Bates alumnae Megan Simmons, Megan Ferrari, Vanessa Williamson and Nicole Sparks.

Bates first-year swimmer Kara Leasure (Los Alamos, N.M.) notched three personal-best times in three quite different events, and won all three of those events at last Saturday’s dual meet at Colby.

Leasure swam the 1,000-yard freestyle in 10:50.54, the 100 breaststroke in 1:10.68 and the 500 free in 5:17.61.

“All were done with more heart than ever expected,” said Bates head coach Peter Casares. “She not only showed the conference that she is one of the best, but she taught both the coaching staff and team what true determination looks like.”

Leasure and the Bobcats host their second home meet of the season this Saturday at 1 p.m., with Wheaton College and NESCAC rival Tufts University visiting Tarbell Pool.

Co-captain Chris Berry (Augusta, Maine) had a big hand in an impressive first home meet for the Bates swimming and diving teams against Bowdoin on Saturday.

The Bates men finished the meet with another pool record performance in the 400 freestyle relay, as Berry and first-years Ned Scott (Maplewood, N.J.), Tom Boniface (Youngstown, Ohio) and Nathaniel Depew (Hudson, Ohio) touched the wall in 3:17.00. The previous mark of 3:17.86 had been established in 1993 by Wesleyan.

Berry and teammates also would have claimed the pool record in the 400 medley relay as well, although the Polar Bears touched the wall first to claim the mark for themselves with a 3:39.57 performance. Swimming in 3:40.05 for Bates were Berry, first-year Alex McKeown (South Windsor, Conn.), Scott and first-year Dan Aupi (Branford, Conn.). The previous mark of 3:39.57 was established by Bates alumni Eric Bowden, Adam Eggert, Nate Curll and Todd Bretl.

Berry also claimed first place in the 100-yard backstroke race, registering a time of 55.65 seconds.

Bates will next compete this Saturday in a dual meet at Colby.

Carlisle said Phelps’ real impact will be evidenced in coming years. “The Olympic market changed, not just Michael — but the Olympics themselves, the way we look at them, the way they will be presented,” said Carlisle, whose stable of Olympic swimmers also includes Portland’s Ian Crocker, world record holder in the 100-meter butterfly. They will all benefit from Phelps’ effort, though Carlisle said it may take some time. [More...]