Hideko Maehata

Hideko Maehata ( Japanese 前畑秀子 , Maehata Hideko ; born May 20, 1914 in Hashimoto , Wakayama Prefecture ; † February 24, 1995 ) was a Japanese swimmer .

She was the first Japanese woman to win a medal in the Olympics. At the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 1932 , she won the silver medal over 200 m breaststroke behind Australian Clare Dennis . At the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin , in the absence of the defending champion, she became the superior Olympic champion over this route and thus became the first Japanese woman to become Olympic champion . It would take until the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich before Mayumi Aoki became a Japanese Olympic champion in swimming again.

In 1979 she was accepted into the hall of fame of international swimming and in 1990 she was named Bunka Kōrōsha, a person with special cultural merits .

Web links

Hideko Maehata in the International Swimming Hall of Fame (English)
Hideko Maehata in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

personal data
SURNAME	Maehata, Hideko
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	前畑秀子 (Japanese)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Japanese swimmer
DATE OF BIRTH	May 20, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH	Hashimoto (Wakayama)
DATE OF DEATH	February 24, 1995