Lenore Kight

Lenore Kight

400-meter silver medalist Kight (left) and gold medalist Helene Madison at the 1932 Olympics
Personal information
Full name	Lenore M. Kight
National team	United States
Born	(1911-09-26)September 26, 1911 Frostburg, Maryland
Died	February 9, 2000(2000-02-09) (aged 88) Cincinnati, Ohio
Spouse	Cleon Wingard Sr. m. 1935
Sport
Sport	Swimming
Strokes	Freestyle
Club	Carnegie Library Athletic Club Homestead, PA
Medal record Women's swimming Representing the United States Olympic Games 1932 Los Angeles 400 m freestyle 1936 Berlin 400 m freestyle

Lenore M. Kight (September 26, 1911 – February 9, 2000^[1]), known by her married name Lenore Wingard after 1935, was an American competition swimmer for the Carnegie Library Athletic fund and an Olympic gold medalist who specialized in freestyle and represented the United States at the 1932 and 1936 Summer Olympics.^[2]

Lenore Kight was born September 26, 1911 to Clarence Onley Kite and Mary Katherine Lehr Kight on the Northern Pennsylvania border in Frostburg, Maryland, though when she was five^[3] the family moved North, to Homestead, Pennsylvania near Pittsburgh.^[4] Kite considered herself a late starter, teaching herself to swim by the age of 14. A local Pittsburgh coach soon noted her skills and got her into a swimming program with the Carnegie Library Athletic Club, where she progressed from local to state and then national competition. Recognized as an outstanding competitor, she was ready for Olympic competition by 21.^[5]

During her amateur career, while primarily swimming for the Carnegie Library Athletic Club, also known as the Homestead Library Athletic Club under Coach Jack Scarry through 1935,^[6] she set 7 world and 24 national records, and won 23 national swimming titles.^[7] In a noteworthy career, she captured both the 1 mile and 440 National AAU freestyle, for four sucessive years. In 1933 she won all of the U.S. AAU National Championship title events in the freestyle.^[7][8]

In what was likely her most publicized single performance, at the 1932 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, she won a silver medal in the women's 400-meter freestyle event bettering the former world record with a time of 5:28.6. In a close race, gold medalist, and American team mate Helene Madison led Kight until the last 100 meters, when Kight overtook Madison. The two battled it out in the final length of the pool. In a very tight race, Madison, who set the new world record touched only a tenth of a second ahead of silver medalist Kight.^[5][9]

On September 4, 1935, Kight eloped and married in Wellburg, West Virginia, then moved to Cincinnati with Cleon Wingard Senior, who had a career as a physical education instructor, teacher, and high school principal. A physical education instructor in the Cincinnati Schools, Wingard was a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh.^[3] Kight-Wingard left the Carnegie Library Athletic Club, and named her husband Cleon Wingard as her new manager.^[6] Cleon Wingard would become the founder of the "Neediest Kids of All" Charity.^[10][5][11]

The following year at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Kite Wingard won a bronze medal in the 400-meter freestyle event with a time of 5:29.0. She finished only around 1.5 seconds behind the silver medalist Ragnhild Hveger from Denmark.^[8]

In 1937 she turned professional and won the long-distance race at the Toronto Canadian Exhibition, as well as Cleveland's Bernard McFadden professional race.^{[5][12][8][13]}

Kight-Wingard won the prestigious James E. Sullivan Award, given to "the most outstanding athlete at the collegiate or Olympic level in the United States", and was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in Fort Lauderdale.^[5] She is also a member of the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame, was the first woman to become a member of the Maryland Athletic Hall of Fame, and is a member of the HELMS Hall of Fame.^[11]

After retiring from active competitions, Kight-Wingard worked as a swimming instructor, giving private lessons to students at pools in Cincinnati from 1959-79. During summers, she directed the swim program and managed the pool at Pittsburgh's Deer Creek.^[5] She continued to set age group records through the age of 75 as a United States Masters swimming competitor.^[14] Through 1995, into her early 80's she swam regularly at the YMCA in the Cincinnati suburb of Westwood, Ohio.^[10][8][12] In 1981 she was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame.^[7]

A resident of College Hill, Kight died at the age of 88 after a long bout with Alzheimer's disease on February 9, 2000 at Mercy Franciscan Hospital-Mount Airy Campus in Cincinnati, Ohio. She was survived by her husband, a son, a daughter, and grandchildren, and was buried in Cincinnati's Spring Grove Cemetery.^[10][4]

• List of members of the International Swimming Hall of Fame
• List of Olympic medalists in swimming (women)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lenore Kight.

• "Sport: Daughters' Girl" Time magazine 6 August 1934
• "Athletes: Lenore Kight" Photograph in the February 1934 issue of Vanity Fair
• "Holds 7 world's records in speed swimming" Lenore Kight Wingard in a Camel cigarette advertisement, Life magazine 19 July 1937, back cover
• Feb. 2000, "US Master's Swimming, So Many Records in the Days of Wool Suits"

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