For five years, she reigned supreme among the country’s backstroke swimmers, winning 16 national titles from 1955 to 1960. At age 16 Carin won a Silver medal in the 100-meter backstroke in a dead-heat, world-record-time photo finish in the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne, Australia, a controversial decision that took officials 20 minutes to sort out.

The pretty blonde held four world records and 23 American standards. Carin scored several victories in the Pan Am Games (2 golds in 1959, backstroke and 400 medley relay) and AAU Nationals (three Junior and 16 Senior). Ridgewood had no swimming team so she trained on her own before school at Graydon Pool (the Village erected turning boards to help her) and at the National Swimming Association facility in Manhattan after school. Her mother, Ruth Cone, taught school in Ridgewood for 27 years.

Carin was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame as an Honor Swimmer in 1984. She was a Dean’s List student at both the University of Houston and the University of Maryland, where she transferred to be closer to home, and has a master’s degree from the University of Alaska, where her husband’s military assignment took them. She retired from competitive swimming in 1960 and married West Point football co-captain and All-American guard Al Vanderbush in 1962. On his third tour at West Point, Al became Deputy Athletic Director (1984-90) and Athletic Director (1990-99) at the U.S. Military Academy. Carin taught kindergarten at West Point Elementary School for 18 years. They have two grown sons. She is pictured here with her Silver medal.