Sports in the Family

Like many of you, I’m glued to the TV and online news sources watching the Olympics. While I don’t have any Olympic hopefuls in my house, there are plenty of athletes on the family tree: In one oft-told tale, my husband’s grandfather had an opportunity to play for a major league baseball team, but his father made him go to law school instead.

Do you have a photo of an ancestral athlete? Send it to me and I’ll share it in this space. Got a story to go with it? I’d love to hear it.

I looked through my archive of recent submissions to this column, but couldn’t find a mystery family photo that fit the theme of sports. Instead, I’ve pulled one from the Library of Congress.

George Grantham Bain took this photo, captioned, “Champion Australian girl swimming team,” April 8, 1919. Bain was a news photographer who primarily worked in New York City. Haven’t found the associated news story to go with it yet, but I’m still looking.