Passages: Butterfly Inventor Jiro Nagasawa, 78

By Hideki Mochizuki, Swimming World Japanese correspondent

TOKYO, Japan, March 24. JIRO Nagasawa, the former world record holder of the 200 butterfly, passed away yesterday at the age of 78 due to throat cancer.

Nagasawa finished sixth in the 200 breaststroke at the 1952 Helsinki Olympic Games, and after that, he is considered to have invented the current style of butterfly with a dolphin kick when butterfly was separated from the breaststroke in May of 1954.

In 1993, Nagasawa was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame. For more information on his life, and his induction, click here.

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