Dorothy Dodson
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Born in 1921, Illinois native Dorothy Dodson is a American track and field athlete whose career spanned the late 1930s through the late 1940s; Dodson's specialty was the throwing events. From 1939 to 1949, with the exception of 1940, she participated in every U.S. AAU Outdoor National Championships.
Dodson won eleven consecutive National Championships in the javelin throw; 1939-49. She also won national titles in the shot put - 1944, '46, and '47; adding a national championship in the discus throw at the 1946 AAU Meet. Dodson was also the gold medalist in the shot put at the U.S. AAU Indoor Championships - 1941, '45, and '46.
Like many amateur athletes of the era, Dodson and her contemporaries were denied the opportunity to compete in the 1940 and 1944 Olympic Games; a world at war would have to wait for such things. The crowning achievement of Dodson's career finally came in 1948, when she represented the United States at the Summer Olympics in London. Dodson competed in the shot put, discus, and javelin throw; she was a finalist in the javelin, finishing in fourth place - five inches from a bronze medal.
Dodson was the last U.S. athlete - male or female - to compete in three throwing events at a single Olympic Games.