Pat O'Callaghan
Dr. Patrick "Pat" O'Callaghan (September 15, 1905 - December 1, 1991), was an Irish athlete and Olympic gold medallist. O'Callaghan was born in Derrygallon near Kanturk in County Cork. O'Callaghan studied medicine at the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin. Following his graduation in 1926 he joined the RAF Medical Corps. He returnd to Ireland in 1928 and set up his own practice in Clonmel, County Tipperary. In 1927 he made his hammer-throwing debut in Dublin. The following year at the Olympic Games in Amsterdam he won the hammer-throwing championship. Thus he became the first person to win a gold medal while representing Irish Free State. He retained his record four years later at the Olympics in Los Angeles where he won Ireland's second gold medal. He was not allowed to compete at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin because the International Amateur Athletic Federation refused to recognise the Irish association. During his career Dr. O’Callaghan won six Irish championships: the hammer, shot, discus, 56 lb (25 kg) shot for height and for distance, and high jump. He achieved an unofficial world record for the shot with a throw of 195 feet 5 inches (59.55 m) in 1937 at the Cork county championships, but as the IAAF still refused to recognise the Irish association, the throw was not accepted. It stood unofficially until 1949. Dr. O'Callaghan built up a busy medical practice in his adopted town of Clonmel for over sixty years until he retired in the late 1980s.
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