King, "Micki" (Maxine J.)
Diving
b. July 26, 1944, Pontiac, MI
King began diving when she was ten. When she entered the University of Michigan in 1962, she went out for water polo and was twice an All-American goalie. She also played for two AAU national champions with the Ann Arbor Swim Club.
Dick Kimball, Michigan water sports coach, encouraged King to take up competitive diving again. After graduating, she enlisted in the Air Force, worked with the Michigan ROTC unit, and trained under Kimball. King won the national outdoor 3-meter championship in 1965, 1967, 1969, and 1970, and was also the 1-meter champion in 1967 and the platform champion in 1969. Indoors, King won the 3-meter event in 1971 and 1972, the platform event in 1965 and 1971.
A favorite going into the 1968 Olympics, she was leading in the springboard finals after eight dives, but she broke her left forearm when she hit the board on the ninth dive. Nevertheless, she performed her tenth and final dive, dropping to fourth place.
She won her gold medal in 1972, taking the lead with her eighth dive and finishing with the same reverse 1 1/2 somersault that she'd broken her arm on. King wept at the medal ceremony and commented afterward, "I've been diving longer than the girl who came in second has lived."
King retired from competition after the Olympics and became diving coach at the Air Force Academy. She was transferred to Tacoma in 1978 and worked with young divers in her spare time there before returning to the academy as men's and women's diving coach in 1983.
She later became commander of the Air Force ROTC detachment at the University of Kentucky. She retired in 1992 with the rank of colonel and became an Assistant Athletic Director at the school. King also served as president of U. S. Diving from 1990 to 1994.