Irving Folwartshny

Irving Henry "Shorty" Folsworth (born Folwartshny; March 16, 1914 – July 27, 1994) was an American hammer thrower and weight thrower. He was a seven-time United States champion and briefly held the indoor world record in men's weight throw.

Biography Like his fellow hammer thrower Don Favor, Irving Folwartshny was an alumnus of Deering High School in Portland, Maine. Subsequently, he studied at Rhode Island State College, where Fred Tootell, 1924 Olympic hammer throw champion, was track and field coach; Tootell's other pupils included Henry Dreyer and Bill Rowe, both of whom also became national hammer throw champions. but his breakthrough year was 1936, his sophomore year at Rhode Island, when his results improved rapidly. as a world record Folwartshny's throw was short-lived, as Dreyer threw 58 ft in (17.79 m) only seven days later; but as a championship record it lasted until 1951.

During the 1936 outdoor season Folwartshny repeatedly threw the hammer over , smashing his 1935 best of . At the national championships Folwartshny threw 167 ft in (50.90 m) and took second behind Rowe; like his fellow Rhode Island throwers Rowe and Dreyer, he was one of the favorites to qualify for the American Olympic team. at the Trials, Dreyer and Rowe took first and second, but the third and final Olympic spot went to Don Favor as Folwartshny only managed 157 ft in (47.93 m) and placed sixth. He also won the IC4A indoor weight throw and successfully defended his outdoor IC4A hammer title. In addition, he became national (AAU) outdoor champion for the first time, throwing the hammer 173 ft in (52.92 m) and beating runner-up Bill Lynch by seven feet. He won his third consecutive IC4A hammer title with a throw of 178 ft in (54.50 m), then the second-best mark in IC4A history behind his own coach, Fred Tootell, who had thrown 181 ft in (55.33 m) when he won in 1923. Folwartshny also repeated as AAU hammer champion, throwing in that meet; it was the best throw at the national championships since Pat Ryan's meeting record of 183 ft in (55.87 m) from 1914. he set his personal best of in) in Osnabrück on August 21, although he still only placed second to Germany's reigning Olympic champion Karl Hein.

Like Dreyer before him, Folwartshny represented the New York Athletic Club after graduating from Rhode Island State. and Folwartshny also lost his outdoor hammer title that year, only placing fourth with a throw of 169 ft in (51.75 m) as Chester Cruikshank won. Folwartshny anglicized his surname to Folsworth before the 1944 national indoor championships, where he took second behind Dreyer in the weight throw. As Folsworth, he won the AAU hammer title for a fourth and final time in 1946, throwing ; it was the eleventh consecutive time he had placed in the top four. Listed as and as a collegiate sophomore in 1936, The Association of Track and Field Statisticians gives his height as .

Legacy Folsworth was inducted in the University of Rhode Island Athletic Hall of Fame in 1973, in the same class as Rowe and Dreyer, and in the Maine Sports Hall of Fame in 1981, in the same class as Favor.