Before he moved to Connecticut to begin his career with Connecticut Light and Power, Charles Milton MacWilliam (circled) wrestled at Cornell and earned a spot on the 1924 U.S. Olympic wrestling team. In small photo, MacWilliam in 1958 at CL&P. (Photo courtesy National Wrestling Hall of Fame)
A century ago, a future Connecticut resident participated in the 1924 Summer Olympic Games in Paris.
Cornell’s Charles Milton MacWilliam earned a spot on the U.S. Olympic wrestling team at 123 pounds at the age of 21. After his wrestling career was completed, he had a long career at Connecticut Light and Power (CL&P), retiring in 1968. Charles and his wife, Hilda, were married for 47 years and lived in Waterbury.
Charles grew up in New Jersey before attending Cornell where he graduated with a civil engineering degree. He won two varsity letters in wrestling, competing at 115 and 125 pounds for the Big Red with a dual meet record of 12-0-1.
He finished second twice in the Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association championship meet in 1923 and 1924. He did earn a spot on the 1924 U.S. Olympic wrestling team at the Olympic Trials at Madison Square Garden in New York.
He competed in one match at the Olympics in the Bantamweight division (123 pounds), losing to Sweden’s Axel Larsson. It was a single-elimination tournament although wrestlers that reached the semifinals wrestled additional matches to determine medals.
After the Olympics, he joined CL&P in 1926 and worked on the Rocky River pumped storage hydroelectric project on the Housatonic River in New Milford, Connecticut, the first pumped storage facility in the nation. He left CL&P in 1929 but rejoined the company in 1930 and worked with the company for the next 38 years.
After various assignments at Montville Station, a oil-fired generation facility, and in the general operating department, Charles was promoted to hydraulic engineer in 1951. In 1958, he was promoted to the newly-created post of Structural Engineer. He was a Construction Manager when he retired from the company in 1968.
Charles was active in the community, too. He was appointed to the newly-formed Water Resource Commission in 1957 by Connecticut Gov. Abraham Ribicoff and reappointed to the commission in 1963 and 1967 by Gov. John Dempsey. Charles passed away in 1975.
