Larry Griswold, Date of Birth, Date of Death
TweetLarry Griswold
Date of Birth: 17-Sep-1905
Date of Death: 24-Aug-1996
Profession: trampolinist
Nationality: United States
Zodiac Sign: Virgo 
About Larry Griswold
- Laurens (Larry) V.
- Griswold (September 17, 1905 – August 24, 1996), known as "The Diving Fool", was an American gymnast & entertainer who was involved in the early development of the trampoline. Griswold was a college level gymnast and tumbler while studying physical education at the University of Iowa.
- While coaching at an acrobatic school in New York, he enjoyed performing in vaudeville shows.
- However, he decided to return to Iowa to become a teacher and in 1931, he became a gymnastics coach at the University of Iowa where he met George Nissen who was also a skilled gymnast & tumbler. In 1933, Griswold organized many of the skilled athletes at the university into a circus team, putting on shows.
- He also developed an act in the swimming pool which involved Griswold clowning and performing tricks on the diving board.
- This would later be developed into an entertaining routine which he performed professionally for years.
- In one of his most famous routines he would pretend to be a drunken, uncoordinated man who was constantly staggering off of the diving board and its ladder as he ostensibly got ready for a big dive.
- Audiences would gasp as he repeatedly "fell" from the board only to seemingly catch himself at the last moment.
- Griswold & Nissen worked together to develop the first prototype trampoline.
- Later they set up a company, the Griswold-Nissen Trampoline & Tumbling Company, to manufacture trampolines.
- However, initially sales were slow and Griswold sold out as his entertainment career was starting to thrive.
- In 1945, he found that he had to limit his immersion in water for health reasons and so changed his routine to use a trampoline disguised as a swimming pool in his diving act.
- This allowed him to play a wider variety of venues. In the 1950s and 1960s, he took his physical clowning & acrobatic act all across the United States becoming one of the top draws in show business.
- He also performed on television variety shows, including the Frank Sinatra Show, The Ed Sullivan Show, Hollywood Palace and the Jackie Gleason Show.
- He toured internationally performing lavish shows in the United Kingdom, France and Japan before settling down for several years as a regular performer in the Folies Bergère.
- Griswold's interest in trampolining and education did not stop with the development of his entertainment career.
- In 1941, he wrote Trampoline Tumbling, the first textbook for the sport of trampolining.
- In 1971, with George Nissen, he founded the United States Tumbling & Trampoline Association (USTA).
- They honoured him by inducting him into their Hall of Fame and by the naming of the Griswold-Nissen Cup for outstanding trampolinists. In 1973, Griswold had a fall while performing in Chicago and suffered a career-ending injury.
- His show continued with replacement performers he had trained in preparation for his retirement.
Read more at Wikipedia