It’s one thing to be a local celebrity but to carry international recognition is an entirely different animal.
Just ask Nancy Hogshead-Makar.
By the time she was 22, she was at the top of her game. A swimmer with an Olympic gold medal, a healthy following and countless speaking engagements, Hogshead-Makar was among the most recognizable female athletes in the world.
“It was so surreal at that time,” Hogshead-Makar said. “Everywhere I went I would get recognized. I couldn’t even make a collect call without the operator getting flustered.”
Today, she remains highly active, though her energy has been refocused. Married, a mother and pregnant with identical twin girls, Hogshead-Makar is an attorney and law professor at Florida Coastal School of Law where she teaches sports law classes.
“I’m really proud of the work I’m able to do now,” she told Daily Record writer J. Brooks Terry in her small but cozy office at the school. “Making the transition from being an attorney to an educator has allowed me to develop policy and influence change through being an expert witness or writing pieces for various publications.”
A cursory scan of Hogshead-Makar’s Workspace more than proves her critical acclaim continued after she got out of the pool. Awards and letters of congratulations and thanks are numerous. Photographs stretch wall to wall.
“But I don’t ever think of it as, ‘This is what I was doing then and this is what I’m doing now,’” she said. “My interests and accomplishments are what make me me. I’m proud of them all.”