According to the yellowed press clippings from the summer of 1970, Scott Hadley was on his way to something big – a successful life, standing in the community, or so it seemed.

Back then, nearly four decades ago, the newspapers and TV stations covered his exploits as a swimmer, especially when the lanky and lean 15-year-old swam 19 miles across Clear Lake, the largest freshwater lake in California, in 11 hours and 53 minutes.

Fifteen boats followed Hadley in the water. A representative from the Amateur Athletic Union was there to certify the record. Sports Illustrated put him in its "Faces In the Crowd" section 19 days later.

It was a simple time for Hadley. He got into the water. He stroked and kicked and breathed. The rest took care of itself.

Hadley knew important people in politics and business and was on a first-name basis with Debbie Meyer and Mark Spitz, Olympic swimming superstars. While still a teenager, the 6-foot-1 Hadley was ranked ninth in the world among marathon swimmers. At Encina High School, he was elected student body president only weeks after transferring from Sacramento High.

These days, it's a different story, a different Hadley.

People look right past him. He's 53, has fought off his demons with cocaine, and has been in and out of homelessness. He often sleeps alone along the American River with a few possessions and the cell phone his sister gave him.

"I'm just relaxing under a tree. It's probably 15 degrees cooler under here," he said by phone the other day. "I'm watching the river go by. It's very serene."

Practically everyone in the family has cut him off except sister Dana Hadley, who says she feels bad when she helps him and worse when she doesn't.

"It's just heartbreaking. He burned many, many bridges," she said. "It was a bane to my mom until she died. I cannot tell you the emotions she went through until she finally said, 'You have to stay away.' "

Politically conservative and a devout Catholic, Scott Hadley eschews government handouts and says he chooses to live a pared down life. He doesn't own a car. He stretches his money by eating the $2.99 special at Del Taco: two burritos, a taco and a small drink.

Maybe it was a curse that the high point in his life came 38 years ago, and that he could never seem to top it or, at least, build on it.

"To him, it's his big accomplishment. It picks him up and makes him feel like somebody," said sister Dana, who witnessed the swim. "He got praise from my dad. Afterwards, dad was so happy, he bought (Scott) a car."

He swam Lake Berryessa two years later. In 1973, sponsors flew him to Naples, Italy, where he placed ninth against the 125 best distance swimmers in the world. He used each swim to raise thousands for charities for the mentally ill.

But it didn't take long before people forgot him. In the spring of 1974, he tried to run clear across the country, attracting media attention once more, only to drop out in pain after a few days.

"Sometimes I had like delusions of grandeur," he said. "I wanted to run across the country and meet President Nixon. But I dropped out. I just couldn't do it."

These days, with a spotty employment history that includes a career as a funeral home embalmer and, more recently, a caregiver for the elderly, Hadley is struggling to get on track.

Often, he will think back to that swim in 1970 in Clear Lake, how the whole world seemed to be watching, how it began in the dark at 5:22 a.m. and how, halfway into it, it was too hard, too much, and he wanted to quit.

"I told myself, 'Wow, this is harder than I thought.' At the halfway point, I told my dad I wanted to get out of the water," Hadley recalled. "My dad was in the boat and he said, 'We didn't train this hard for you to quit.' "

After high school, he enrolled at American River College, but he didn't know what he wanted to do. He knew there was no money in swimming. His part-time job at a funeral home turned into a 15-year career as an embalmer.

"Then I was introduced to this white stuff called cocaine," Hadley said. "I was losing money. I lost my job. That whole beautiful life I had was gone."

By his early 40s, a disillusioned Hadley landed at a mission in Santa Barbara, the same town where he had run for City Council. He wanted to kill himself.

"For me, it felt like being in a barrel. You try to climb out and then you slip back down," he said. "It was a whole downward spiral. I was angry at God. I said, 'Why have you done this to me?' But I had really done it to myself. I blamed everybody else."

Hadley's life is not a comeback story, at least not yet. In swimming terms, he's struggling to stay afloat.

He can recall that 1970 swim as if it were yesterday, how his mother put together a blend of liver and honey he could eat in the water for energy, how the only thing he wanted after 12 hours in the lake was a plain old hot dog.

After that, things get hazy. The choices he made are hard to explain or even recall.

He has filled out applications for caregiver jobs. He shaves every day in a public restroom. He dresses neatly. And he waits for answers under that shade tree, watching the river go by.

Once in a while, he'll jump in. The strokes and kicks are stiffer now, the breaths more labored, but he's still that swimmer who made history, the one whose story remains alive in those yellowed press clippings.

"I'm never really alone," he said. "I have what I believe to be God with me. I have memories of good people, and memory is a form of companionship."

Call The Bee's Blair Anthony Robertson, (916) 321-1099.