Herb excelled in sports throughout high school. Then at the University of Pittsburgh, he, along with another African-American became the first to make the football team. He is the only Olympic medalist to score a touchdown against Notre Dame. However, track and field was his area of strength. He went on to capture three national amateur athletic union championships for the long jump and five intercollegiate championships, one in the 100-yard dash. In the process he set a Pitt long jump record that lasted 23 years. Then in the 1948 London Olympic games, Herb reached his pinnacle by winning bronze medal in the long jump.

JOHN WOODRUFF

“The Day” was August 4, 1936, when Woodruff pulled what was then called “the most daring move ever seen on the track” to win the 800 meters gold medal in the 1936 Olympic Games, the last ones held before World War II. John thought he might get home for in the summer of 1936, but he won the Allegheny Mountain Assn. meet 880 and advanced to the Olympic semifinal trails at Harvard Stadium. A victory moved him to the finals at Randalls Island, N.Y., where he won again and was on his to way to Berlin. To get that win, he had to outrun a standout field of American and nationally acclaimed distance runners. John ran a 1:51 and was on his way to Europe.

When you mention top all-around athletes in our nation’s history, certainly the name of Milt Campbell has to be up there with Jim Thorpe, and Rafer Johnson, among others. Campbell was an Olympic decathlon champion but track and field wasn’t the only sport in which he excelled. He was also outstanding in football and played in the Canadian and National Football Leagues. He was an All-American swimmer was also a national competitor in karate. Milt also was a national champion in the high hurdles, he set a world 120-yard high hurdles record of 13.4 in 1957 and held the world indoors best of 7.0 for 60-yard high hurdleswhile still in high school and.

A two-time Olympic gold medallist, Evans set a world record in the 400-meters at the 1968 games that stood for over 20 years. He was also a member of the 4x400-meter relay team that also set a world record on its way to winning the gold medal in Mexico City in 1968. In 1983, Evans was inducted into the USA Track and Field Hall of Fame and in 1989; he became a member of the Olympic Hall of Fame.

EDITH MCQUIRE

Edith McGuire Duvall is an Olympic Gold Medalist (track). She won a gold medal in the 200-meter, and two silver medals in the 100 and 400 meter runs at the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games. She established herself as a sprinter after setting a Pan-American Games record for the 100-meter run. 1964 was an outstanding year for Edith. She establishes six records: a world record in the 70 yard dash breaking the one set by Wilma Rudolph; she equaled an American record in the 100 meter run; set and Olympic tryout record in the 200 meter run and she set an American outdoor record in the 220 yard dash. At the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo, the gold medal she won in the 200-meter run broke the record set by Wilma Rudolph.

It’s been 52 years since Harrison Dillard became the only man in Olympic history to win the 100-meter dash and the 110-meter hurdles, and there’s not one in sight who is likely to match that achievement. Nor is it likely that anyone else will win 82 consecutive 110-meter hurdles races, a record that Mr. Dillard has held for 45 years. At one point, he simultaneously owned 11 World, Olympic and American records. Those are only the brightest highlights of Dillard’s incredible career.

On the way toward being inducted into the National Track & Field Hall of Fame and the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame, Wyomia Tyus made coming in first a habit. There’s one first, however, that set her above the world’s competitors in the sprints. In the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, she became the first runner in history-female or male-to win the gold medal in a sprint event for eh second consecutive Olympiad. She achieved that by winning gold in the 100 meters dash in 1964 in Tokyo and then repeating that feat four years later.

Alice Coachman was the first African-American woman to win an Olympic gold medal and the only American woman to win a gold medal in the 1948 Olympics in London. When she was young, blacks could not participate in organized athletic activities in Southern schools and YMCAs. Therefore, Alice trained for sprint events in fields and dirt roads and jumped barefoot at a neighborhood playground. In 1939, at the age of 16, she received a scholarship to attend Tuskegee Preparatory School. Before classes began she competed in the women’s track and field national championship. She broke the high school and collegiate high jump records without wearing shoes. Also, at Tuskegee, she ran on the national champion 4/100-meter relay team in 1941 and 1942. In 1943, she won the AAU nationals in the running high jump and the fifty-yard dash.

Tommie was the 200-meter champion in the 19th Olympiad in Mexico City with a time of 19.83 seconds, which was a world record until 1979 and an Olympic record until 1984. Yet with God-given talent, and encouragement to excel, Tommie Smith was propelled into human rights spokesman ship long before it became a popular cause. Cheered by some jeered by others, and ignored by many more, Tommie Smith made a commitment to dedicate his life, even at great personal risk to champion the cause of African-American-sociologically,, educationally, morally, athletically, financially, and spiritually. To the this day, since the “Stand for Victory, Tommie Smith remains as committed and as dedicated to principles which are God-blessed.

REGINALD PEARMAN

What did Dr. Reginald Pearman, a 1952 Olympian, like most about running? “Winning, “ he said. “It was all about winning. Winning was the objective and being able to attain an objective gave some kind of psychic or emotional satisfaction. Some guys like to run: I like to win.” In 1947, Dr. Pearman won three important collegiate championships and qualified for the 1948 Olympics in London, England, in the half mile. The came one of the deepest disappointments and athlete could ever experience. He couldn’t compete in the Olympics because he suffered an Achilles tendon injury in the Olympic Trials.

Send him your tired, your poor, your wretched refuse and Wilbur Ross will make record breakers out of the. He has been doing it for decades as a high school coach, college coach, international coach, and currently as a guru. Ross is a man of infinite ingenuity and sublime self-confidence. People use to laugh when he said that Renaldo Nehemiah had not right running the high hurdles in more than 13 seconds. The Nehemiah took him on as a personal coach and one month later he became the first hurdler in history to smash the 1-second barrier! Nobody laughs anymore. Check the kind of people who have come to Ross for answers: Carl Lewis, Greg Foster, Willie Gault, Roger Kingdom, Tony Dees, Michael Johnson, and Andre Cason, to name a few.