William DeHart Hubbard

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Olympic medal record
Men's athletics
Gold 1924 Paris Long jump

William DeHart Hubbard (born in Cincinnati, Ohio on November 25, 1903 - June 23, 1976) was a track and field athlete who was the first African American to win an Olympic gold medal in an individual event; the running long jump at the 1924 Paris Summer games.

He subsequently set a long jump world record of 25 feet 10¾ inches (7.89 m) at Chicago in June 1925 and equaled the world record of 9.6 seconds for the 100-yard dash at Cincinnati, Ohio a year later.

He attended and graduated from Walnut Hills High School in Cincinnati, graduated with honors from the University of Michigan where he was a three-time National Collegiate Athletic Association champion (1923 & 1925 outdoor long jump, 1925 100-yard dash) and seven-time Big Ten Conference champion in track and field (1923 & 1925 indoor 50-yard dash, 1923, 1924, & 1925 outdoor long jump, 1924 & 1925 outdoor 100-yard dash). His 1925 outdoor long jump of 25 feet 10½ inches (7.89 m) stood as the Michigan Wolverines team record until 1980, and it still stands second.[1][2] His 1925 jump of 25 feet 3½ inches (7.71 m) stood as a Big Ten Championships record until Jesse Owens broke it on with what is now the current record of 26 feet 8¼ inches (8.13 m) in 1935.[3]

He later served as a race relations adviser for the Federal Housing Authority. He died in Cleveland in 1976. Hubbard was posthumously inducted into the University of Michigan Hall of Honor in 1979; he was part of the second class inducted into the Hall of Honor.[4]

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ The Record Book (through the 2006 season). MGoBlue.com. Retrieved on 2008-01-08.
  2. ^ (2008) in Hergott, Jeremiah: Two Thousand Eight Michigan Men's Track & Field. Frye Printing Compamy. 
  3. ^ Big Ten Conference Records Book 2007-08: Men's Track and Field. Big Ten Conference, Inc. (2007). Retrieved on 2007-11-12.
  4. ^ Michigan Athletic Hall of Honor. The Regents of the University of Michigan. Retrieved on 2007-12-11.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

v • d • e
Olympic champions in men's long jump
1896: Ellery Clark • 1900: Alvin Kraenzlein • 1904: Myer Prinstein • 1906: Myer Prinstein • 1908: Frank Irons • 1912: Albert Gutterson • 1920: William Petersson • 1924: William DeHart Hubbard • 1928: Ed Hamm • 1932: Ed Gordon • 1936: Jesse Owens • 1948: Willie Steele • 1952: Jerome Biffle • 1956: Greg Bell • 1960: Ralph Boston • 1964: Lynn Davies • 1968: Bob Beamon • 1972: Randy Williams • 1976: Arnie Robinson • 1980: Lutz Dombrowski • 1984: Carl Lewis • 1988: Carl Lewis • 1992: Carl Lewis • 1996: Carl Lewis • 2000: Iván Pedroso • 2004: Dwight Phillips
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