| Medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
Josiah McCracken |
||
| Men's athletics | ||
| Competitor for the United States | ||
| Olympic Games | ||
| Silver | 1900 Paris | Shot put |
| Bronze | 1900 Paris | Hammer throw |
Josiah Calvin McCracken (March 30, 1874 – February 15, 1962)[1] was an American football player and track and field athlete.
Contents |
McCracken, nicknamed Joe, was born into a devout Presbyterian family in Lincoln, Tennessee. His earliest known Ulster-Scots ancestors settled in Pennsylvania before the French & Indian War (Seven Years War). When Joe was 8 years old, his parents moved to Garnett, Kansas, and by the time he reached 17, the family was living in Sterling, Kansas.
In 1896 Joe McCracken left the Cooper College preparatory program (known today as Sterling College) to attend the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Finance. At the end of his first academic year he transferred to the Penn School of Medicine.
While at Penn, McCracken was an all around student athlete, playing varsity football four years, track four years (captain his senior year) and was a member of the gymnastics team. On May 31, 1898, he set a World Record in the hammer throw with a distance of 46.83m (153–8 ft) at a meet in New Jersey. In 1899 he was named a Walter Camp College Football All American [1] at the guard position. He won a silver and bronze medal at the 1900 Paris Olympics [2]. McCracken was elected president of his class all four years, was president of the Christian Association three years, president of the Houston Club one year and an associate editor of the student newspaper, The Pennsylvanian. A New York Times article of April 11, 1901 described him as "the University of Pennsylvania's best all around athlete and the most popular man at the university..." When Joe graduated in 1901 and while receiving his diploma the whole audience rose to their feet and loudly applauded, an ovation never before given in the history of the University.
McCracken played varsity football at Penn primarily as an offensive fullback and defensive guard from 1897 to 1900. During 1899 he played alongside John Outland (Outland Trophy) and A. R. Kennedy, two transfer students from the University of Kansas football program. McCracken, Outland and Kennedy were known around Philadelphia's Franklin Field as the "Kansas Musketeers".
McCracken's previous world record in the hammer throw earned him a spot on the U.S. Olympic team and a trip to the 1900 Summer Olympics in Paris. During the Paris Olympics, The New York Times reported on July 16, 1900, that the French Olympic Committee had shifted several final events to Sunday and that American athletes including Josiah McCracken from Penn and Robert Garrett from Princeton University refused for religious reasons to compete in any Olympic events that were scheduled on Sunday. McCracken and Garrett were replaced with athletes from Hungary and Greece. Richard Sheldon also representing the USA, elected to participate on Sunday and won the gold medal in the shot put. Fortunately, McCracken's and Garrett's Saturday qualifying results in the shot put were good enough to earn them silver and bronze medals respectively in the shot put event. McCracken also received the bronze medal in the hammer throw.
After graduating from Penn, McCracken remained involved in college football as both a game official and coach. During his medical residency and internship period, McCracken was a football referee, linesman or time-keeper for many Ivy League varsity games, including the Harvard vs. Yale games of 1902 and 1904. In 1903, he returned to Kansas for one season as the Cooper College football coach. McCracken Field at Sterling College's Smisor Stadium is named in his honor. Also in 1903, three Penn 1900 Olympic athletes—Dr. Alexander Grant, George W. Orton and Dr. Joe McCracken—established Camp Tecumseh [3], a residential summer camp in New Hampshire for young men. The camp’s mission now as it was then, is “to make good boys better” through healthy athletic competition.
McCracken completed his medical internship at Columbia University and his medical residency at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital. In 1906, the University of Pennsylvania Christian Association sent McCracken to China to establish a Christian medical school in Canton. McCracken served as president of the University of Canton Medical School from 1907 to 1913 and then as dean of the Pennsylvania Medical School of St. John's University in Shanghai from 1914 to 1942. McCracken spent a total of 36 years in China training Chinese doctors and improving existing medical schools. When the Japanese occupied China in 1942, Dr. McCracken and his family were expelled and placed aboard an Italian ship in Shanghai. Their escape from China required the assistance of the Swiss Consulate. Their passage home took them down the coast of southeastern Asia, across the Indian Ocean to Mozambique, Africa. In Mozambique they were transferred to a Swedish ship that took them around the Cape of Good Hope to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and finally to New York. During World War II McCracken served as a Major in the U.S. Public Health Reserves. Joe's wife Helen and his daughter Mary both died in the United States during the war. After the war McCracken returned to Shanghai for another year before having to return to the United States for health reasons. During retirement McCracken continued to raise funds for the hospitals and medical schools in China until the takeover in 1952 by the communist government.
The McCracken's had eight children,seven whom were born in China. A son of Joe and Helen, Dr. Josiah C. McCracken Jr., was a Penn football running back in the 1930s,whose nickname was the "Shanghai Express." During World War II Joe Jr. rose to the rank of Major in the U.S. Army Medical Corp and received the Bronze Star for his service in the southwest Pacific.
In May 1952 Joe Sr. returned to Kansas to visit relatives and the graves of his parents. While in Sterling he decided to sell his parents' farm. He donated the proceeds from the sale of the family farm to Sterling College in appreciation for what the school had done for him and other young people since then.
Joe McCracken Sr. died in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania, on February 15, 1962, at nearly 88 years of age, and is buried alongside his wife Helen and daughter Dr. Mary McCracken in Woodlawn Cemetery, Bronx, NY. Also buried in Woodlawn Cemetery are several of his distant relatives who had changed the spelling of the McCracken surname to MacCracken, including Henry Mitchell MacCracken, Chancellor of New York University, who conceived the idea of a Hall of Fame for Great Americans; and his sons Dr. Henry Noble MacCracken [4], President of Vassar College; and Dr. John Henry MacCracken, President of Lafayette College.[5]
On May 23, 1956, Joe was elected to the University of Pennsylvania Track Hall of Fame. On November 11, 2000, he was inducted into the University of Pennsylvania Athletic Hall of Fame.
During 2008 the University of Pennsylvania Christian Association established the Dr. Josiah C. McCracken Society [6].
In 2009 Joe McCracken was nominated for induction into the Kansas Sports Hall of Fame so he could take his place along side the other two Kansas Musketeers Kennedy and Outland previously inducted.
|
|||||