Melvin E. Walker (April 27, 1914 – November 9, 2000, in

Strongsville, Ohio Strongsville is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States, and a suburb of Cleveland. As of the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census, the city population was 44,750. The city's nickname 'Crossroads of the Nation,' originated from the Baltim ...

) was an American

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping events ...

athlete specializing in

high jump The high jump is a track and field event in which competitors must jump unaided over a horizontal bar placed at measured heights without dislodging it. In its modern, most-practiced format, a bar is placed between two standards with a crash mat f ...

. He was the co-national champion with

Dave Albritton David Donald Albritton (April 13, 1913 – May 14, 1994) was an American athlete, teacher, coach, and state legislator. He had a long athletic career that spanned three decades and numerous titles and was one of the first high jumpers to use th ...

in 1938. He finished a non-qualifying fourth place in the 1936 Olympic Trials. That year, while representing

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

, he had tied with his Ohio State teammate Albritton for the

NCAA Championship The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges and ...

. On August 12, 1937, he set the

world record A world record is usually the best global and most important performance that is ever recorded and officially verified in a specific skill, sport, or other kind of activity. The book ''Guinness World Records'' and other world records organization ...

for high jump in

Malmö Malmö (, ; da, Malmø ) is the largest city in the Swedish county (län) of Scania (Skåne). It is the third-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm and Gothenburg, and the sixth-largest city in the Nordic region, with a municipal populat ...

, clearing . The record would stand until June 17, 1941, when it was beaten by Lester Steers. Walker benefitted from a rule change that had previously outlawed diving, or clearing the bar first with his head. Walker used a variation of the

Western roll The Western roll was a high jump technique invented by George Horine of Stanford University. This technique was succeeded by the straddle. History It is said that George Horine came to invent the Western roll because the high jump pit at Stanford ...

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Walker, Mel 1914 births 2000 deaths American male high jumpers World record setters in athletics (track and field)