Sport: Athletics

Hometown: Hillsboro, TX

Biography:  Rafer Johnson was born on Aug. 18, 1935 in Hillsboro, Texas, about 55 miles south of Dallas. At Kingsburg High School, Johnson was a superb all-around athlete, winning varsity letters in football, baseball, basketball and track. He averaged nine yards a carry as a halfback in leading the team to three league championships, scored 17 points a game in basketball and was a .400 hitter for the baseball team. But he was even better in track and field. As a high school star in four sports, he decided to compete exclusively in track, he chose the decathlon. Johnson already had the world record, three national AAU championships and a silver medal in the Olympics on his resume when he competed in the 1960 Olympics. Missing was the gold. Johnson led his friend and UCLA teammate by 67 points going into the final event on the night of Sept. 6, 1960. He had won the gold medal, setting a then-Olympic record of 8,392 points in the process. He won the Pan-American Games in Mexico City in 1955. Returning to Kingsburg, he scored a world-record 7,985 point at a welcome-home meet, breaking Mathias' mark by 98 points. In 1956, he won his first national decathlon championship. Johnson, At the age of 25, Johnson had fulfilled his high school dream. He received the 1960 Sullivan Award for being the outstanding collegiate or Olympic athlete of the year and was named the Associated Press Athlete of the Year. He is a member of the National Track and Field and U.S. Olympic Halls of Fame. In 1984, 24 years after his gold-medal performance, Johnson again participated in the Olympics. As the final torchbearer, he climbed up the stairs at the Los Angeles Coliseum and lit the flame that symbolized the opening of the Games.