Darrow Hooper

Olympic medal record
Men’s Athletics
Competitor for  United States
Silver	1952 Helsinki	Shot put

Clarence Darrow Hooper (born 30 January 1932) is an American athlete who competed mainly in the shot put.

In 1949 he graduated from North Side High School in Fort Worth, Texas, and went on to attend Texas A&M University. He won the NCAA shot put title in 1951. By the time he graduated from college, he had a wife and two children. He competed for the United States in the 1952 Summer Olympics held in Helsinki, Finland in the shot put. Hooper's last throw was just two centimeters away from winning the gold medal: Parry O’Brien's shot put measured 17.41 (57' 1 1/2"), while Hooper's measured 17.39m (57' 3/4") Hooper won the silver medal.^[1]

In the Olympic trials, Hooper had beaten O'Brien with an almost mirror image of the Olympics, 17.41m listed as (57' 1 3/8") while O'Brien shot putted 17.38 (57' 1/2"). It was O'Brien's last defeat before an unprecedented 116 straight victories over the next 3 years, 364 days.^[2][3] Both athletes left Jim Fuchs, the World Record holder at the time, relegated to third place with a 17.36m. That ended Fuchs' string of 88 consecutive consecutive victories that dated back to 1949.^[1]

References

1. ^ ^{a b} http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/summer/1952/ATH/mens-shot-put.html
2. ^ http://www.usatf.org/statistics/champions/OlympicTrials/HistoryOfTheOlympicTrials.pdf
3. ^ http://articles.latimes.com/2007/apr/23/local/me-obrien23

Persondata
Name	Hooper, Darrow
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	30 January 1932
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death