November 9, 1923

Tuskegee Institute track star Alice Coachman was born in Georgia. At the age of 16, Coachman enrolled in the high school program at Tuskegee Institute and won 10 straight national championships in the high jump and 25 other track and field championships. In 1948, she competed in her first Olympics and set an Olympic record in the high jump that stood for eight years. She was the first black woman of any nation to win an Olympic gold medal and the first American woman to win an Olympic medal in track and field. Coachman was inducted into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame and the Olympic Hall of Fame.

Read more at Encyclopedia of Alabama.

Tuskegee Institute alumnus Alice Coachman is seen breaking the women’s high jump record in the 1948 Summer Olympics in London with a leap of 5 feet, 6 1/8 inches. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, courtesy of Library of Congress)

Alice Coachman was the first black woman to win an Olympic gold medal and the first African American woman to medal in an Olympic track and field event. She began her track and field career at Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University) in Macon County. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, Alabama Sports Hall of Fame)

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