National High School Records Through the Years

Boys Outdoor Record – Long Jump

Jesse Owens (East Technical High School, Cleveland, Ohio)

Performance – 24 feet, 11 ¼ inches

Date – June 3, 1933

Place – Cleveland, Ohio (John Adams Field)

Meet – Senate League Championships 

Previous Record – 24-10 by Winfield (Skinny) Whipple, of Arkadelphia, Arkansas, in Texarkana, Arkansas, April 10, 1933

Jesse Owens was of course a legendary figure in the Olympics and in college. He was the same in high school, where at one time he held the national records for 100 yards, 100 meters, 200 meters, 220 yards, and in his signature event, the long jump. Owens grew up in Alabama, until his parents took the family north to Ohio for better opportunity. He went to Cleveland East Tech, a trade school on the East Side of that industrial city. When Owens began his senior season of 1933, the national record in the LJ was 24-2 ½, by Ed Hamm, of Lonoke, Arkansas, the 1928 Olympic champion. Owens exceeded that distance numerous times that spring, but alas, the goalposts were moved on April 10 when another Arkansan, Skinny Whipple, of Arkadelphia, pushed the record all the way out to 24-10. Owens jumped 24-3 later that month, 24-3 ½ at District, 24-3 ¾ to win the Ohio state meet in May. Not enough. Then at the City Championships aka the Senate League, 92 years ago this week, he did 24-3 ¾ and 24-6, with one attempt left. In front of a packed stadium of some 3,000 fans, he nailed it, 24-11 ¼, setting a high school record that lasted 16 years. (George Brown, of Los Angeles, jumped 25-2 ½ in 1949. The boys’ HSR in the LJ stayed in California for the next 30 years, until Carl Lewis, from Willingboro, New Jersey, jumped 26-6 in 1979.) Two years after this, at the Big Ten Championships, Owens, then a student at Ohio State, set a world record, 26-8 ¼, that lasted 25 years.    

National High School Records Through the Years appears once a week, compiled and written by a track historian, Jack Pfeifer (Lake Oswego, Oregon). Inquiries may be directed to him by email (jack.pfeifer@gmail.com).