Charles William Paddock (August 11, 1900 – July 21, 1943) was an American athlete and two-time
Olympic champion.[2][3]
Biography
Paddock was born in
Gainesville, Texas, to Charles H. and Lulu (Robinson) Paddock. His family moved to
Pasadena, California, when he was a child. After serving in
World War I as a lieutenant of field artillery in the
U.S. Marines, Paddock studied at the
University of Southern California.[4] There he became a member of the track and field team, and excelled in the sprint events. He won the 100 and 200 m in the first major sporting event after the war, the 1919
Inter-Allied Games, in which soldiers of the Allied nations competed against each other. Paddock was the first person named "The fastest man alive".
In 1920, Paddock represented his country at the
1920 Summer Olympics in
Antwerp. In Belgium, he had his greatest successes, winning the 100 m final, while placing second in the 200 m event. With the American 4 × 100 m relay team, Paddock won a third Olympic medal. Paddock became famous for his unusual finishing style, leaping towards the finish line at the end of the race.
The next year, he ran the 110
yd, which is slightly more than 100 m, in 10.2 seconds. It was not until 1956 that the
world record for the 100 m became lower than Paddock's time over 110 yard. Paddock broke or equaled several other world records over Imperial distances.
At the
1924 Olympics, Paddock again qualified for both the 100 and 200 m finals, but he was less successful than four years earlier; he finished 5th in the 100 m and won another silver medal in the 200 m. Paddock was not a part of the American relay team. In Chariots of Fire, the 1981 Oscar-winning film about those races, Paddock was portrayed by
Dennis Christopher. In 1928, Paddock participated in his
third Olympics, but did not reach the 200 m final.[2]
During his athletic activities, Paddock also held management positions in several newspapers; his father-in-law was newspaper publisher
Charles H. Prisk. In 1926, Paddock appeared in The Campus Flirt, a black-and-white silent film (now lost) featuring another Texas native, Paramount starlet
Bebe Daniels.[5] Paddock served on the personal staff of Major General
William P. Upshur beginning at the end of
World War I. An autobiography, entitled The Fastest Human, was published in 1932.[1]
^E. R. Bills. Texas Far & Wide: The Tornado with Eyes, Gettysburg's Last Casualty, The Celestial Skipping Stone and Other Tales. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2017.