April 13, 1906

Eddie Hamm was born in Lonoke (Lonoke County). Hamm was a state- and world-class athlete in high school and college who competed in the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam. He set a world record in the long jump, becoming the first Arkansan to win a gold medal. The Atlanta Journal called him “the South’s first world champion in any sport,” and he was inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame in 1971.

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