January 19, 1960

Track and field star Al Joyner Jr. was born in East St. Louis, Illinois. Joyner won the gold medal at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles for the triple jump, the first American in eight decades to win the event and the first African American to do so. He attended Arkansas State University (ASU), where he later returned as a coach, and was the winner of the prestigious Jim Thorpe award, honoring the best American field athlete at the Olympics. He also married now-deceased track legend Florence Griffith, who came to be known as “Flo Jo” after her marriage to Joyner. His sister, Jackie Joyner Kersee, is also an Olympian.