Dallas Long

Biography and cause of death of Dallas Long

Dallas Crutcher Long (June 13, 1940 – November 10, 2024) Dallas Long was an American track and field athlete, who mostly competed in the shot put. Between 1959 and 1964 he set six official and five unofficial world records. His first was at the 1959 Santa Barbara Easter Relays, the last in 1964 in the USA vs USSR dual meet. Long attended the University of Southern California.

He competed at the 1960 Summer Olympics, where he won a bronze medal behind fellow Americans Bill Nieder and Parry O’Brien. One of his coaches was Frantisek (Frank) Louda, an American-Czech who had held the European hammer throw record in the 1930s. Long returned four years later to Tokyo for the 1964 Summer Olympics and won a gold medal. Domestically he won the AAU title in 1961 and the NCAA title in 1960–62.

While a senior at North High School in Phoenix, Arizona, he set the National High School Record in the shot put. He was Track and Field News “High School Athlete of the Year” in 1958.

Long’s best mark in the shot put was a then-world record of 20.68 meters (67 ft 10 in) set at the U.S.-U.S.S.R. dual meet in 1964.

Dallas Long Later life and death

After retiring from competitions Long became a dentist and a physician specializing in emergency medicine. He served as a defense witness in the Rodney King trial against the Los Angeles Police Department police officers Laurence Powell and Stacey Koon in early 1993. In 1996 he was inducted into the National Track and Field Hall of Fame.

As of 2020, Dallas lived in Whitefish, Montana, with his wife Suzanne. He died there while under hospice care from complications of Parkinson’s disease on November 10, 2024, at the age of 84.

Source: Wikipedia