John Frederick McLean (January 10, 1878 – June 4, 1955) was an All-American college football player, track and field athlete, and coach. He won a silver medal in the

110 metre hurdles The 110 metres hurdles, or 110-metre hurdles, is a hurdling track and field event for men. It is included in the athletics programme at the Summer Olympic Games. The female counterpart is the 100 metres hurdles. As part of a racing event, ten hur ...

at the 1900 Summer Olympics in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

with a time of 15.5 seconds. He was also selected as an All-American football player in 1899 while playing for the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

. He went on to coach the Knox College and

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus University of Missouri System. MU was founded in ...

football teams in the 1900s. He was dismissed from his coaching position at Missouri in January 1906 after being accused of paying money to a player. Knox College voted him into their athletic Hall of Fame in 2012.

Athlete at Michigan

McLean's hometown was

Menominee, Michigan Menominee ( ) is a city in the Upper Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 8,599 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Menominee County. Menominee is the fourth-largest city in the Upper Peninsula, behind Marquett ...

, a lumber town located in Michigan's

Upper Peninsula The Upper Peninsula of Michigan – also known as Upper Michigan or colloquially the U.P. – is the northern and more elevated of the two major landmasses that make up the U.S. state of Michigan; it is separated from the Lower Peninsula by ...

. He enrolled in the

where he became a star athlete in

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

, track and field, and baseball. He played as a substitute on Michigan's 1897 football team and played left halfback for the 1898 and 1899 teams. McLean was also a member of Michigan's track and baseball teams. In May 1899, McLean set the University of Michigan school record in the 120-yard hurdles with a time of 16-1/5 seconds. On the same day, he also broke a western intercollegiate record in the running

broad jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

by clearing 23 feet. In 1898, McLean played on Michigan's first Western Conference (as the

Big Ten Conference The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference) is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representati ...

was then known) championship football team. The Wolverines won the championship with a 12–11 victory over Chicago—a game that inspired

Louis Elbel "The Victors" is the fight song of the University of Michigan. Michigan student Louis Elbel wrote the song in 1898 after the football team's victory over the University of Chicago, which clinched an undefeated season and the Western Conferen ...

to write the

's fight song, "

The Victors "The Victors" is the fight song of the University of Michigan. Michigan student Louis Elbel wrote the song in 1898 after the football team's victory over the University of Chicago, which clinched an undefeated season and the Western Conferen ...

." McLean contributed to the win over Chicago with a kick return to the 50-yard line and a second kick return for 35 yards. In November 1899, McLean led the Wolverines in a game against eastern football power, the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

Franklin Field Franklin Field is a sports stadium in Philadelphia, United States, at the eastern edge of the University of Pennsylvania's campus. It is the home stadium for the Penn Relays, and the University of Pennsylvania's stadium for American football, foo ...

in Philadelphia. The Wolverines lost the game 11–10, but McLean's play at left halfback drew praise in newspaper accounts carried across the country. McLean made several long runs, principally on

end run In gridiron football, an end run is a running play in which the player carrying the ball tries to avoid being tackled by running outside the end (or flank) of the offensive line. It is distinct from a dive, which is a run "up the middle", or an ...

s. Michigan scored its first touchdown "wholly on a series of runs by McLean, around Pennsylvania's left end." The score came on a 22-yard end run that "set the Michigan rooters fairly wild." ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' reported that even the Penn fans showed their appreciation for McLean -- "his brilliant sprinting around Pennsylvania's ends often brought applause from the followers of the Quakers." McLean's final game for Michigan was a November 1899 match against the

University of Wisconsin A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, ...

played in front of 17,000 fans in Chicago. Newspaper accounts reported that Michigan's "crack halfback" McLean "made one of his end runs" with ten minutes to play—a forty-yard run for a touchdown. Another newspaper described McLean's final touchdown as follows: "the premier halfback, receiving the ball on the forty-yard line, bounded past the Badgers' left end, and at a high speed struck out for the goal line." After the season ended, McLean received acknowledgement with his selection as a first-team All-American, including All-American selections by ''The Philadelphia Inquirer'' and ''The Fort Wayne News.''

Olympic athlete

McLean competed for the United States in track and field events at the 1900 Summer Olympics in

. He won the silver medal in the

with a time of 15.5 seconds.

Alvin Kraenzlein Alvin Christian "Al" Kraenzlein (December 12, 1876 – January 6, 1928) was an American track-and-field athlete known as "the father of the modern hurdling technique". He was the first sportsman in the history of the Olympic games to win four i ...

took gold with a time of 15.4 seconds. McLean also took sixth place in the

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a ...

with a distance of 6.655 metres, not making it into the top five who qualified for the final, as well as the

triple jump The triple jump, sometimes referred to as the hop, step and jump or the hop, skip and jump, is a track and field event, similar to the long jump. As a group, the two events are referred to as the "horizontal jumps". The competitor runs down th ...

, in which he did not place in the top six, and the standing triple jump, in which he did not make the top four.

Coaching career

Knox

In 1901, McLean became the head football coach at Knox College, a private liberal arts college located in

Galesburg, Illinois Galesburg is a city in Knox County, Illinois, United States. The city is northwest of Peoria. At the 2010 census, its population was 32,195. It is the county seat of Knox County and the principal city of the Galesburg Micropolitan Statistical ...

. He compiled a 15–5–3 record as football coach at Knox from 1901 to 1902. McLean turned Knox into an elite football program in 1902, leading to speculation that he was recruiting ringers. McLean denied the allegation, insisting that every man on the team was "a bona fide student of the college." He was voted into the Knox–Lombard Athletic Hall of Fame in 2012. McLean won fame "by coaching little Knox college into a high place in western football."

Missouri

In 1903, McLean was hired as the head football coach at the

. He coached the

Missouri Tigers The Missouri Tigers intercollegiate athletics programs represent the University of Missouri, located in Columbia. The name comes from a band of armed Union Home Guards called the Fighting Tigers of Columbia who, in 1864, protected Columbia fro ...

for three years (1903–1905) and compiled an overall record of 9–17–1. In 1906, McLean became involved in a scandal that resulted in his dismissal as Missouri's head coach. Evidence was presented that Akerson, the star fullback on Missouri's 1904 team, was a professional who had been "hired" to serve on the team. Akerson had previously played at Knox and went on to become "one of the best individual players who was ever a member of a Tiger team." McLean paid Akerson $250 out of his own pocket, and several alumni from Kansas City were to have shared the expense. However, the others "welched," and when McLean wrote to them requesting that they pay their share, they turned over the correspondence to the university's athletic director. The news created "a real sensation" that resulted in McLean's being "dismissed in disgrace." A Nebraska newspaper called it "the biggest scandal in the history of Missouri athletics," and some even called for the abolition of football at the school.

Head coaching record

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:McLean, John 1878 births 1955 deaths 19th-century players of American football American football halfbacks American male hurdlers Knox Prairie Fire football coaches Michigan Wolverines baseball players Michigan Wolverines football players Michigan Wolverines men's track and field athletes Missouri Tigers football coaches Athletes (track and field) at the 1900 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1900 Summer Olympics Olympic silver medalists for the United States in track and field People from Menominee, Michigan Coaches of American football from Michigan Players of American football from Michigan Baseball players from Michigan Track and field athletes from Michigan