BOSTON, RALPH

born May 9, 1939, Laurel, Miss., U.S. American athlete who set a world record in the long jump and was the first man to jump more than 27 feet (8.23 m). On Aug. 12, 1960, Boston jumped 26 feet 11.25 inches (8.21 m), breaking by 3 inches the world record set by Jesse Owens 25 years earlier. He then won the gold medal at Rome. On July 16, 1961, during a U.S.-Soviet meet in Moscow, he jumped 27 feet 1.75 inches (8.28 m). In 1964 he tied the world record set by the Soviet jumper Igor Ter-Ovanesyan with a jump of 27 feet 3 inches (8.31 m) and on May 29, 1965, made his longest jump, 27 feet 4.75 inches (8.35 m). Boston won the silver medal at the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo and the bronze medal at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, where Bob Beamon shattered his world record. Later that year Boston was suspended by the Amateur Athletic Union for taking a job as a television sports commentator. After his track career ended, Boston was an administrator at the University of Tennessee (Knoxville). Boston also excelled in the high and low hurdles, the high jump, and the triple jump.