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http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4715

Alfred Carlton Gilbert: He Challenged Us to Think as We Played -- Part I
by Steven Brockerman (June 27, 2006)

Hey! C’mon. I wanna show you my toys.

This is my American Flyer set. It really smokesâ€â€

http://www.pacificu.edu/news/detail.cfm ... EGORY_ID=1

Four Athletes And Coach Inducted Into Hall of Fame

An Olympic gold medalist, a three-sport standout and the school's winningest women's basketball coach headline the 2007 inductees into the Pacific University Athletic Hall of Fame

FOREST GROVE - An Olympic gold medalist, a three-sport standout and the winningest coach in Pacific women's basketball history lead the 2007 induction class of the Pacific University Athletic Hall of Fame.

A.C. Gilbert, Lisa Harings and coach David Olmsted headline the class, which will be inducted in the Hall of Fame on Sat., Oct. 20. Joining the three are baseball standout Leon Meade and record-holding quarterback Ralph Nickerson.

The induction ceremony will be held on Sat., Oct. 20, 7:00 p.m., at Pacific's Taylor-Meade Performing Arts Center. Admission to the ceremony is free. An invitation-only dinner for inductees and current hall of fame members will be held prior to the ceremony in the Pacific Athletic Center.

A.C. Gilbert competed on Pacific teams at the turn of the 20th century, including for two years while a student at the University's preparatory school, Tualatin Academy. Gilbert excelled at football, wrestling, boxing and track and field. He trained in 1902 under the legendary Bill Hayward and in 1903 led the Pacific track team to the state collegiate championship. In 1903, The Oregonian lauded Gilbert as "the best quarterback to be found in Oregon." Gilbert transferred to Yale in 1904 and in 1908 won the Olympic gold medal in the pole vault. His innovations in track and field, including using a flexible bamboo pole and digging a hole in which he inserted his pole for stability, were forerunners of current practices in the sport. As Gilbert did not earn his degree from Pacific, Gilbert is being inducted in the "honorary" category.

http://159.54.226.83/apps/pbcs.dll/arti ... 90412/1018

AREA COLLEGES SPOTLIGHT: A.C. GILBERT
Pacific inducts inventor into hall of fame
Erector Set creator was an Olympic gold medalist in 1908

CHRIS HAGAN
Statesman Journal
September 19, 2007

Noted Salem toy inventor A.C. Gilbert has been inducted into the Pacific University Athletic Hall of Fame.

Gilbert may be best known as the inventor of the Erector Set, but he also excelled as an athlete. Gilbert attended Pacific from 1903-04, where he won the 1904 Intercollegiate Wrestling Championship and was named captain of the track team. He set a then-Northwest Conference record of 11-7 in the pole vault.

He transferred to Yale in 1904 and in 1906 set a world record in the pole vault at 12-3, later extending it to 12-7 in the 1908 Olympic trials. Gilbert then shared the gold medal in the pole vault at the London Olympics.

Pamela Vorachek, executive director of A.C. Gilbert's Discovery Village, the Salem children's museum, said visitors often don't know the inventor was such an accomplished athlete.

"People are very surprised," Vorachek said. "He wanted to be an athletic director and that's why he went for a medical degree at Yale. In those days you needed to be an MD to do that."

Vorachek said Gilbert, who was born in Salem in 1884, started his passion for sports in his home town, including taking in track meets at Willamette University.

"He started with tricycle races in Salem," she said.

Gilbert also brought his skill as an inventor to the track. In the pole vault he used a more flexible bamboo pole instead of the more common hickory of the turn of the century and dug a hole for stability.

During his years as an athlete Gilbert also competed in boxing and football and was called "the best quarterback to be found in Oregon" by the Oregonian in 1903.

Because Gilbert did not complete his degree at Pacific, he will be inducted in the honorary category of the athletic hall of fame.

http://www.statesmanjournal.com/apps/pb ... 018/SPORTS

My hero A.C. Gilbert
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
You really know that you have not accomplished much in life when you start comparing yourself to A.C. Gilbert, the Salem native who invented the Erector Set.
And the key for Gilbert is that he was so good in fields that just don’t go together. Inventing a bunch of classic toys AND winning a gold medal in the pole vault at the 1908 Olympics?
How weird a combination is that?
Remember the kid in your high school who spent all day up to his elbows in computer paper, unknotting the problem of artificial intelligence? Well, that kid rarely wound up on the track team.
Or earning an MD from Yale (which he helped pay for by working as a magician).
Or coming up with the idea of employee benefits for the workers at his toy company.
But that’s what Gilbert did.
Amazing guy.