not, however, and nearly failed to even make the team; with only one round left, he had a best of 24 ft in (7.50 m) and was four inches behind Taylor, who held the third and final qualifying spot. On his last jump Brown improved to 25 ft in (7.66 m), overtaking Taylor by two inches to join Gourdine and Jerome Biffle on the Olympic team. Despite his third place at the Trials Brown remained the Olympic favorite. At the Olympics in Helsinki he cleared the qualification on his first attempt, jumping 24 ft in (7.32 m). In the final, however, he fouled on all of his jumps and failed to register a valid mark; in muddy and slippery conditions most jumpers had problems hitting the board, but Brown and the Netherlands' Henk Visser were the only two to foul out. The other Americans, Biffle and Gourdine, won gold and silver. Despite his losses at the Trials and the Olympics, Brown still maintained his top spot in the Track & Field News rankings as the best jumper of 1952. He also topped the world list for the second consecutive year, in (23 cm) ahead of Taylor. Later career Brown joined the U.S. Army in 1953 but remained the world's top jumper, winning the United States championship with a jump of 25 ft in (7.89 m) and leading both the world list and the Track & Field News rankings for a third consecutive year. In 1954 he was defeated at the national championships by John Bennett and slipped to third behind Bennett and Hungary's Ödön Földessy in the world rankings. After an off year in 1955 Brown made a comeback in 1956. At the national championships in Bakersfield he jumped 25 ft m (7.75 m), his best jump since 1953; he took second behind Ernie Shelby and defeated the eventual Olympic champion, Greg Bell, who was third. At the Olympic Trials, however, he only placed 13th with a jump of 23 ft (7.21 m) and failed to make the Olympic team. References 1931 births 2018 deaths 20th-century African-American sportspeople American male long jumpers Athletes (track and field) at the 1952 Summer Olympics Olympic track and field athletes of the United States UCLA Bruins men's track and field athletes Track and field athletes from Los Angeles