Jack Mahan

Jack Mahan threw the javelin for Texas A&M. It’s not clear how he made the 1920 Olympic Team, as he did not finish in the top six at the US Olympic Trials. Mahan was a star fullback on the football team at A&M, helping them to an undefeated and unscored-upon season in 1919 and captaining the team in 1920. He later became a football official in the Southwest Conference. Mahan at first ran a large farm for J. D. Leeper in Southern Oklahoma, but later worked as a vocational agricultural teacher.

Mahan died in unusual circumstances. He was fishing with his family on a lake southwest of Gainesville, Texas. His wife left briefly and when she returned Mahan was missing with his cap floating on the lake’s surface. They later found his body but how he died was unclear. His fishing line was noted to be entangled in his shoelaces, leading to speculation that his line caught his shoelaces and threw him into the lake, and he was unable to recover. Mahan was also partially paralyzed for the last few years of his life, and that may have made it difficult for him to get out of the lake.

Personal Best: JT – 53.53 (175-7,5) (1920).