Willard T. Schmidt

(1910-1965) born near Swanton, Saline County, and lived in Omaha. Athlete, machinist, won gold medal as member of U.S. basketball team at 1936 Olympics, the first year the sport was included in the games, played for Creighton University from 1931 to 1934, and later for Amateur Athletic Union teams in Kansas and Colorado, was president of machinists union at Coffeyville, Kansas. Consult Wilber Republican obituary, April 22, 1965, p. 5 and Bill Mallon and Ian Buchanan, Quest For Gold: The Encyclopedia of American Olympians (Leisure Press, 1984) 41-42 and William W. Zellner and Ruth L. Laird, Nebraska: The First Hundred Years (Galaxy Publications, 1985) 263.

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