COMMERCE– For years, track athletes chased a mark they thought was unattainable. Many tried, but the elusive four-minute mile was just out of reach. Many even thought it was impossible– beyond the capacity of human ability. This feat was achieved in 1954, and has since become the standard of sprinters.
 
Back in the 1950's, a similar mark was sought by high jumpers. Each was seeking to become the first man in recorded history to post a seven-foot high jump. Among the athletes seeking for the seven-foot mark was Charles Holding, then a freshman at East Texas State Teachers College. It was a mark that Holding sought earnestly, and in his quest, he became one of the most dominant high jumpers in the world, and an ET track and field legend. Throughout his career, his never-ending goal was to become the first man in recorded history to perform a seven-foot high jump.
 
1950 was a different time in the United States. The Baby Boom was in full swing. Rock and Roll was sweeping the nation. The highway system was being built throughout the continental U.S. And high jumpers were still jumping over the bar head-first, as the Fosbury Flop, the technique of jumping back-first, would not be popularized for another 17 years.
 
Holding came to ETSTC in 1951, and immediately his impact was felt for the Lion track and field program. During his freshman campaign, he already was the best high jumper in the Lone Star Conference. He placed in first place in the high jump in several meets that season, including a six-foot-eight-inch mark at the Lone Star Conference Championships, earning the individual title.
 
The next season was an even greater success for Holding, as he again was the LSC individual champion in the high jump, as well as the javelin, helping ET to the 1952 LSC Championship. Holding then went on to make school history, becoming the first athlete to win an individual NAIA National Championship, again posting  leap of six-feet eight-inches in the high jump.
 
It sparked a series of dominant performances from Holding, as he would repeat as LSC Champion and National Champion, posting a personal best 6-feet 9.75-inches in 1953. His senior season would prove even better, as he pulled off yet another sweep of the championships, winning the LSC Championship for the fourth year in a row, and was crowned the national champion for the third straight year. His school record was broken again, this time with a career-best mark of six-feet-10-inches at the 1954 LSC Championships.
 
Holding's dominance was because of his determination, although he never posted the elusive seven-foot mark in an actual meet. However, he was reported to have broken the mark several times in practice. Yet these were unofficial results, despite the fact he had multiple witnesses attest to his feat.
 
Holding went down in history as the first national champion in Lion history, and to this day is the only athlete in program history to win three national championships in the same event, and also the only athlete in school history to win the LSC individual championship four years in a row.
  
Holding would go on to join the United States Air Force, where he continued to show off his impressive leaping ability. At one time, he held the Air Force high jump record. He served in the Air Force for 28 years before his retirement.
 
Holding was inducted into the NAIA Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1960 as an athlete, and was a member of the inaugural Lion Athletics Hall of Fame Class in 1978.
 
The mark of seven feet in the high jump was first accomplished officially by Charles Dumas on June 29, 1956 in Los Angeles at the Olympic Trials. Dumas would go on to win the Gold Medal in the high jump at the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne, Australia. The current world record of 8-feet-0.25-inches, was set by Cuban Olympian Javier Sotomayor in 1993.
 
A&M-Commerce's record for the high jump currently sits at seven-feet-one-inch, set by Jerome Broadus in 1985.