Hall of Fame
John “Spike” Harshbarger won nine varsity letters in football, basketball and track and field from 1954-57 and also participated in gymnastics. He was a three-year starter on the football team and won basketball letters in 1954 and 1955. His greatest success came in track and field where he was the Oklahoma Intercollegiate Conference (OIC) champion in pole vault for four consecutive years, breaking a 28-year-old conference record with a vault of 13’1” in 1956. He tied for third place in the vault at the NAIA National Championships in 1957. He also earned conference medals in the discus, shot put, javelin and the 880-yard relay.
Harshbarger went on to a successful high school teaching and coaching career in Oklahoma and Kansas, and now lives in retirement in Manhattan, Kan., with his wife Gwen. The couple has three children.
