Hall of Fame
In an era when freshmen did not play varsity sports, Donald M. Belknap, Class of 1934, was one of those rare athletes who won nine letters at Coe. He won three letters each in football, basketball and track. Both an end and quarterback, Belknap was named to the All Midwest team as an end. He enjoyed a conference championship in his senior year on a Coe team that lost only to Army at West Point. As an all-conference guard in basketball, he was noted for tenacious defensive skills. However, in the low-scoring games of those days, his eight points was once high for Coe in a game won by Iowa State 27-22. His 1934 squad beat Carleton 34-30, handing Carleton their first conference defeat in six years. In track, the quarter mile and the relays were his events, an introduction to a career-long interest in track. In the Cleveland area, for example he served as starter and official for the Junior Olympic track meets for 31 years. Don Belknap's entire life has been involved in coaching, recreation and sports officiating. He has coached at Winthrop, Manchester, Corning and Grinnell, Iowa, high schools. On the college levels he has coached and taught at Coe, Grinnell and Case Institute of Technology. For 33 years he directed programs of municipal recreation. He served Cleveland, Ohio, as superintendent of recreation and directed recreation and parks departments in South Euclid-Lyndhurst, Mentor, and Bedford, Ohio. He is past president of both the Track and Football Officials Associations of Northeast Ohio. In recognition of achieving nine letters in sports at Coe, in appreciation of his years as a teacher and coach, and on behalf of the thousands of participants both young and old who have benefitted from his direction of municipal recreation programs, it becomes an honor for me to present Donald Merle Belknap for induction into the Coe Athletic Hall of Fame.
