Steve Jackman, University of Minnesota All-America swimmer once dubbed ‘Fastest Man in the World,’ has died

Steve Jackman was well-respected by his teammates on the University of Minnesota men’s swimming team, but not just for his athletic abilities.

“They had confidence he would win,” said teammate and former Gophers men’s swimming coach Dennis Dale. “And he won most of the time. He was popular, not just because he won, but because of how he won with fun and delight.”

During his college career, Jackman, who grew up in Rochester, won six individual Big Ten titles and swam on two Big Ten relay champions while swimming for the Gophers from 1961 to 1963. He also won six NCAA titles — four individual and two relay — and was an 11-time All-America.

Dale, who was a freshman on the Gophers squad when Jackman was a senior, said that despite all of Jackman’s success, “humility was one of his strengths. He was a confident person who liked to have fun. He was known to his teammates as a wild man — in an affectionate way.”

While competing for the Gophers, Jackman’s major was pre-medicine. He graduated from the University of Minnesota Medical School and had a long, distinguished career as a radiologist.

“As an athlete you push yourself and focus on your goals,” said Dale, who was an All-America for the Gophers in 1967 and coached the Gophers from 1985 to 2014. “It’s the same in the classroom. Steve was highly successful in both.”

Jackman died on June 14 in Augusta, Ga. He was 83.

At Rochester High School in the late 1950s, Jackman was a three-time champion at the Minnesota State High School League’s boys state swimming meet.

A story in the Minneapolis Star in March 1962 reported that Jackman swam a mile or more each day for 10 months of the year. Jackman told the newspaper, “I’m basically lazy. Swimming helps keep me from it.”

Three days after the story appeared, Jackman won the 50-yard freestyle at the NCAA meet in Columbus, Ohio, in an NCAA record time of 21.1 seconds.

Jackman also won the 100-yard freestyle at the 1962 meet to help the Gophers finish in third place as a team — their best finish at the meet since 1943. The third-place finish remains the best at the NCAA meet in program history.

Jackman told the Minneapolis Tribune, “For my part it was a great thrill, but more important, we finished third as a team.”

During that era, the 50-yard freestyle was not an Olympic event and the NCAA champion of the event was called the “fastest man in the world.”

“He was a short-course specialist,” Dale said. “He was 6-foot-5 or 6-foot-6. He was really strong. He was a powerful athlete in swimming or whatever sport he chose. I remember him being at swim practice and then afterwards, he went to an intramural track meet. He won both the discus and shot put.”

Jackman also won a silver medal at the 1963 Pan American Games in Brazil. In 1964, Jackman trained in California but didn’t qualify for the U.S. Olympic team that competed at the Tokyo Olympics.

Two of Jackman’s teammates on the 1961 Gophers squad commented on a message board that accompanied Jackman’s obituary on the Springfield (Ill.) State Journal-Register website.

Jay Johnson wrote, “He was truly a unique individual. A remarkable person. … Steve’s nickname back in the day was ‘Spider – Spi’ for short. Spi will be missed by us all.”

“Steve was a loyal friend and teammate,” William Milota wrote. “His sense of humor and zest for life were legendary. He was brilliant as a student and I am sure as an MD.”

After graduating from medical school in 1968, Jackman served with the U.S. Office of Naval Research as a physician for Project Tektite in the U.S. Virgin Islands. The project, a cooperative between government, industry and university, was the United States’ first nationally sponsored scientists-in-the-sea scheme.

Jackman went on to practice at Mayo Clinic in Rochester and at Memorial Medical Center in Springfield, Ill.

During his professional career, he also served as an associate clinical professor of radiology at Southern Illinois University Medical School and served in the U.S. Public Health Service in Houston, Texas.

Jackman was inducted into the University of Minnesota Aquatics Hall of Fame in 1986 and the University’s “M” Club Hall of Fame in 1991. In 2021, he was named as one of the 100 Greatest Swimmers and Divers of the past century by the College Swimming and Diving Coaches Association.

Jackman is survived by two daughters, two sons and eight grandchildren. His wife of 54 years, Dr. Jane Lloyd Jackman, died in 2023.

A memorial service will take place in Springfield, Ill., on Aug. 31.