Dent McSkimming

A St. Louis newspaperman who was devoted to soccer for decades, but is most famous because of a single game.

When the United States upset England in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, during the 1950 World Cup, McSkimming was the only American reporter present. And even then, he had not been sent there by the paper he worked for, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, but was on vacation, covering the games on his own time.

By 1950, McSkimming was a veteran journalist, more than 50 years old. He had begun working for the Post-Dispatch in 1922, and retired in 1961. During the decades in between, which did include several stints in other jobs, he conducted a tireless campaign to keep soccer in the public eye among St. Louis newspaper readers.

Inducted in 1951.