Varsity Club Hall of Fame
Arthur Allen, of Schenectady, N.Y., has been elected to the Northeastern University Varsity Club Hall of Fame for excellence in the sport of track and field. Allen, Class of 1986, will be inducted along with four others in formal ceremonies at Northeastern’s Matthews Arena in Boston Mass., on Friday, April 13, 2012, at 7 p.m.
Allen, a sprinter at Northeastern from 1982 to 1985, was a New England Indoor and Outdoor champion as well as an IC4A champion, setting school records in four different events en route to graduating as the greatest sprinter in Northeastern history.
The upstate New Yorker was a highly decorated track star far before his matriculation on Huntington Avenue. As a high schooler at Mt. Pleasant High School in Schenectady, Allen set state records in the 60, 100 and 220-yard sprints. After a year at the University of Houston, Allen transferred to Northeastern and immediately added a sorely needed dash man to what had otherwise been one of the East’s best track teams.
“Before Arthur Allen came to Northeastern, the dash events were always one of our weaknesses,” said Irwin Cohen, Allen’s coach through his junior season. “Well, we no longer have that problem with Arthur.”
Allen wasted no time making an impact on Northeastern track; as a freshman, he won the 100 and 200-meter events at both the Greater Boston and New England championships, indoor and outdoor. He also placed second in the 100-meter dash at the Boston College Relays.
His sophomore year, however, was what earned him the nickname, “Northeastern’s Fastest Human.” On Feb. 5, 1983, at the Greater Boston Indoor Championships, Allen won the 55-meter dash with a time of 6.32 seconds, a Northeastern record that still stands today. More records fell as the outdoor season hit: in sweeping the 100 and 200 meters at the New England Outdoor Championships, his time of 21.27 set a meet record in the latter.
By his junior season, Allen was smashing both personal and Northeastern records in the 100 and 200 meters. His crowning moment came at the New England Outdoor Championships on May 1, 1984, when he took home the gold medal in both events with a pair of school records – 10.54 seconds in the 100, and 20.94 seconds in the 200. Allen’s 200-meter record still stands today.
Allen’s senior campaign began with some near misses – runner-up finishes at New England Indoors and at Harvard – but Northeastern’s Fastest Human finished his career in style. At that year’s New England Outdoor Championships, Northeastern entered the 4x100-meter relay behind in the meet. In his final race – one which head coach Everett Baker later said, “changed the whole complexion of the meet,” – Allen finished the anchor leg to deliver the Huskies another gold medal, and with a time of 40.56, another school record. Northeastern went on to win the meet, and the school record – you guessed it – still stands.
Allen graduated Northeastern in 1986 with a degree in electrical engineering technology. He has spent the past six years as a district service manager at Emerson Network Power’s Liebert Services. He lives in San Francisco.
