Villanova University Varsity Club Hall of Fame
One of the top sprinters in the world during his racing career and at one time a co-world record holder in the 60 yard dash, Ed Collymore was equally well known on campus for his decades of service to Villanova University where he worked as the Executive Director of the Office of Multicultural Affairs. Collymore, a native of Cambridge, Mass. and a 1959 graduate of Villanova, was inducted to the Varsity Club Hall of Fame in 1980.
During his sophomore season on the Wildcats track & field squad Collymore was part of the program’s 1957 national championship season. That season has been widely considered as one of the greatest track & field teams assembled in the sport’s history, with a young Collymore at just 19 years old playing a role at the NCAA Championships with a third place finish in the 220 yard dash. Less than a year later he would tie the standing world record in the 60 yard dash during the 1958 indoor season.
Edward L. (Ed) Collymore was born January 5, 1938 in Cambridge, Mass. and attended the Houghton Grammar School and Rindge Technical High School in Massachusetts before he came to Villanova. Collymore came through the same scholastic program at the Rindge school which produced his future Wildcats teammate and Olympic gold medalist Charles Jenkins. Following the conclusion of his track & field career, Collymore had a professional career serving roles in education, insurance and the Massachusetts juvenile courts before retiring in January 2004.
Collymore was hired by Villanova in 1969 as an Assistant Director of the Office for Social Action Programs. He was promoted to Director three years later and, in 1992, became the Executive Director of the office. Collymore developed and implemented special programs geared for students from inner-city areas, including recruiting, admissions, counseling and working in all areas of the University. He also coordinated Villanova’s student volunteer program and the campus Education program.
A pioneer in social justice reform, Collymore accepted responsibility for focusing on issues of ethnicity and multiculturalism in his work. Upon being named the Executive Director of the Office for Social Action Programs, he also had purview over the Office of International Students and Human Services in addition to teaching an Education class. In 2014 the Edward Collymore Honor Society was established at Villanova to recognize scholars of high moral and academic integrity, foster academic and professional improvement, and encourage individual excellence.
Villanova won the 1957 outdoor NCAA team title with 47 points, a dominating performance in which the Wildcats finished 15 points ahead of runner-up California and the rest of the 44 teams who scored at least one point at the meet. The championship roster for Villanova included Jenkins and Ron Delany who had each won Olympic gold medals less than a year earlier. Delany won the individual NCAA title in the mile and was runner-up in the 880 yards, with Jenkins tallying a third place finish in the 440 yards.
Other top-three scorers for the Wildcats included pole vault world record holder Don Bragg and Olympic high jumper Phil Reavis. And, of course, Collymore, just 19 years of age and competing at the NCAA Championships for the first time. He earned the first of two career All-America honors with his third place finish in the 220 yards, then became an individual NCAA champion a year later when he won the same event with a winning time of 20.70 in Berkeley, Calif.
Collymore competed before there was an NCAA championship for indoor track & field. At this point in time winning the annual indoor and outdoor IC4A meets was an accomplishment on par with a national title, and the IC4A Championship was indeed regarded as a de facto national championship. Collymore helped Villanova sweep both the indoor and outdoor IC4A titles in 1957 and 1958. He won seven career IC4A titles, including the 220 yards outdoors three straight years from 1957-59. Collymore was also the outdoor champion in the 100 yards in 1957 and won the 60 yards in consecutive seasons as a junior and a senior. At the 1957 indoor meet he anchored the champion mile relay squad which also included Eugene Maliff, John Furlinger and Al Peterson on the team.
The collegiate success that Collymore and his teammates had came as no surprise. As a senior in high school he helped lead Rindge to a national scholastic indoor championship and was the individual 440 yard champion. Collymore went on to set numerous collegiate records in addition to matching the world record in the 60 yards. While still a student at Villanova, he represented the United States on tours of Hungary, Poland, Greece, Russia, Germany and England. He competed in the first United States vs. Russia track & field meets held in Russia.
Collymore first competed at the Penn Relays while in high school and he starred at the world’s oldest and largest track & field meet for Rindge, Villanova University and eventually Quantico Marines in 1960 at the start of his professional career. As a junior in 1958, Collymore anchored the mile relay to a Championship of America title with a winning time of 3:11.8. He had an even 46-second split on the anchor leg and the Wildcats winning time remained a meet record on the old cinder track until the synthetic track surface was installed nine years later.
The freshman mile relay was considered a Championship of America race in those years and Collymore won his first of seven Penn Relays wheels for Villanova as the anchor of the 1956 freshman squad. William Rahn, Vic DeMaio and Charles Stead preceded him in the lineup and the Wildcats raced to a winning time of 3:19.0. Just a year earlier a team of future Villanova greats in George Sydnor, Walter Budney, Rowland Simpson and Delany had became only the second group of Wildcats freshmen to win the mile relay championship. The first had been 23 years earlier in 1932 when legendary Villanova coach Jumbo Elliott ran the third leg of the relay.
Following his freshman mile relay championship, Collymore helped lead the Wildcats to Championship of America titles in the mile relay (1957, 1958, 1959), the distance medley relay (1957, 1958) and the sprint medley relay (1958). He anchored the mile relay squad in consecutive years in 1958 and 1959. The record-setting 1958 mile relay squad was inducted onto the Penn Relays Wall of Fame in 2011.
Collymore earned a B.S. in Economics from Villanova and later an M.A. in Counseling from the University, followed by an Ed.D. in Educational Administration from the University of Pennsylvania. He was part of the 1980 induction class to the Villanova University Varsity Club Hall of Fame and was inducted to the track & field Wall of Fame in Villanova Stadium during a ceremony on November 2, 1996. Collymore was inducted to the Massachusetts Track Coaches Athletic Hall of Fame and the Cambridge Athletic Hall of Fame.
A longtime member of Bethel AME Church in nearby Bryn Mawr, Pa., Collymore was an active volunteer and was named the church’s Man of the Year in addition to being recognized for his community contributions by the Rosemont Optimist Club. The Community Action Agency of Delaware County recognized Collymore as its Board Member of the Year, while the Villanova University Alumni Association presented Collymore with the Social Action Award and the Black Cultural Society honored him with its W.E.B. Dubois Award. Collymore is listed in “Who’s Who Among Black Americans” and was honored by the Main Line M.L.K. Association.
Collymore was a retired Colonel in the United States Marine Corps Reserve (USMCR). He was commissioned as an Officer in the USMCR in 1959 and served in the capacity of staff motor transport officer on both Company and Battalion levels at Quantico, Va. and Camp Pendleton, Calif. He later served in several Reserve Units and as Marine on-campus liaison officer at Villanova until retiring with the rank of Colonel in 1991. A Seibu-Kan Karate Black Belt, Collymore held memberships in the Marine Corps Reserve Association, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, the American Legion Post #457 and the R.R. Rifle Club of Chester County.
Collymore was married to the former Marcia L. Burnett and the couple resided in Bryn Mawr, Pa. They were parents of Sandra L. Coleman (husband Andre V. Coleman) and Edward L. Collymore, Jr. (wife Lori S. Collymore) and had three grandchildren, Bryce E. Collymore (wife Jessica E. Collymore), Andre V. Coleman, Jr. and Hollis E. Coleman. Collymore passed away at the age of 85 in May 2023.
