Hall of Fame
After attending high school, Stanley Barker, a native of the Wilmathsville-Bible Grove (Mo.) area, worked at various jobs for five years. While traveling around, he had an opportunity to be Charles Lindbergh's passenger when the famous aviator was barnstorming in Kansas. During this time, he ran in track meets, displaying a lot of athletic ability. Because he didn't own a pair of track shoes, he ran in his bare feet. Mr. Barker has two sisters living in Kirksville at that time, and in 1923 he enrolled at the university. He never played high school football, but that didn't stop him. Mr. Barker played under two Bulldog coaching legends, H.L. "Curley" McWilliams and Don Faurot. He made the first All-Conference team twice and the second All-Conference team once. He served as team captain in 1925 and was named to the All-State team in 1926. He was a member of the first Bulldog conference championship team in 1924 after the Missouri Intercollegiate Athletic Association was reorganized that year to include only the five regional state colleges. While in school and after college, Mr. Barker worked in a Kirksville clothing store for several years. He married and he and his wife moved to Chicago where he worked 25 years in sales for an aluminum company. He then was semi-retired and worked with home correspondence courses. Mr. Barker died in 1974.
