World Athletics said Moore passed away from pancreatic cancer.

Moore also won a silver medal as part of the United States 4x400m relay team at Helsinki 1952.

He set a world record of 51.6sec in the 440 yards hurdles at the British Empire Games in London, held two weeks after the Olympics in the Finnish capital.

Moore also helped pioneer a 13-step approach to the hurdles discipline, which is still used in the sport to this day.

He enjoyed a successful career before becoming the Olympic 400m hurdles champion, winning NCAA titles in the 440 yards and 220 yards hurdles for Cornell University and four consecutive US crowns.

Moore topped the world lists in the discipline from 1949 to 1952 and justified his status as the pre-event favourite for the Olympics with a superb performance in Finland.

The American runner was inducted into Cornell's Athletic Hall of Fame in 1978 and the USA Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1999, while he also donated his two Olympic medals to the Mercersburg Academy.

"I couldn't figure out how you divide two medals among nine children," Moore said in a recent interview on the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee website.

"Mercersburg gave me my start and they'll be there for everybody to see, including my children."

Following his career in athletics, Moore went on to become a successful businessman, starting in his family's steel forging company before going on to serve as chief executive of several multinational manufacturing companies.

Moore also held roles on the United States Olympic Committee Board from 1992 to 2000, joining as a public sector director and later serving as the chair of its Audit Committee.