[2][3] In 1937, the family moved to nearby Stuart, Florida, where Ferguson became a multi-sport star athlete for Martin County High School.

[11] He also led the 1941 Florida football team with 36 points scored and 420 minutes played; the 1942 Seminole yearbook referred to him as a "defensive bulwark," "colorful," and "unpredictable.

[14] Following his final college football season, Ferguson became the State of Florida collegiate heavyweight boxing champion, and won the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) national championship in the javelin throw with a distance of 203 feet, 6 and 1/2 inches, in 1942.

[9] Several months after the United States entered World War II, Ferguson joined the U.S. Army in 1942, and was commissioned as a second lieutenant after attending officers' candidate school.

[17] Ferguson was awarded the U.S. Army's Distinguished Service Cross, the nation's second highest medal for gallantry, for "extraordinary heroism" in combat on June 6, 1944.

[17] Ferguson never fully recovered from his head wound, and died from complications arising from his war-time injuries on May 15, 1954, at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Coral Gables, Florida; he was 34 years old.

[9] Following a community memorial service at the First Baptist Church in Stuart, he was buried with military honors in All Saints Cemetery in Jensen Beach, Florida.