Aight, I wouldn’t usually write about two athletes one after the other, but I was just introduced to the amazing story of Wilma Rudolph and couldn’t wait. Wilma was born in Saint Bethlehem, Tennessee in 1940. She was the twentieth of twenty two children…Lemmie, say this again, She was the TWENTIETH child of Ed and Blanche Rudolph and they still said: “We should have about two more!”
Her childhood was a rough one. She suffered from scarlet fever, pneumonia, and infantile paralysis which she got from contracting the poliovirus. She got over polio, but it severely impacted her left leg, and foot. The family moved from Saint Bethlehem, to Clarksville, Tennessee shortly after her birth. As it was hard to find medical care for Black Folks in Clarksville, Wilma’s parents sought care from Meharry Medical College, a historically Black medical school. The only problem is; this school was located 50 miles away in Nashville! Wilma and her mother spent YEARS traveling to Nashville so she could recover use of her limbs.
Wilma would walk with a leg brace until she was 12 years old. When the brace came off, instead of just chilling and living a healthy, brace free life, she immediately threw herself into sports…like you do! In eighth grade, Wilma started playing basketball, and in High School became a starter for her team. She’d break a record during her sophomore year scoring 803 points. They even nicknamed her “Skeeter” because of how quick she moved on the court, and remember, just a few years prior she was unable to walk without a leg brace!
It was during her years on the basketball team that she caught the eye of Ed Temple. Temple was the track and field coach at Tennessee State University. He was so impressed by Wilma’s performance that he invited the then 14 year old Wilma to join his summer training program at TSU. She would enter nine events at an Amateur Track Meet in Pennsylvania and went on to win ALL of them. Temple had her training regularly with the Women’s Track Team before she would finally enroll at the university herself in 1958.
But before we even get to her college years, we have to back up a little bit. In 1956, Wilma travelled to Seattle, WA (ayyyyye) to try out for the US Olympic Track Team, which she fully qualified for and became the youngest member of the squad. The team would go on to win the bronze medal. Four years later while still attending TSU Wilma again qualified for the olympic team, smashing qualifying records on her way there and during the 1960 Summer Olympics Wilma would go on to win THREE gold medals… THREE! She was the first woman ever to do this. Folks were literally calling her “The fastest woman in HISTORY” which she WAS! She got super famous after this. She was all over the cover of magazines and doing spots on Ed Sullivan. People loved them some Wilma Rudolph.
When the 1964 olympics came around Wilma was like: “Nah, I’m good.” She was quoted as saying: "If I won two gold medals, there would be something lacking. I'll stick with the glory I've already won like Jesse Owens did in 1936." So she stepped away from track, got her degree and began a career in education as well as coaching. Rudolph was also an avid civil rights activist, participating in many protests including one in her hometown of Clarksville. This incident was to protest the segregation of a local restaurant. Shortly after her involvement the mayor announced that all public facilities including restaurants would be integrated.
She spent a lot of time working for nonprofits, and other organizations that were focused on the training and advancement of youth athletes. In 1981 she would establish the Wilma Rudolph Foundation, which had the same goal. In 1987 she would be named the Director of the Women’s Track Program at DePauw University, where she would also serve as a consultant on minority affairs.
In July of 1994 Wilma was sadly diagnosed with brain cancer, as well as throat cancer and passed away months later at the age of fifty four. When I tell you her funeral was packed, I’m saying THOUSANDS of people attended, and across the state of Tennessee the state flag was flown at half mast.
So, what this story about? Well, overcoming polio and childhood disability and then becoming the world’s fastest woman, and then sharing your gift and knowledge with generations to come all while raising four children and dealing with the systemic racism of the Jim Crow Era South is…it’s a lot. But again it’s another example of Black strength and tenacity. It’s the story of who we are as people and have been since the founding of the nation, and long before that. To sum up this woman’s life is a far greater task than I’m up to. I didn’t even talk about the fact that she had her first kid in high school, did tours of Africa, dated Muhammad Ali, was a television icon, none of that even made the cut! She was seriously one of a kind so all I can say is Thank you, Wilma, Thank you!
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