Category Archive: Gender

The Silent Shame Part 4: Changing the Law to Protect the Victim, not the Abuser

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Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) thinks the law that governs Olympic sports organizations in America leaves child athletes at risk of abuse. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

The recent revelations of decades of child sexual abuse within USA Gymnastics has created a firestorm. The spotlight has given increased awareness to the fact that “six Olympic sport governing bodies have been beset over the years by allegations of mishandled complaints of abuse,” according to the Washington Post.

In other words, cases of sexual abuse by members associated with such organizations as USA Gymnastics, USA Swimming, USA Taekwando and U.S. Speedskating have been essentially hushed up over the years.

See this link for the first part of my posts on sexual abuse in USA Gymnastics.

And now the US Government is getting involved, and their sights are on the United States Olympics Committee (USOC). On February 21, 2017, Senator Diane Feinstein of California announced that she wants her colleagues to agree on an amendment to a federal law that governs Olympic sports organizations – The Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act. This law was passed in 1978 in order to have a single governing body (USOC) manage the various individual national sports organizations, as well as assist in the process of selecting Olympic team members.

But what has been recently understood is that when suspicions of abuse emerge, the USOC’s policy has been one of passivity and reactivity, and that language in the Ted Stevens Act“has been interpreted by lawyers to afford coaches suspected of sexual abuse more rights than they would have if they worked in other industries.”

The Ted Stevens Act requires an Olympic governing body give fair notice, due process and a hearing to any member athlete, coach, or official it wants to ban; requirements that have sometimes prevented governing bodies from banning coaches suspected of abuse. Other youth-serving organizations, such as the Boy Scouts of America, have policies requiring swift actions when abuse is suspected, always erring in favor of protecting children from harm.

Senator Feinstein’s objective is to re-write the law so that any governing body affiliated with an Olympic governing organization must report cases of sexual abuse immediately to law enforcement authorities, as well as prevent the common practice of rotating a suspected child abuser from one club to another without any official record.

On March 2, US senators put considerably more pressure on the chief executive of the USOC, Scott Blackmun, to provide greater detail about how the USOC has handled these allegations of sexual abuse. In a letter from Senator John Thune of South Dakota and Senator Jerry Moran of Kansas to Blackmun, they say they have “serious concerns about the extent to which the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) is meeting its mandate to protect the health and safety of athletes.”

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The Olympics as a Force for Change: Potential Victory for Women in Japan’s Old Boy’s Bastion of Golf?

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Kasumigaseki Country Club in Kawagoe City, Japan. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

“The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Olympic Charter shall be secured without discrimination of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, sexual orientation, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.” – Principle 6 of the Olympic Charter

Principle 6 was challenged by Russia in the lead up to the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics when:

  • a Russian judge would not allow construction of a Pride House, which is where athletes who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) can gather during an Olympic Games, and
  • a law was passed that banned “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relationships” among minors, which was perceived to outlaw any reference to LGBT.

The associated homophobic violence in Russia and the uproar in media outside of Russia left the IOC wondering what they could do to give teeth to Principle 6. But it’s likely they only really started considering the seriousness of the situation when a group of over 50 current and former Olympians banded together to start a campaign asking the Russian government to reconsider the law on “gay propaganda”. They called this campaign, the Principle 6 Campaign.

The IOC got the message. According to The Guardian, the IOC established a new clause to the host city contract. So when a city bids for an Olympic Games, their bid mush show they are complying with this clause: “Any form of discrimination with regard to a country or a person on grounds of race, religion, politics, gender or otherwise is incompatible with belonging to the Olympic movement.”

Perhaps unfortunately, the host city contract did not have these “teeth” in 2007 when Sochi won the bid for 2014. But any city wanting to bid in the future have to show their country is not blatantly exercising discrimination.

Japan is not a country that blatantly discriminates. While it is considered one of the most meritocratic countries in the world, there are times when non-Japanese have various cultural or legal issues, or females wonder whether they are getting treated fairly. But it is subtle and discussion today is more common and open on the issues and how to improve them.

Which brings us to golf.

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Tokyo governor Yuriko Koike, has asked the proposed course for the golf tournament at the 2020 Olympics, Kasumigaseki Country Club, to admit women members Credit: Aflo/REX/Shutterstock

For the first time in history, Tokyo has a female governor, Yuriko Koike. In addition to taking a microscope to the ballooning Tokyo2020 budget, she poked the ribs of an organization that does not allow women to enjoy full membership – the Kasumigaseki Country Club. Under ordinary circumstances, it is unlikely that a governor would want to take on a private association over female membership as a top ten priority. But Japan will be hosting the 2020 Summer Games, and Kasumigaeki CC is slated to be the venue for golf. Suddenly, the country club became an easy target.

Why?

Because the governor can exercise what is known in Japan as “gai-atsu”, or the tactic of

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The Best of The Olympians 2016: In Memoriam (Part 2)

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The great American diver, Sammy Lee

In memory of Olympians or people significantly connected to the Olympics who passed away in 2016.

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Triumphant Vera Caslavaska in Mexico City
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The US Women’s Team Pursuit Miracle of 2012 Part 2: Money Ball in Cycling and the Impact of Big Data on Athletic Performance

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Four women, Dotsie Bausch, Sarah Hammer, Jennie Reed and Lauren Tamayo, did something no American women had done in 20 years – win a medal in track cycling at the Olympics.

Their incredible story of training and triumph are told impactfully in the documentary, Personal Gold. You can find a summary of their story at this link here. This post is about the amazing transformation sports performance sciences is undergoing, and how biometric data is making an impact on the training and performance of athletes today.

With incredibly little resources available to them, Reed called her former USA Cycling teammate, Sky Christopherson, who was well on the way of making a marked transition from athlete to entrepreneur. Christopherson had become convinced that digital medicine would become a vital tool for high performance athletes. Understanding how to uncover insight from big data is hugely important in marketing, financial services, economics, and is now a big part of health and human performance sciences.

Due to the relatively low support of the women’s cycling track team by USA Cycling, Christopherson recruited volunteers to help him gather individualized biological and genetic data on each of the four cyclists, data that was being generated by sensors attached to the athletes bodies 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and then to analyze it.

According to Christopherson, who was also the producer of the documentary, Personal Gold, the amount of information available to them was overwhelming, not only for Sky and his team, but for his computers, which in the early days crashed in trying to cope with the number crunching.

But once Christopherson recruited a big data analysis firm to volunteer their time and expertise, they began to take note of insight they could use. And all the data told them that each cyclist had unique characteristics and individual needs, and thus training them all the same way could at times be detrimental to the individual’s performance and growth. Here are a few examples pointed out by Christopherson at a recent speaking engagement in Tokyo, sponsored by the US Embassy:

  • In Hammer’s case, blood tests showed she had Vitamin D deficiencies, made worse by training indoors most of the time. Having normal levels of Vitamin D is key to getting the most out of one’s training, so Hammer was working harder than she needed to due to her deficiency.
  • Bausch, whose experience was greater as a distance cyclist and was struggling at sprinting speeds, was found to have what is known as the “sprinter’s gene”, which according to this Wired article, boosted her confidence.
  • Sensors noted that Reed was not getting enough deep sleep. More and more research is revealing the importance of deep sleep. In the case of athletes, the longer and deeper you sleep, the more HGH (human growth hormones) like cortisol or testosterone, is released naturally into their systems. These hormones are essential to faster recovery, and thus the ability to train longer at peak performance.

The data can also tell an athlete when an athlete can train hard, when the body is ready for it, or when to rest. This is key because as Christopherson advised, this knowledge can prevent injuries from occurring.

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Trailer screenshot

I asked Christopherson if this was a case of “Moneyball“, where the women’s team had access to insight that other teams didn’t have, using that information arbitrage to their advantage unbeknownst to the heavily-resourced cycling giants.

“We were grassroots and so we were very nimble and could innovate and change very quickly,” Christopherson told me. Being a small, low-budget operation forced them to be innovative, using whatever resources were available to them in the world. In fact, he felt that the well-financed teams, whose funds came from sponsors, often limited their flexibility. While teams are obligated to using the products of sponsors, the American team had no such limitations, and Christopher told the audience that they had the flexibility to change sensors and equipment as they saw fit.

The proverb, “necessity is the mother of invention”, was never truer.

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The Silent Shame Part 3: New Sexual Abuse Allegations for USA Gymnastics

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A few weeks ago, I wrote about the revelations by The Indianapolis Star of sexual abuse of teenagers and pre-teens by coaches and officials within and affiliated with USA Gymnastics.

At the time, IndyStar was aware of about 50 cases. Now they report they have uncovered through police files and court case documentation that hundreds of gymnasts have been abused in the past 20 years.

“At least 368 gymnasts have alleged some form of sexual abuse at the hands of their coaches, gym owners and other adults working in gymnastics. That’s a rate of one every 20 days. And it’s likely an undercount.”

The IndyStar’s most recent article on this travesty provides a fascinating analysis of a sports organization and its affiliated officials, coaches, and gym owners in denial. Here is a good chunk of that shocking analysis in full:

  • USA Gymnastics focuses its efforts to stop sexual abuse on educating members instead of setting strict ground rules and enforcing them. It says it can’t take aggressive action because member gyms are independent businesses and because of restrictions in federal law pertaining to Olympic organizations. Both are contentions others dispute.
  • Gym owners have a conflict of interest when it comes to reporting abuse. Some fear harm to their business. When confronted with evidence of abuse, many quietly have fired the suspected abusers and failed to warn future employers. Some of those dangerous coaches continued to work with children.
  • Some coaches are fired at gym after gym without being tracked or flagged by USA Gymnastics, or losing their membership with the organization. USA Gymnastics often has no idea when a coach is fired by a gym and no systematic way to keep track. Ray Adams was fired or forced to resign from six gyms in four states. Yet some gym owners hired Adams, believing his record was clean.
  • Though the vast majority of officials put children’s well-being ahead of business and competition, some officials at every level have not. Coaches suspected of abuse kept their jobs as long as they accepted special monitoring. Others were allowed to finish their season before being fired. In 2009, Doug Boger was named a USA Gymnastics Coach of the Year and was sent to international competition while under investigation for alleged sexual abuse.
  • Victims’ stories have been treated with skepticism by USA Gymnastics officials, gym owners, coaches and parents. Former gymnasts Charmaine Carnes and Jennifer Sey said they felt pressured by Penny not to pursue allegations of abuse by prominent coaches Don Peters and Boger. Carnes said she thought Penny tried to keep the claims about Boger quiet for as long as possible to protect the sport’s image and win championships, a characterization that USA Gymnastics disputes.

Women’s gymnastics have made tremendous strides, winning team gold at the 2012 London Olympics as well as the 2016 Rio Olympics. But I’m curious – I’ve seen or read no reaction from the coaches and athletes at the apex of the USA Gymnastics pyramid: the Karolyis, the members of the women’s Olympic gymnastics team, and their parents. Their silence may be the result of counsel provided to them by the advisors that surround them. But at some point, they need to lead in this pivotal moment, this crisis of confidence in women’s gymnastics.

The Silent Shame Part 1: USA Gymnastics Ignored Sexual Abuse Allegations

The Silent Shame Part 2: Why Would / How Could Leaders of USA Gymnastics Stay Silent in the Face of Sexual Abuse Allegations?

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The Incredible Babe Didrikson-Zaharias Part 2: You Can’t Win Them All

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Jean Shiley and her scissor-kick style

She was a bolt out of the blue in 1932. Mildred Didrikson, nicknamed “Babe” because she could wallop a baseball, was suddenly a track and field phenomenon. She had single handedly dominated the US Women’s track and field championships that year. At the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, she had won gold in the 80-meter hurdles and the javelin throw. So as she prepared for the high jump competition, the press, the crowd in the stadium, and people all over America were expecting to see Babe Didrikson win her third gold medal.

But another American, Jean Shiley, was not going to just let Babe take it. Shiley from Pennsylvania was actually known at the time as the world’s best high jumper, but at the Los Angeles Olympics, she was playing second fiddle to the Babe. The masses wanted Babe to win her third gold medal. But athletes who knew Didrikson….not necessarily. Here’s how Shiley described her predicament in the book, Tales of Gold:

The women’s track and field events ran for a week, and at the Games Babe was the Sun King. On Sunday she won the javelin. Then on Wednesday she won a controversial decision in the hurdles. By that time the crowds were all behind her. They have their heroes and heroines. And the newspapers got into it, too. The following Sunday was the high jump, and the night before all the girls were in my room telling me, “You’ve got to do it. You’ve got to do it.” Oh, boy, they were really putting the pressure on me.

In the end, the crowd got to see Didrikson and Shiley face off for gold. The world record holder in the high jump, Lien Gisolf of the Netherlands, could not clear 1.6 meters. Then Canada’s Eva Dawes succumbed to the height of 1.62 meters, her efforts winning her the bronze medal. Both Didrikson and Shiley would go on to clear 1.62 meters, and set a world record at 1.65 meters, only for both to fail three times to clear 1.67 meters (5 ft 5 inches).

The rules of the time required a jump-off, a sudden death competition to clear a height incrementally higher than 5 ft 5 in . First the bar was raised another inch to 5 ft 6 in (1.676 meters). Shiley knocked the bar off its supports. Didikson barely cleared the bar with her body only to have her leg tap the bar and knock it off in her descent. So the bar was lowered to 5 feet 51/4 inches. Shiley soared higher in competition than she ever soared before, and lept over the bar. It was now up to the Babe, who lept and made it safely across. A tie…again.

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Babe Didrikson and her Western roll style

But then something strange happened. According to the book, Babe Didrikson Zaharias: The Making of a Champion, Didrikson was said to have made an illegal jump.

Then Babe ran toward the crossbar and leaped off the ground, kicking up her feet and rolling in midair as she went over the bar. It was another tie – or was it? The judges huddled. According to Olympic rules then in effect, a high jumper had to clear the bar feet first. If the jumper went over the bar head first in a “dive,” the jump was disqualified. The judges ruled that Babe had dived. The first-place gold medal went to Jean Shiley, the silver to Babe Didrikson.

The rules at the time stated that the jumper’s feet must cross the bar first, which is why most athletes, including Shiley, employed a scissor-kick style. But Babe’s style is what was called the Western roll, a popular style where one’s arm and head, face down, are essentially the first parts of the body over the bar. Why was this ruling strange? Because Didrikson, as the press pointed out, had been jumping that way the entire competition. If the judges were going to rule her jumps illegal, they should have done so from the first jump.

The ruling stood, and according to Shiley, Babe was seen in the public as a victim, cheated out of her third gold, while Shiley was the villain. In the end, Shiley said she understood, knowing that Didrikson inspired great emotion in others. She in fact considered Babe to be the Muhammad Ali of her time in her egocentric confidence. She also considered Didrikson to be a fun person to be with, and a friend.

Babe Didrikson inspired either great enthusiasm or great dislike. At that time, even though they competed in sports, girls were to be young ladies, and I think a lot of girls found her behavior a little beyond how they thought a young lady should act. The Babe was very brash, and she bragged a lot, but she was also very humorous, especially when she wasn’t getting all the attention. She’d pull a harmonica out of her pocket and start to play it just to get attention. And nobody did anything better than she did. I don’t care if it was swallowing goldfish; she would have to swallow more fish than anybody else. It wasn’t Muhammad Ali who started this “I’m number one” stuff. Babe started it.

She was just so different from all the rest of the girls that it grated on their nerves. It could have been jealousy. That’s the way Babe was, and it bothered some of the girls, but it didn’t bother me. I was captain of the 1932 team, and I had to represent all of the girls. I had been on the 1928 team, and I learned that there are a lot of people in the world, and they are very different and very interesting. So Babe didn’t bother me; in fact, she and I became friends and remained so even though we’re two entirely different people.

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The Incredible Babe Didrikson-Zaharias Part 1: The First Female Super Athlete

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Mildred “Babe” Didrikson at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics

Role models are essential, particularly to groups under-represented.

In the first half of the 20th century, women around the industrialized world were told that exerting themselves too much in sports would not only be unlady-like, it might be bad for their health.

In America, one woman refuted those assumptions, brashly.

Babe Didrikson was the female version of Jim Thorpe. Whatever sport she took up, she did very well, often better than most others, female or male. She was an exceptional diver, bowler, baseball player and roller skater. Out of high school, she was the star on the Employers’ Casualty Insurance Company of Dallas women’s basketball team.

At the national track and field championships in 1932, the one that would determine participation in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, Didrikson won an amazing six events – the broad jump, the shot put, the javelin, the 80-meter hurdles, the baseball throw, as well as tying for first in the high jump – all in a three-hour period. Her individual total points of 30 was greater than the next best team score of 22 points, accumulated by 22 athletes.

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At the 1932 Olympics, Didrikson would win two gold medals and a silver and become one of the sensations of the Los Angeles Games.

And she was just getting started.

Packing star power, Didrikson was able to get paid in ways that other female athletes could only dream of: singing and playing the harmonica on vaudeville, doing so while hitting plastic golf balls into the delirious audience…making thousands of dollars per month, a king’s ransom in those days.

In 1934, Didrikson began to play golf seriously, and went on to become the best female golfer in the world, wining 82 golf tournaments as an amateur and a professional. For one stretch in 1946 and 1947, she won 14 straight gold tournaments. Her influence was so great that she co-founded the LPGA – the Ladies Professional Golf Association.

But she was a pioneer, so she had to do so under challenging conditions. People around her and the press in particular would call her gender in to question, openly telling her to stay home. “It would be much better if she and her ilk stayed at home, got themselves prettied up and waited for the phone to ring,” one sports columnist wrote in the New York World-Telegram.

What is surprising, according to this New York Times article, is that the great Mildred “Babe” Didrikson, who was named “Woman Athlete of the Half Century” in 1950, is little known today, her museum in Beaumont, Texas, rarely visited.

While girls who like sports today have a growing number of female role models in the 21st century, one of the greatest took the world by storm some 70 to 80 years ago. And this Babe is worth a look.

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The Fascinating Link of Japanese Women’s Volleyball and the Textile Industry: From Silk to Gold

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Kanebo ad form the 1964 Tokyo Olympics Official Souvenir Book

One of the biggest cosmetics brands in Japan is Kanebo. But its corporate origins were in textiles. Established in 1887 as the Tokyo Cotton Trading Company, a few years later the name was changed to the Kanegafuchi Spinning company, or Kanebo. As you can see in the above ad, printed in the Tokyo Olympics Official Souvenir book from 1964, Kanebo was primarily a major exporter of cotton, silk, wool and non-natural textiles.

The cotton and silk spinning industry, born of the age of industrialization that hit Japan in the late 19th century and early 20th century, was a huge employer of young women, most of them teenagers. As industry was transforming the state of the family, companies wanted to reassure parents that their daughters were well cared for. The textile companies would provide educational and social opportunities for their employees, as well as in sports so that they could stay physically fit.

Helen Macnaughtan, who wrote an article called The Oriental Witches: Women, Volleyball and the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, and in it she explains how volleyball became the sport of choice for the textile factories:

Sport and recreation activities developed alongside key educational initiatives as a way not only of keeping young girls busy and occupied during non-working hours within factory residential compounds but also as a way of promoting the physical health of workers. The sport of volleyball was introduced by textile companies as it offered the chance to encourage team work amongst young female workers, required minimal equipment and could be played both indoors and outdoors. Over time the increased popularity and indeed strength of these female corporate teams from the large Japanese textile companies became notable, and developed into an investment beyond mere recreation.

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Nichibo ad from the 1964 Tokyo Olympics Official Souvenir Book

 

In the 1950s, women’s volleyball had become a highly popular sport in Japan, resulting in the first national volleyball tournament in 1951. According to Macnaughtan, six teams were from Kanebo, one of the earliest adopters of volleyball in textile factories, and five from Nichibo. In 1960, Japan sent a male and female volleyball teams to the world championships held in Brazil. The women’s team took second place, which was a surprise. It happened to be a team completely from the Kaizuka factory of the Nichibo Company, the logic being that instead of trying to put a team of all stars together very quickly, they should probably send one of their best teams. This team, buoyed by the success in Brazil, was then funded to compete in Europe, where they won 24 straight matches.

At the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, the first female team competition was debuting – women’s volleyball. Nichibo’s team from Kaizuka was now considered one of the best in the world, if not the best. Ten of the twelve members of the Japanese women’s Olympic team were selected from that Nichibo team, with two coming from other corporate volleyball teams.

And on the last day of competition at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, all of Japan exploded in joy when Japan beat the Soviet Union in three straight matches. How did the Japanese achieve this monumental victory? You just need to pull the thread that leads you back 100 years ago, at the emergence of the age of industrialization in Japan.

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The Groundbreaking Wilma Rudolph Part 3: An Enduring Role Model for Women

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When you see a champion, there is almost always a role model.

For Olympic champions like Florence Griffith Joyner, Jackie Joyner-Kersee and Evelyn Ashford, the role model is Wilma Rudolph, the first American woman to win three gold medals in a single Olympic Games. Crowned the fastest women in the world at the 1960 Rome Olympics, Rudolph easily won the gold in the 100-meter and 200-meter sprints, and anchored the American 4×100 team to victory.

Due to her modest grace and her apparent beauty, as well as a life story of overcoming difficult odds to become the best in the world, Rudolph was in the early 1960s the most famous female athlete in the United States, if not the world.

And while she is well known for helping to integrate her hometown of Clarksville, Tennessee when she insisted on the relaxation of segregation laws during her Clarksville Welcome Home celebrations, she has perhaps had a more lasting impact on the success of women, particularly black women, in sport.

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At the banquet in her honor during “Wilma Rudolph Day” on October 4, 1960, she made this statement: “In every effort I have been motivated by one thing: to do justice to those who believe in me and to use my physical talents to the glory of God and the honor of womanhood.” David Maraniss, in his book Rome 1960, pointed out that phrase as a symbol of Rudolph’s true lasting influence.

…it was the last phrase of her banquet speech – the honor of womanhood – that resonated deepest and longest. She was by no means the first great woman Olympian, but a unique combination of personal and cultural forces – her style and attractiveness, her candor and pride in who she was and where she was from, the leg braces of her childhood, the fact that she flashed onto the scene so brilliantly at the first commercially televised Olympics, her international esteem – made her a powerful symbol of the rise of women in sports. If there were a Mount Rushmore of women athletes, her profile would be one of the four chiseled faces. “For every woman athlete who came after, she was the person who opened the door,” Ed Temple said later. “Wilma opened that door, and for all women, not just in track and field. She had that smile. She had that charisma.”

Maureen M. Smith wrote the book, Wilma Rudolph: A Biography, and proclaimed, “Wilma Rudolph’s story is more than the races she won and world records she established. It is the story of a young woman who overcame tremendous obstacles that should have kept her from ever experiencing athletic success, and yet she is the epitome of triumph.”

Here was a woman that women, particularly black women, could look up to with pride, and set as the bar for achievement. When Rudolph passed away in November, 1994, here’s what Joyner-Kersee had to say about her idol.

She was someone I could always talk to. She was very inspirational. She was always in my corner. If I had a problem, I could pick up the phone and call her at home. It was like talking to your sister or your mother, someone you knew for a lifetime. I always thought of her as being the greatest, and not only athletically. You respected her as a woman.

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Jackie Joyner-Kersee with medals

None other than 1960 Olympics teammate and USA team captain, Rafer Johnson, wrote in his autobiography, The Best That I Can Be, that Rudolph’s contribution cannot be overlooked.

One of the most important changes has been the advancement of female athletes. In my day, the public suffered under the assumption that women could not compete in the same sports as men, or had to be protected if they did. I remember women’s basketball, for instance, when each team had an offensive and defensive unit so the players did not have to run full court. Most of the male athletes I knew had great respect for their female counterparts; we were not surprised to see the strides women have made since Wilma Rudolph dazzled the world in Rome.

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The Groundbreaking Wilma Rudolph Part 2: Quietly Yet Powerfully, an Activist

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Wilma Rudolph and Richard Nixon in Nashville_1960

It’s an oft-told tale of Black Americans triumphing overseas – soldiers, athletes and musicians – only to come back home to a world of discrimination and second-class citizenship.

Wilma Rudolph broke the mold.

In the Rome Olympics in 1960, Rudolph won gold in the women’s 100 and 200-meter races, as well as the 4×100 relay, and arguably became the most popular athlete in the world due to her beauty and charm. (That’s saying a lot since Cassius Clay was also on the scene.)

Nearly a month after the end of the Rome Olympics, it was announced by officials of her hometown, Clarksville, Tennessee, that October 4 would be “Wilma Rudolph Day”, and that according to ESPN, Tennessee Governor Buford Ellington, was going to lead the celebration. Tennessee at the time was a segregated state, a place where authorities or owners could require the separation of races in the activities of daily life, like drinking from a water fountain, riding a bus, or eating at a restaurant. And Governor Ellington was a man elected on his support of continued racial segregation.

Rudolph understood the leverage she had at that moment, and said she would accept only if all activities related to Wilma Rudolph Day were racially integrated. It was an offer that no matter where you stood on the political and racial divide, you could not refuse. Rudolph was not to be denied, and so that day was the first time in Tennessee that blacks and whites would be allowed to mix socially.

I found this letter to the editor in the Milwaukee Journal from October 22, 1960, where one Virginia Williams of Wisconsin wrote in praise of Rudolph as the finest of role models for black Americans.

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JFK and Wilma in the Oval Office

Wilma Rudolph, the Negro girl from Clarksville, Tenn., who won three gold medals at the Olympics for her running, also won praise for her good looks and charming ways. This unassuming Negro girl, coming from a large family of average income, brought honor to her race and her country. She brought credit to her country as an ambassador of good will.

County Judge William Hudson spoke in Clarksville at an integrated banquet give for Wilma. With tears in his eyes he said: “If I can overcome my emotions, I’ll make you a speech. Wilma has competed with the world and brought home three medals. If you want to get good music out of a piano, you have to play both white and black keys.”

And in order for America to maintain her leadership in the world, she has to tap all of her resources, utilize all of them. Negroes need America and America needs them.

As one can imagine, race relations in America has improved, but it has been a bumpy road. A few years later, Sports Illustrated caught up with Rudolph on the eve of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and see how domestic life was treating her. While she was busy being a mom, she was also out on the occasional protest.

It was different in May of 1963, when Wilma took part in two demonstrations at Shoney’s, which is considered one of Clarkesville’s finest restaurants although it does not have much more to offer than hamburgers. She was turned away, together with the other Negroes. “I cannot believe it!: she said to a reporter. “Remember the reception they gave me in 1960?” A few months later Clarksville was integrated.  (Sports Illustrated, September 7, 1964)

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