Wilma Rudolph

BORN: JUNE 23, 1940, SAINT BETHLEHEM, TN

DIED: NOVEMBER 12, 1994, BRENTWOOD, TN

We are all the same in this notion: The potential for greatness lives within each of us.

Wilma Rudolph was four years old when she was stricken with polio. Doctors said she would not walk again. But Wilma’s mother took her daughter to weekly therapy, and she and her other children massaged Wilma’s legs every day. By age eight, Wilma could walk with the aid of a brace. A few years later, she was playing basketball with her brothers. At age sixteen, Wilma competed as a sprinter in the 1956 Olympic Games. In 1960, when she competed in the Rome Olympics, most people were not aware of Wilma’s story of triumph over adversity. To them she was just another athlete. But when she became the first woman to win three gold medals in track, she received international recognition and was named “athlete of the year” by the Associated Press.

Wilma Glodean Rudolph, the twentieth of twenty-two siblings, was raised in Tennessee. She set a state record for high school girls’ basketball by scoring 803 points as a sophomore. While playing in a game, she was spotted by Ed Temple, coach of the Tennessee State University track and field team. He recognized her natural athletic ability and invited her to train with his team, called the Tigerbelles. At the 1960 Rome Olympics, the first to be televised internationally, Wilma was the fastest woman runner in the world.

When Wilma returned home, her town wanted to honor her with a parade. Most of the city facilities were still segregated, but Wilma insisted that any banquet or parade for her had to be fully integrated. The city planners complied. After retiring from competitive sports in 1963, Wilma went back to school to study elementary education. She taught in public schools and colleges and continued to use her celebrity status and skills to support civil rights causes. She coached and mentored young women and athletes of color and established the Wilma Rudolph Foundation in Indianapolis, a community-based amateur sports program that she considered her greatest success.