Rudolph, Wilma G.
Track and Field
b. June 23, 1940, St. Bethlehem, TN
d. Nov. 12, 1994
The twentieth of twenty-two children, Rudolph weighed only 4½ pounds at birth and she suffered a variety of illnesses, including polio, as a child. She began to walk at eight with the aid of a leg brace. The brace was replaced by corrective shoes when she was eleven.
Rudolph soon began taking the shoes off to play basketball barefoot with some of her older siblings and eventually she stopped wearing them entirely. In high school, she starred in basketball and track. After a year of competition, she qualified for the 1956 Olympic team when she was sixteen and won a bronze medal for running in the 4 by 100-meter relay.
Nicknamed "Skeeter" by her high school basketball coach, Rudolph went to Tennessee State College, where she became known for sleeping a lot. A teammate once said, "I guess Wilma would rather sleep than do most anything. Next to that it's reading, but mostly in bed."
Illness kept her out of the entire 1958 season and a pulled thigh muscle hampered her for much of 1959, although she won the first of four consecutive AAU outdoor 100-meter championships that year. The 5-foot-11, 132-pound Rudolph emerged as the U. S. hero of the 1960 Olympics. She ran a world record 22.9 in the 200-meter at the Olympic trials and set a world record of 10.3 in a preliminary 100-meter heat. Rudolph won gold medals in both sprints and was also a member of the winning 4 by 100-meter relay team.
She went on a European tour in 1961 and was immensely popular with fans everywhere. The French called her "La Perle Noire" (the Black Pearl), the Italians "La Gazella Nera" (the Black Gazelle). Rudolph tied her 100-meter record at a meet in Moscow and lowered it to 11.2 seconds four days later at Stuttgart.
In addition to her four national 100-meter titles, Rudolph was the outdoor 200-meter champion in 1960 and she won the indoor 60-meter sprint three times.
The Associated Press female athlete of the year in 1960 and 1961, Rudolph won the 1961 Sullivan Award as the outstanding amateur athlete of the year. She was only the third woman to win the honor. After retiring in 1962, Rudolph established the Wilma Rudolph Foundation, which helps underprivileged children and sponsors athletic competition for youngsters.
Rudolph married and had four children. At various times, she served as a track coach at DePauw University and as a U.S. goodwill ambassador to French West Africa. She died of brain cancer at the age of 54.