Vol. 3 No. 66 More on Albie Thomas

This article from  Athletics New South Wales comes from Albie Thomas' closest friends and perhaps tells more about him than our previous article.  Special thanks to his mates Down Under for providing this tribute.  GB

VALE: Albie Thomas 1935 - 2013

Author: Athletics NSW Administrator/Sunday, 27 October 2013/Categories: News

After a year long illness Albie Thomas died on the morning of Sunday October 27, 2013 and the athletics’ world lost one of its greats.

Born in Hurstville on February 8, 1935, Thomas became one of Australia’s greatest distance runners. He broke world records, competed at three Olympic Games, was a dual Commonwealth Games medallist and after his career he coached and worked tireless for his athletics club.

 

The early years

Albert Thomas lost his mother while he was in primary school and was too small for any success at rugby league but in 1951, aged 16 years and while attending Canterbury Boys’ High School, he started to emerge as an athlete. In September at the Combined High Schools state carnival, Thomas won bronze in the open 880 yards and mile races, clocking times of 2:14.0 and 5:01.4. Seeing his talent Denis Wilson encouraged him to join St George Athletics Club and compete in the Tuesday night club races on Hurstville Oval. He initially ran in bare feet until he bought a second-hand pair of shoes. For the next two years Thomas won various club races, clocking cross country times of 10:16 (two mile) and 18:33 (three mile).

 

Cerutty influence

Things started to change in 1953 after a visit to Percy Cerutty’s Portsea training camp. Thomas was now following a training program written by Cerutty. He was also making progress in competition when in July 1953 he was third in the NSW junior cross country championship. Over summer he clocked times of 4:29.8 (mile), 9:47.6 (2 mile) and was second in the state two mile championship. During this period he did his six month national service at the RAAF base in Wagga Wagga. In July 1954, competing at his second home, Scarborough Park, he won the NSW Novice Championship, easily beating Pat Clohessy (who at the time was living in Newcastle) who placed third. His times were coming down and in the summer of 1954/55 he recorded 1:54.8 (880y), 4:14.6 (mile), 14:39 (3 mile).Excited about the upcoming Olympic Games, Thomas brought tickets to attend for his girlfriend Nola and himself. He certainly didn’t expect to be competing, however, a little over 12 months later, he would indeed run for Australia at the Olympics.

 

From nowhere to the Olympics

At the start of the 1955/56 track season Thomas really started to progress running 8:54.0 (2 mile) in December. In this race he beat Dave Power and it ranked him No 2 in Australia for the year ahead of Al Lawrence and Ron Clarke. In February he ran 13:36.0 for three mile, just outside the national record of 13:31.8 and a week later was less than one second behind Al Lawrence in the State Six Mile Chamionship. They recorded times of 28:39.0 and 28:39.8. Although Thomas didn’t compete at the national championships in Melbourne, Thomas was in the thick of things taking iconic photos of the most famous national championship race in history, where John Landy stopped mid-race to help Ron Clarke back to his feet after he had fallen, before going on to win the race.

 

In June 1956, Thomas was third in the NSW Cross Country Championship, but his attention was soon on track races in the lead up to the Olympic trials. In September Thomas ran a personal best of 14:04.0 in the 5000m and 29:23.0 in the 10,000m. At the Olympic trials he earned selection in the 5000m and was named reserve for the 10,000m. Just 21 years of age at the Olympic Games, he won his 5000m heat and placed fifth in the final. After the Games he won a three mile race at the British Empire Games team V USA meet in 13:43.2.

 

Post Melbourne Olympics

In the next 18 months there were many more highlights for Thomas, including running 28:30.4 in winning the NSW six mile title, the 1957 national three mile title and over a week late in 1957, a NSW mile record of 4:01.5 and an Australian three mile record of 13:26.0. In June 1958 he was preparing to depart Australia for Europe where he would compete in the lead-up to the Cardiff Commonwealth Games. But before he left, on June 14 1958, he clocked an Australian two mile record of 8:37.8.

 

World records and Commonwealth Games medals

In July he started a two month assault on Europe, clocking world records and winning Commonwealth Games medals.  His first race was on July 8 and he won a mile in Belfast in 4:07.4. But the next night in Dublin he set a world record for three miles of 13:10.8, nearly four second under the old record. Two weeks later he travelled to Cardiff to compete in the Commonwealth Games. His first event was the three mile. He led early and although he slowed the field down, no one would take the lead until the later stages of the race when New Zealander Murray Halberg surged to the front and ran away with the win. Thomas had to settle for the silver. He closed the Games with a bronze in the mile, in an Australian trifecta. Still in Europe in August he won a three mile race at White City, London, then travelled back to Dublin where he helped pace Herb Elliott to a 3:54.5 mile world record. Thomas finished the race fifth in 3:58.6. The next night at the same venue, a tired Elliot was unable to provide the required pace (hitting the mile six seconds too slow for Thomas) who was attempting a two mile world record. Taking the lead himself, Thomas nailed the record with a 61 second last lap, an extraordinary achievement. Over the next four weeks he raced in Germany and Scandinavia, including a race in Gothenburg where he again helped Elliott to a world record, on this occasion over 1500m.

 

1959 to 1965

Back in Australia, Thomas took up more of a family life, marrying Nola, working fulltime and starting a family.

On the track, there would be many more highlights including:

·         Competing at the 1960 and 1964 Olympics and 1962 Commonwealth Games

·         Winning four consecutive Australian mile titles from 1962 to 1965.

·         In 1959 running on the Australia team which broke the 4x 1 mile world record

·         In 1960 running the first sub-4 minute mile on grass in NSW, clocking 3:58.8

·         Setting Australian records: 1962 three mile (13:21.6), 1963 5000m (13:51.4) [In this era Australian records had to be set in Australia]

·         Commonwealth and Australia record: 1963 two mile on Chatswood Oval (8:33.0), Sydney.

·         World Indoor record in 1964 – three mile, in Toronto Canada (13:26.4)

·         In 1963 winning the NSW marathon title (2:29.04) and Australian mile title just three months apart.

 

Thomas achieved so much on the track, in an era where Australian distance running was at an all-time high. He was competitive with Herb Elliott, Ron Clarke, Al Lawrence, John Landy, Merv Lincoln, Trevor Vincent, John Murray, Denis Wilson, Dave Power, Dave Stephens, Robert Vagg, John Plummer, Keith Ollerenshaw, Graham Thomas, Tony Cook and Dave Chisholm.

 

Career winds down

After the 1965 season Thomas’ elite career started to wind down. In 1966 he started a 27 year career with Qantas.

However he continued to run regularly for his club and in 1972 ran the famous Bay to Breakers fun run. In 1975 he competed at the inaugural World Masters Track and Field Championships, where he won the 1500m (3:58.2) and 5000m (14:49.8).

 

Coaching and administration

Albie launched into coaching and increased his involvement with his club and was officially the club distance coach from 1973. He was still club President at the time of his death.

He coached a number of elite athletes including James Nipperess and Bridey Delaney and also guided many club athletes.

 

Nipperess, a dual World University Games representative, was coached by Thomas from 2003 to 2008.

“I would never have persued athletics as a sport outside of school competition if not for his offer to coach me,” Nipperess said.

“I owe all of my early success to him and his passion for the sport. He worked tirelessly for the St George community and was both an inspirational mentor and a friend.”

 

One of his favourite people was Bridey Delaney. This year she achieved something which had eluded him, when she won the National Cross Country Championship. Thomas had placed second in 1961 and 1963 and 50 years later Delaney went one better.

“I first met Albie when I was 11 years old. He coached me throughout my teenage years,” she said.

“To me Albie and Nola were surrogate grandparents. They played an important role in shaping the person I am today. Albie’s training environment was perfect for nurturing athletes through their youth. Albie was the perfect role model, not just because he was a legend of the sport but because he had a big heart. He gave so much back to the community. I have learnt a lot from Albie, which I will take with me throughout life. I will miss his mischievous grin, cheeky nicknames and sense of humour.”

 

Health

In 2004 after bypass surgery Thomas had a pacemaker installed. His health for eight years was good, but in 2012, he started to deteriorate and had some spells in hospital.

In later times his daughter Robyn and wife Nola were his carers and they welcomed many guests who visited Thomas over the last few months.

 

The honours for Albie were many and well deserved. One of the highest and proudest achievements was the awarding of an OAM in June 2013. As he was unwell, Governor Marie Bashir visited his home on August 23, 2013 to present the medal to Albie. He would wear it every day.

 

Albie Thomas was a special and rare person. He was a world beater in his sport and following his retirement  gave back enormously through coaching, administration and inspiring the next generation for 50 years after his racing career ended. The sporting community send our condolences and deepest sympathies to his wife, Nola; daughters Robyn and Patricia; and four grandsons, Thomas, Mark, Liam and Mathew.

 

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HONOURS

2013 received OAM

2006 Commonwealth Games Queens Baton Relay runner in Melbourne (25/1/06)

2000 Awarded Australian Sports Medal

2000 awarded Centenary Medal

2000 Sydney Olympic torch bearer (he ran through Hurstville on 12/9/2000)

1994 Plaque in the Path of Champions at the Sydney Olympic Park Athletics Centre

1994 Athletics NSW Merit Award winner

1983 St George District Athletic Club, Life Member
1983 Honored by Hurstville City Council in its Heritage Walk
1979 inducted in to the NSW Sports Hall of Champions (at Homebush)

1975 St George District Athletic Club, Merit Award winner
1957/58, 1958/59, 1962/63 and 1963/64 four-time winner of the Richard Coombes Memorial Medal, outstanding track and field athlete

At the Morton Pre-Games, in Ireland, an annual event is the Albie Thomas men’s 3000m

 

TRIBUTES

Olympian and St George club member, Ben St Lawrence:

“As president of St George, and all-round great bloke Albie and I would often talk. Albie would offer advice, encouragement and fascinating anecdotes from his time as an athlete. I was always amazed by his vitality and generosity. He had a great sense of humour and positive attitude to life. He will be sadly missed by all who knew him and the wider running community.”

 

Olympian and local athlete, Eloise Wellings:

“I'll miss his cheers of encouragement every time I trained over at Scarborough Park where he'd walk with Nola. "Go kid, pump your arms! Go! Go! Go!" An inspiring man and a life well lived. Rest in peace, Albie.”

 

Newcastle distance legend Jim Beisty:

“So sad to hear of the death of a man I admired all my athletics life. I remember sharing a run with him at Canberra only a few short years ago, two old blokes chasing the young ones they coached up a steep hill. Condolences to the family and to so many close friends he had worldwide. RIP.”

 

Leading Australian distance runner and good friend, Trevor Vincent:

“I'm devastated at the very sad death this morning of one of my oldest and best mates, the great Albie Thomas, in Sydney. Albie and I have been the best of friends off the track while tough rivals on the track for more than 50 years - with great mutual respect. Albie was one of the greatest Aussie distance runners of all-time – a three time Olympian, world record holder at two and three miles, as well as the 4x1 mile relay on the track. An incredible influence on our sport. Albie, always with the great support of his wife Nola, was a fine coach to a great many top athletes and a St George Club stalwart. He will be very sadly missed by all of his friends and the athletics community in general.”

 

World record holder and rival to Albie, Herb Elliott:

“He will be really missed. I admired his guts and determination, his wicked humour, his energy and his solid outlook on life family and friends.  Nola has been a wonderful support to him from his youth to now.”

 

Australian Cross Country Champion Eliza Stewart:

“He may have passed but will never be forgotten.”

 

Former AOC Secretary General and former St George distance runner Bob Elphinston:

“He was a great inspiration to me as an athlete and as a volunteer for the Sydney 2000 bid and Olympic Games.”

 

OTHER INTERESTING FACTS

·         Albie took care of a garden at the St George School for disabled children.

·         Member of St George Club from 1951 to 2013, 62 years.

·         President of St George club from 1995 to 2013, 18 years. Committee member for more than 25 years.

·         The actor Gregory Peck watched the 4x1 mile relay team break the world record in Melbourne in 1959.

·         Albie Thomas took iconic photos of Ron Clarke falling in the 1956 Australian mile championships.

 

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PROFILE and STATISTICS: Albert George Thomas

 

Known as: Albie or Alby

Birth: Hurstville, Sydney - February 8, 1935

DOD: October 27, 2013

Resident: Kogarah, Sydney, Australia

Club: St George

Height: 1.65m

Weight: 57kg

 

WORLD RECORDS

1958 – 9 July, Santry Field, Dublin IRE. Three mile 13:10.8

1958 – 7 August, Santry Field, Dublin IRE. Two mile 8:32.0

1959 – 22 March, Olympic Park, Melbourne AUS. 4 x 1 mile relay 16:25.6 (2nd leg, 4:06.5) with Denis Wilson, Herb Elliott and John Murray

1964 – 24 January, Toronto CAN. Three mile indoor 13:26.4

 

INTERNATIONAL RECORD:

1956 Olympics – 5000m 5th 14:05.33

1960 Olympics – 1500m 5th heat 3:46.95, 5000m 11th 14:20.88

1964 Olympics – 1500m 9th heat 3:54.9, 5000m 11th heat 14:27.8

1958 Commonwealth Games – 1 mile bronze medal 4:02.77, 3 mile 13:24.37

1962 Commonwealth Games – 1 mile 5th 4:11.19, 3 mile 5th 13:40.64

AUSTRALIAN CHAMPIONSHIPS

He won eight national titles and was placed on 18 other occasions.

1 mile – ’59 3rd 4:06.2, ’60 2nd 4:06.7, ’61 3rd 4:09.6, ’62 1st 4:06.5, ’63 1st 4:05.0, ’64 1st 3:58.3, ’65 1st 4:05.9

3 miles – ’57 1st 13:37.6,’58 1st 13:41.8, ’59 1st 13:42.8, ’61 2nd 13:50.2, ’62 2nd 13:36.4, ’63 2nd 13:46.6, ’64 1st 13:20.4, ’65 2nd 14:08.8

Cross Country – ’59 3rd 32:52.6, ’61 2nd 35:49.0, ’63 2nd 33:21.0

NSW CHAMPIONSHIP TITLES

He won 20 state titles.

1 mile – ’59 to ’65 (7 consecutive titles)

3 mile – ’58 to ’61 and ’63 to’65

6 mile – ’57 and ’65

10km cross country – ’59 and ’64

NSW Novice Cross Country - ‘54

Marathon – ’63

 

PERSONAL BESTS

1500m- 3:42.61st Melbourne21.03.64 (en route to a mile)

One mile - 3:58.3 1st Melbourne21.03.64

2000m 5:10.0 1st Narrabeen, Sydney 27.09.64

3000m8:01.4 Sydney 19.01.60 (en route to 2 mile)

Two mile- 8:32.0 1st Dublin 07.08.58

Three mile - 13:10.8 1st Dublin 09.07.58

5000m- 13:50.0 2nd Sydney 2.02.64

10,000m - 29:21.02nd Sydney 01.09.56

Six Mile – 28:30.4 Sydney 27.02.57

Marathon – 2:29.04 Sydney 29.06.63

 

David Tarbotton and Ron Bendall for Athletics NSW

Image: Albie Thomas beats Trevor Vincent in the 1965 Australian Mile Championship (courtesy of Trevor Vincent).

Vol. 2 No. 30 February , 1961

FEBRUARY 1961

The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming! At least Valeriy Brummel and Igor Ter-Ovanesyan are here to take on John Thomas and Ralph Boston in the New York AC Games and the National AAU meet, both in Madison Square Garden. Brummel is track and field's newest shining star, having broken Thomas' world record with a 7-4½ last month in Leningrad.

The NYAC games are held Feb. 17. If the Russian youngster is nervous about his first US competition, it doesn't show. When Thomas can't negotiate 7-2, Brummel is on his own. He is over 7-3 on his second jump. To the delight of the crowd, he has the bar placed at 7-5 because, as he says later, “I wanted to do better than I have ever done. He has three good shots, but doesn't clear. There will be another day, specifically eight days hence in same environs.

If Brumel is disappointed, it is nothing compared to the anguish of Ter-Ovanesyan who, presented with a runway 30 feet shorter than he is accustomed, can't get his step down and fouls six times. Boston needs no competitive incentive. He sails 26-1¾ for an indoor world record. Wins for Brummel and Boston, disappointments for Thomas and Ter-Ovanesyan; you could say the jumps had their ups and down.

Don Bragg, not used to being second banana, soars 15-7 for a meet record and has three near misses at 16-0. With that mark in mind, it is significant to mention that John Uelses places fourth with his first 15-0 clearance, perhaps an indication of things to come.

The most anticipated event on the track is the 880 where George Kerr beats Belgium's 800 world record holder Roger Moens 1:52.2 to 1:52.5. Hungary's Istvan Rozsavolgyi toys with the mile field, winning by 2.5 seconds over Peter Close in 4:04.0.

And now to the AAU meet. The jumps have the same Russian – American match ups and the excitement level has been ratcheted up a notch. Ter-Ovanesyan has his step down and takes the lead in the first round with a leap of 25-7¾. In the third round he becomes the second ever indoor jumper to reach 26 feet with a jump of exactly that distance. Boston answers in the fourth round with a 25-11¼, but time is running out. Neither improve in the fifth round and one jump remains for each. Boston is up first. With the crowd cheering wildly, the Olympic champion sprints down the runway, hits the board with two inches to spare and elevates. At the top of his jump it is apparent that this is a special jump. Indeed it is. The measurement is 26-6¼, a world record by 4½ inches. If you think it is all over but the shouting, think again. The Russian is made of stern stuff. He has been moving his mark back all evening and he does so once again. This is to be an all or nothing attempt. He is all out down the runway, hits the board and it is obvious that this is his best jump of the evening, well over 26 feet. Is it enough to beat Boston and take his WR? We'll never know. The red flag goes up. It is a foul by about an inch. The Russians want it measured anyway. They are turned down by judge Eulace Peacock who cites the rules. Eulace Peacock, does that name ring a bell? If so, it is because he was a 26-3 jumper himself in 1935. Were it not for Jesse Owens, he would have been the world record holder for 24 years until last summer.

The crowd anticipates the high jump match between Thomas and Brummel, but though it is exciting, the marks are an inch below those of last week, Brummel winning 7-2 to 7-0. How far high jumping has come in the last few years is measured by the 18 year old Brummel's apology for missing 7-3.

There is far more excitement on the track than there was last week. In the 1000 Ernie Cunliffe, pictured on the front page, comes within a tenth of the world record he set in Boston, splitting 54.5 and 1:51.9 en route to a 2:08.0 clocking, two yards ahead of Ed Moran. The milers jog through a 3:12.5, with Istvan Rozsavolgyi leading, before Jim Beatty destroys the field with a 56+ final quarter to win easily in 4:09.3. Hayes Jones, who had said he would be concentrating on the sprints in the future, ties the world record in the 60 yard hurdles, defeating Elias Gilbert. No times are given for the placers. Eddie Southern wins his first AAU indoor championship with decisive 1:11.9 victory in the 600.

Bruce Kidd is a crowd favorite and justly so. Record holder Al Lawrence takes the three mile field out with a 4:33 first mile. Houston teammate John Macy then trades the heavy lifting with Lawrence as they take turns leading laps. By two miles, reached in 9:16, Lawrence has realized it is not his day and fallen back, but Lazlo Tabori and the 17 year old Kidd are right there. Another lap and Kidd pops into the lead followed by Tabori. Goodby, Macy. For the next three quarters the Hungarian veteran stalks the Canadian teenager, never more than three yards back. He is still there at the gun and the race is on....but not for long. Down the backstretch Kidd opens up 10 yards, an advantage he stretches to 20 at the tape, winning in 13:47.0, claiming the fifth spot on the all time list. Lazlo has to be content with 13:51.6.

Though some results from the Boston AA meet were mentioned in the last issue, the story appears in this month's. Ernie Cunliffe set the world record at 1000 yards of 2:07.9 in winning by 3.5 seconds. John Thomas set the American record in the high jump with a 7-3 clearance. It would have been the world record had not Brummel jumped 7-4½ a few hours earlier in Leningrad. Thomas, after clearing 7-3, was quoted as saying, “That's enough for one night. I'm satisfied.” Here is a question to ponder. When he said that, did he know of Brummel's jump?

Speaking of Brummel, the classic shot of him touching a basketball rim with his right foot appears on page 15 of this issue.

Now it is February 3 and we are at the Millrose Games at the Garden. Henry Wadsworth bests Don Bragg in the vault, 15-4 to 15-0, Tarzan's first loss at MSG since 1957. The Florida vaulter also takes second in the high jump at 6-6. Hungary's Istvan Rozsavolgyi has said that he is in shape to break Ron Delany's 4:01.4 world record in the mile. For awhile it appears this could be the night. Ernie Cunliffe leads through the quarter in 61.5, but Rozsavolgyi takes over and quickens the pace to 2:01.7. Could we be viewing a record?......No, wait. False alarm. Rozsa slows and Deacon Jones is forced to take over before the 1320, reached in 3:05.3. With two laps (320 yards) left “the slim Magyar zoomed to the front”. Jones hangs tough, but is dropped with half a lap to go. Rozsavolgyi coasts home in 4:06.0. “Cunliffe, apparently out of it, finished fast to grab second in 4:06.4 with Jones at 4:06.5.”

It's the next week and we are at the Sports Arena for the LA Times meet. This 17 year old Canadian, Bruce Kidd, just continues to impress. On tonight's two mile menu we have Al Lawrence, Max Truex, Jim Beatty and John Macy. The veterans let the kid take the lead, but the pace is a dawdling 2:25 at the half. No other splits are given. The pace picks up, but it is still tactical. The youngster leads - “mincing along on his toes” even - for 21 of the 22 laps. At this point “Beatty put an end to all the foolishness with a 160 yard burst that covered the final circuit in an unbelievable 18 seconds”. Beatty 9:05.7, Kidd 9:07.7.

Bert Nelson writes: “The best time of the meet was the 2:08.7 for the 1000 yards by Ernie Cunliffe. Off form with the tail end of a cold, Ernie bolted to the fore halfway through the race and hung on for a diminishing but decisive five yard margin over Jim Grelle.”

Eddie Southern's 57.8 takes the 500 over Jack Yerman and Mal Spence, 58.1 for both. George Kerr, the best 400-800 runner on earth, logically is comfortable in the 600. He wins in 1:11.1 over Mal Spence's twin, Mel, who clocks 1:11.9.

In an odd footnote, the outstanding performer of the meet doesn't go to any of the above, indeed not to any performer in an open race. It goes to crowd favorite Tom Sullivan of St. George High in Evanston, Illinois who wins the high school mile in 4:13.7 with painful splits of 2:01.5 and 2:12.2.

Remember how discouraged Dyrol Burleson was after his thumping at the hands of Jim Beatty last month? Well, apparently Coach Bowerman knows what he is doing. Burleson is in New Zealand kicking some major Olympic butt. On Jan. 21 in Auckland he handles OG 5000 champ Murray Halberg in a 1500, 3:47.4 to 3:47.7. Four days later in Napier he outruns Bill Baillie by two seconds with a 4:04.0 mile. The best is yet to come. Back in Auckland on the 28th he takes on Halberg and OG 800 champ Peter Snell at a mile and leaves them both behind: Burleson 4:05.6, Snell 4:05.7, Halberg 4:06.4. On Feb. 1 in Dunedin he once again handles Halberg 4:01.2 to 4:03.6. Good? Yes, but you ain't seen nothing yet. In Christchurch on the 4th he lines up for an 800 against all three Olympic 800 medal winners, Snell, world record holder Roger Moens and George Kerr. No description of the race is given, but when the dust clears, Burly has won in a personal best equaling 1:50.0. The medalists finish in the same order they did in Rome: Snell 1:50.1, Moens 1:50.4, Kerr 1:50.6. That he stubs his toe in a final mile against Halberg four days later in Wellington, 4:04.2 to 4:04.8, doesn't diminish the success of the Oregonian's tour.

Gleaned from columns: Bobby Poynter has left his San Jose problems behind and is now enrolled at LA State....Istvan Rozsavolgyi has a guilty secret: he is a “chain smoker”, knocking off three or four cigarettes in succession each evening....Roger Moens says his best days are behind him and that he won't break his 1:45.7 800 world record, but neither will Peter Snell. “He is too heavy. He is a shot putter on the side.”.....Vern Wolfe who coached three high school national record holders in consecutive years (Jim Brewer in the PV, Dallas Long in the shot and Karl Johnston in the discus) and then took an assistant job at San Jose State, is now the head coach at Foothill Junior College. Wonder how far his climb up the coaching ladder will go?......Speaking of how far, Ralph Boston, whose broad jump record is a fraction of an inch short of 27 feet, is a confident guy. He says he can jump 30 feet....And finally, Bert Nelson vents, “At Rome many of our runners wore disgraceful dirty gray sweats into the stadium in place of their official blues. They wore non standard uniforms in Greece and London. And some refused to wear numbers in the London meet. None of our athletes are good enough to be allowed to do this and our coaches and managers should see that they don't.”

We'll close with an ad. Kansas coach Bill Easton will lead a “Hawaiian Track Party” for ten days in July. There are no meets, but there will be clinics which will display Easton's “wealth of coaching experience and know how plus genial personality.” Airfare from San Francisco, accommodations at the luxurious Waikiki Biltmore and many activities are included for only $315. Sign up now.

Vol. 2 No. 26 January , 1961

JANUARY 1961

You want indoor meets? We got 'em, but first, let us tell you about two previous outdoor meets.
The first is the Sugar Bowl meet, held appropriately enough in New Orleans on the first day of the year in 50 degree weather. Aubrey Dooley, the former Oklahoma State star, is the unanimous selection as the meet's outstanding performer on the basis of his 15-4¾ vault which breaks the 20 year old meet record of 15-1 set by Cornelius Warmerdam. Ernie Cunliffe has the best mark on the track with his 3:49.0 1500, “a tremendous effort given the poor condition of the track”. He leaves Archie San Romani, George Larson and Barry Almond well behind.
Now a week has passed and we are at Stanford for an all-comers meet. This is not just any old all-comers as evidenced by the setting of two American records. Olympic 5000 champion Murray Halberg is running the two mile for a tune up for next week's Oregon Invitational. There is no significant competition and the New Zealander is on his own. He puts miles of 4:19.5 and 4:21.3 together to win by over half a minute in an American all-comers record of 8:40.8.
Not to be outdone, in the very next race Ernie Cunliffe establishes an American record for 1000 yards with a 2:07.3, the fastest time ever recorded, but there is no recognized world record for this distance, so the American record will have to do. He splits 55.0, 1:51.3 and finishes with a strong 26.2 final 200.
The first of the indoor meets is the inaugural Oregon Invitational held January 14 in Portland. The track, built in Eugene to Bill Bowerman's specifications, is made of ½ inch plywood with tongue-in-groove fitting and 44 inch banking on the curves at a cost of $15,000. Athletes who have run the Eastern indoor tracks say it is the best they have seen. The only complaint is from Bowerman who says that it is too well made. “We could have put it together for $5000 (without tongue-in-groove) and still had a quality surface. It will last forever.”
Murray Halberg sure loves it. He breaks Al Lawrence's indoor 2 mile world record by 11.7 seconds in an oddly paced race. After passing the mile in 4:16.0, he runs the next 880 in 2:20 before going to the afterburners to complete the last half mile in 1:58.3 for a time of 8:34.3. The band breaks into “God Save the Queen” and the crowd of 7111 gives him a two minute standing ovation. Halberg, a laboratory technician in an Auckland brewery, responds with the understated, “It's all in a day's work”. Though left far behind, Lazlo Tabori's 8:47.6 is his best ever on the boards.
Jim Beatty is over the foot injury that kept him from performing his best in the Olympics. He demonstrates his fitness in the mile or at least the last half of the mile. The 880 is reached in a plodding 2:09. Dyrol Burleson then throws down a 61.0, but it is nowhere near enough to keep Beatty at bay. With only half a lap to go, the former North Carolina star separates the men from the boys with a burst that gives him a 15 yard victory in 4:07.4. A discouraged Burleson who is about to undertake a three week tour of New Zealand says, “Maybe somebody who deserves it should take the trip”. The future would not be served without a mention of the fourth place finisher, Bob Schul, who clocks 4:19.5.
Roscoe Cook takes the measure of Darrell Horn and Harry Jerome with a world record equaling 6.0 60. Horn returns to take the broad jump by nearly a foot and a half with a 25-6¼.
Contrary to his remarks after the Olympics, Parry O'Brien is back in the shot put ring. He throws 61-11¾ to leave Dallas Long's 59-3 far behind. Ron Morris gets the better of Don Bragg who can't match Morris' 15-0 vault.
The only faux pas of the evening comes in the 500 where Bowerman has the race run in lanes all the way in an attempt to provide a world record. Obviously the staggers are enormous and apparently confusing. The race should be a dual between Otis Davis and Eddie Southern, but isn't. Both are confounded by the stagger and lose count of the laps to the benefit of Washington State's Rick Harder who wins in 59.5, the same time as Davis and a tenth ahead of Southern.
Murray Halberg may be the present king of the two mile, but the future belongs to 17 year old Bruce Kidd of Canada as measured by his performance in the Boston Knights of Columbus meet this day. Running against 31 year old Pete McArdle and 39 year old Fred Norris, the teen prodigy follows through half mile splits of 2:11, 4:25 and 6:40, before jumping the veteran foreigners with 4¼ laps of the 160 yard track remaining. His move startles the competition and delights the crowd. He opens a 15 yard lead on McArdle who closes only to have the kid open ground again. McArdle makes one more gallant effort, closing within two yards on the final lap, but the Kidd holds him off for an 8:49.2 – 8:49.6 victory. Former Harvard hurdler Bob Rittenburg writes, “Boston Garden was in danger of collapsing from the vibration of the cheering that the fans sustained during the last four laps of the race and the two extra laps that Bruce jogged with the spotlight on him.”
January 21 finds us at the second annual Los Angeles Invitational. The Los Angeles sports fan has the Rams, Lakers, Dodgers, USC and UCLA, yet 13,586 fill the Sports Arena. Would that that be the case now.
The track, “a $12,000 spruce job from Finland, was judged slow and in need of work by some of the runners”. Times were slow in the 500, 600 and 1000 (Ernie Cunliffe, where are you?), but the mile and two were quality races. We will get to them later. Right now the spotlight falls on the rejuvenated Parry O'Brien. The two time Olympic champion once again dominates the shot put. His 63-1½ throw with the bee-bee packed leather shot is a world record. Dave Davis improves a foot from last week's mark at 60-4, but the day belongs to O'Brien.
Ralph Boston's initial indoor indoor effort results in an American indoor record of 25-10, leaving Darrell Horn, last week's 25-6 winner, far behind at 23-9. Bob Avant, a senior at USC, surprises with a 6-ll PR to win the HJ by four inches. Lazlo Tabori edges Max Truex at two miles, 8:53.2 to 8:55.0. Hayes Jones wins the 60 HH in 7.1 and says he will concentrate on the sprints from now on.
Roscoe Cook, who tied the WR in the 60 last week in Oregon, misses replicating that performance by a tenth with a 6.1 victory over a good field. But “One of the best sprint performances of the evening came at the end of the mile when Jim Bailey exploded past a strong running Ernie Cunliffe and left his pursuer by nearly 15 yards in the last 100” to win in 4:06.4.
Under the heading “Late News” there is abbreviated news of happenings on January 28. John Thomas betters his indoor WR (7-2½) with a clearance of 7-3 1/8 in the Boston AA meet. If he had done it the day before it would have been a world record, but earlier this day Valeriy Brummel, still only 18, jumped 7-4½ in Leningrad. Obviously Thomas has some ground to make up.
Who doesn't have ground to make up is Ernie Cunliffe who scorches the Boston track in an American indoor record 2:07.9 1000. Too bad this is not a regulation event as it seems to be EC's best. He is not the only Bay Area middle distance runner heard from this New England evening. Former Cal star Jerry Siebert takes the 600 in 1:11.2. No details are given for either race. Olympic champ, Ralph Boston, does not win the broad jump. This is because he skips the event, instead winning the 45 yard hurdles and takes second in the high jump at 6-6.
Down under on the same day it would appear that Dyrol Burleson's apprehension about competing in New Zealand was unfounded. He wins the invitational mile in Auckland in 4:05.6, edging Peter Snell by inches. Once again no details are given.
Perusal of columns provides the following information. Pro football has taken plucked two more from the rolls of track and field. Bowling Green hurdler Bernie Casey has signed with the 49ers and Olympic intermediate hurdle bronze medalist Dick Howard of New Mexico will wear the blue and white of the Cowboys......Remember the item about Bill Nieder taking a Hollywood screen test? Seems to have worked out. The Olympic shot put champ has just signed a contract to play Jack Dempsey in an upcoming movie........The Helms Athletic Foundation has just announced its' selection for the top athletes for each continent. Livio Berrutti of Italy wins for Europe. Peter Snell is the “Australian” winner. The HAF strikes a blow for gender equity by naming Wilma Rudolph the North American winner.......Speaking of awards, the prestigious Sullivan Award goes to Rafer Johnson. But the balloting reflects the progress women have made as Wilma Rudolph finishes second........Peter Snell writes that the success he and Murray Halberg enjoyed at the Rome Olympics, “really put athletics to the fore here, and we will soon have our first cinder track. There are four tracks planned for completion by '62”. Contrast this with Finland which has 730 cinder tracks.....Herb Elliot says his performances may deteriorate while he attends college in England because Percy Cerutty will remain in Australia. “Any teaching he has got, I have learned, but he does more than teach. He inspires.”........Dan Ferris, secretary of the national AAU says that three to five track men will be picked to compete in South Africa in March or April. He says no question of color or race was raised by the South African AAU, but the team “is expected to contain no Negroes”.......And now a brief visit to our I Am Not Making This Up department. Avery Brundage, the IOC president, has suggested.....are you sitting down?...that gold medal winners be barred from future Olympics in order to give more athletes a chance......Looks like the Nelson brothers made rent this month. There are two one page ads: You can buy high jump and pole vault standards from The John L. Haines company in Galva, Illinois (or “dealers everywhere”) and Ryan Films of Hamden, Connecticut has six 16mm instructional sound films (discus, high jump, hurdles, shot put, pole vault and broad jump) available for purchase in either color or black and white.....Just in case you wondered, the cost of the magazine remains $3 a year and Clifford Severn Sporting Goods still owns the back page.

Vol. 2 No. 23 November 1960

NOVEMBER 1960

This issue reports on the championship cross country meets, more tidbits from the track season and the final US lists.

The US cross country season is dominated by Australia's Al Lawrence

Al Lawrence today

Lawrence setting world indoor 3 miles record

and the University of Houston, the best team money can import. On Nov. 21 in East Lansing, Lawrence takes 40 seconds off the course record, winning in 19:28. Teammate John Macy is second, 16 seconds back. Barrie Almond and Pat Clohessey finish 8th and 11th. At this point it doesn't matter that George Rankin is 50th. He could have finished 84th in the field of 99 and the Cougars would still have won. All of these guys are foreigners. Their average age is 27. Coach John Morriss recruits well.(See Tribute to Johnny Morriss, below) Houston 54, Michigan State 80, Western Michigan 84. Once again all the teams are from the East or Midwest. The schools furthest west are Air Force and Colorado State.

Three days later it is the AAU meet in Lexington, Kentucky. It is a smaller field, but the results are the same. Lawrence runs away from 39 year old Englishman Fred Norris to win by 6 seconds in 31:21. Norris' affiliation is listed as Lake Charles. He is a freshman at McNeese State, but can't represent the school because of Louisiana segregation policies. ( Another interesting note about Fred Norris is that he was 39 years old when he came to McNeese St., already a hardened journeyman runner working in the coal mines of England. He was older than the McNeese coach. One can only imagine what Lake Charles, LA seemed to be to Fred after all those years underground. Did he get used to gumbo and crawfish over fish and chips? We'll never know. Nevertheless he ran some sub 9 minute two miles indoors for them and was in the lead pack late in the Boston marathon before getting thrown off stride by an unleashed dog. He was so thin, some called him the running cadaver. Harold Norpoth would have looked like Arnold Scwharzenegger beside Norris. If you google "Fred Norris,McNeese St." a site for 'Brawn Drain', will appear and an interesting chapter can be seen about old athletes and imposter athletes gaming the NCAA recruiting system. the editor) This time Houston flies the colors of the Houston Track and Field Club. They thump the New York AC for the title 33-42. The University of Chicago TC is a respectable third at 50 points. Morehead College is fourth at 94, but then it gets interesting. Berea College takes fifth with what looks like a PE class. In the field of 61 over 10 K, the local lads place 43-47-52-56-58-59 with times between 38:15 and 43:24. As the saying goes, 80% of success is showing up.

Ted Haydon, U. of Chicago Track Club Coach

Ted Haydon captained the University of Chicago track & field team in 1933 and returned to Chicago to serve as head track & field coach from 1950-85. A member of the U.S. Track & Field Hall of Fame, Haydon formed the University of Chicago Track Club, which became a national force. As a student-athlete at Chicago, he was a national qualifier in the javelin.


The most significant of the collegiate meets is the Big Eight meet in Stillwater, Oklahoma where the hometown Cowboys win their first conference championship and end Kansas' streak of 13 consecutive titles. The finish is one for the ages. Billy Mills of Kansas takes the individual title, but not by much. His 15:03.6 gets him home barely ahead of three Okie Staters, John Haraughty, 15:04, Jack MePhail, 15:05, Harold Smith, 15:06, and teammate Bill Dotson, 15:07. That's five guys within 3.4 seconds over three miles.

Remember the retirements of Ron Morris and Parry O'Brien? Forget it, they will be competing indoors and perhaps outdoors as well. Tell you who will not be back: Lee Calhoun and Bobby Morrow because they have been declared professionals. Morrow has made public his business affiliation with a company that produces among other things the Bobby Morrow Kick Gauge, a device that positions one's starting blocks for maximum leverage. Calhoun's professional status stems from his acceptance of the job of sports director for the the city of Gary, Indiana's parks and playgrounds. As this is enough to keep him from competition, he is free to accept a gift of $3000 as a down payment on a home.

High jumper Joe Faust (see article below) has dropped out of Occidental College “for personal reasons” and has jumped for the last time. How many times have we seen the term “personal reasons” used to gloss over something negative? Not this time. Joe Faust is leaving the school and the sport to enter the priesthood.

Remember the tragic crash that took the lives of so many of those on board the plane that carried the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo football team Oct. 29, 1960? One of those who lost his life is 46.0 400 meter runner Vic Hall.

Last month we reported that Olympic 100 meter champion Armin Hary, not having his price met for three films featuring his own wonderfulness, had devoted his time to writing his memoirs. Well, it appears that the siren call of the silver screen has once again captured his attention. He is now interested in filming The Armin Hary Story with himself playing the title role. Not to be outdone, his Olympic teammate, Carl Kaufmann, is moving forward with his entertainment career as well. He has just recorded his first song, “Und Amor lauft mit” which translates as “Cupid Runs too”. If you know the tune, feel free to hum along as you read further.

Archie San Romani Jr. has transferred from Wichita State to Oregon.

San Romani Jr. 2 nd to Jim Grelle at Mt. San Sac? Relays

Glenn Cunningham, Archie San Romani Sr. and Gene Venzke the 3 US 1500 entrants at 1936 Olympics on the boat to Europe.

Gordon Pirie has retired and moved to New Zealand. Roger Moens, Belgium's 800 WR holder is the subject of conflicting reports. Some say he will retire, but others report an interest in continuing his career in the 1500 where he has a PR of 3:41.4.

The IAAF ruled that 200 meter races around a turn which have aiding wind in the stretch will not be considered for record purposes. As this was not the case when England’s Peter Radford's 20.5 was accepted as the WR, his mark will be referred to as a “record accepted by mistake”. Awkward at best.

From our thinking outside the box department: Harold Abrahams of Great Britain has a suggestion that would revolutionize broad jumping. He proposes a “step off board” one meter in length. The jumper can take off anywhere within this zone and the measurement will be taken from the footprint (made more visible through the use of an adequate material). Jumpers would be “psychologically unbothered” while going down the runway and there would be practically no fouls. The more your hard working reporter thinks about that, the better the idea seems.

With the track world abuzz from the Olympics, this issue is full of ads. For the first time an entire page is devoted to an ad, specifically Champions on Film who offer “1960 Olympic Movies from Rome” ($25), 16mm “loop” movies and sets of “loops” in 8mm ($19.95). Honest to God,.....I am not making this up,......the address is 303½ S. Main Street, USA. No phone number. Think someone got yelled at for that?

The choice of shoes now includes Spot-Bilt (with all-kangaroo uppers), Puma (the imported shoe), Dreske (a fine, new track shoe / dealers wanted) and, of course, Adidas (the proof is in the wearing).



A Tribute to Johnny Morriss from the Lousiana Sports Hall of Fame
Johnny Morriss
Sport: Track and Field
They don't make hurdles – or hurdlers – like they did before World War II.

Johnny with US team in Torino,Italy 1933

Johnny later in life.
Six of the 15 track and field athletes in the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame were world class hurdlers, including two of the five members of Bernie Moore's LSU team that won the 1933 National Collegiate Athletic Association championship. But modern day hurdlers such as Rodney Milburn and Willie Davenport should be thankful that they didn't compete in the good old days.

Hitting a hurdle now might cost an athlete a tenth of a second. Fifty or sixty years ago, it could mean a broken leg.

“It was straight upback and did not have anything on it that would give,” Johnny Morriss said of the hurdles he conquered in tying the world record with a time of 14.3 seconds in 1933.

In one exhibition race in Cleveland, Morriss didn't even run in a straight. “We ran on the baseball field,” he recalled. “The high hurdles started at home plate and five hurdles were down the right field line. Then it curved toward centerfield for the last five hurdles. Of course, it was all on grass. I ran 14.6, and it was published as a world record.”

His first taste of international competition was a victory over Lord Burghley of England (the 1928 Olympic 400 meter hurdles champion, and one of the Olympians portrayed in the movie “Chariots of Fire”) in the 1930 Toronto World's Fair. Lord Burghley was elected to Parliament in 1931, but was granted a leave of absence for the 1932 Olympics.

Morriss was a three-year letterman in football, basketball and track at Lafayette High, graduating in 1926. He earned 12 letters at Southwestern Louisiana Institute – four apiece in football and track, two apiece in football and golf.

Abbeville High hired him in 1930 – officially as a teacher and assistant principal, to protect his amateur status. But unofficially, he did plenty of coaching, Marty Broussard, then a student at Abbeville High, recalled Morriss setting up hurdles in the school's hallway on rainy days to practice when he was preparing for a major meet.

The year before he broke the world record, Morriss was the first alternate in the 110 meter high hurdles on the 1932 U.S. Olympic team.

George Saling of Iowa, the NCAA champion, won the gold medal and Percy Beard, who had nipped Morriss by a foot for the third spot on the U.S. team, won the silver medal.

One year later, Morriss won the national AAU championship at Chicago's Soldier Field with a world record clocking of 14.3 seconds in a qualifying heat. Perseverance paid off for Morriss, who had finished fourth or fifth in the previous three national AAU championships. Third place in that race went to Al Moreau of LSU, another member of the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.

The other “old-timer” in the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame is Glen “Slats” Hardin, whose specialties were the longer hurdles races.

After the 1933 national AAU meet in Chicago, Morriss toured Europe for two months and won 17 consecutive races in international competition. In the World Student Games in Turin, Italy, Morriss was selected to carry the U.S. flag in the opening parade of nations. He won the high hurdles in that meet. Throughout his career, he wore a red and white SLI shirt, even in European meets.

Morriss, who coached athletes in four sports at Abbeville High, later coached North Carolina to Southern Conference championships four years in a row, directed SLI to three consecutive Gulf States Conference championships and led the University of Arkansas to the Southwest Conference cross country title. Between those stints, he spent three years in the U.S. Navy during World War II and worked with a Chicago athletic supply company for two years.

In 1955, Morriss took over the track and cross country program at the University of Houston. His Cougars won three consecutive national AAU cross country championships.

Morriss coached 30 All-Americans in track and field, and 36 in cross country. His athletes tied or broke eight world records, and nine of them competed in the Olympic Games – three for the United States and six for Canada.

He originated the “Meet of Champions” in Houston and brought indoor track to Houston. Morriss was instrumental in bringing the national championship meet to Houston's Jeppesen Stadium in 1986.

“He's the only man I know,” said one friend, “who can start talking about football, basketball or anything else, and wind up talking about track.”

Morriss, author of The Self-Coached Runner, is the only track coach from Louisiana or Texas to be elected president of both the NCAA Cross Country Coaches' Association and the Outdoor Track Coaches' Association. He is a member of numerous Halls of Fame.

In recent years, Morriss has been battling Alzheimer's disease. A man who had seven holes-in-one as a golfer, his golf game has been limited to practicing putts in the backyard of Houston's Sheltering Arms Day Center. The game that kept him alert was dominoes.

Alzheimer's is a progressive, degenerative disease that claims more than 100,000 lives a year – making it the fourth leading cause of death nationally behind heart disease, cancer and stroke.

His wife, Nona, said the most difficult thing was watching a dynamic person who was always self-reliant become dependent on others for everything. “We still have a lot of good conversations,” she said in the winter of 1991. “We take walks and we have friends who involved us in what they do. But I cry easily now. That's something I never used to do.


The following is an article about Joe Faust from the Culver City HS Alumni News by Rick Weingarten including an exerpt from "Rome 1960".
An Olympian from Culver High : : Joe Faust

From the book: "ROME 1960..The Olympics That Changed The World” by David Maraniss

“The high-jump competition was an all-day affair. It started at 9 that morning with 32 jumpers, and by lunch the field had narrowed to 17 who had cleared 6’-6 ¾” . American Joe Faust, with a sore lower back, was the first one out in the afternoon. “

“It could be said that Joe Faust failed at the Rome Olympics, coming up short after working toward a single moment for 7 years, but his disappointment was not written into the larger drama of U.S. men’s track-and-field team on what came to be known as Black Thursday. Few had heard of Faust before or after 9/1/60, and he was virtually invisible at the competition, withdrawing after the preliminary round in the high jump. He barely dragged his pained body over the bar at 6-4 ¾, then bowed out, finishing in 17th place, which was far worse than he might have done but better than 14 other jumpers from Tunisia to Iceland. That is how most Olympic athletes finish, unknown and unseen, away from the glare of media hype and patriotic hope. Like any of them, Faust would have been delighted to win a gold medal at the Stadio Olimpico, but he understood that in the larger scheme of things it would not have mattered, and the scheme of things is what he was all about.

There had been a touch of fame in the family before his athletic career. His father, Louis (Bob) Faust, was an actor who played a villain in several John Wayne movies, including the 1947 “Angel and the Badman.” Bob assumed the role of bad man in the family, too, leaving his pregnant wife and 7 children. Joe was 5 when his parents separated, and spent much of his childhood with a foster family in Culver City. He was a normal kid except in two respects: he had wondrous spring in his legs and religious curiosity in his heart. By age 10 he was a precocious Catholic, searching for the spiritual essence of life.

His junior high track coach notice Joe’s exuberant bounce and quickly steered him toward the high jump. It was 1953, and together they developed an ambitious long-term plan to get to the 1960 Olympics. One out of a million chance, perhaps. ‘But I believed him,’ Faust said of his coach. ‘And we started working.’ His first jump was 3-foot-7, but by the end of that year he was at five-eight and moving higher by the week. He did the straddle jump, like most jumpers of that era, approaching the bar from a left angle and kicking up and over with his lead arm & leg. ‘I loved seeing the bar as I went over it,’ he said, something no high jumper would do in later decades after Dick Fosbury introduced the revolutionary Fosbury Flop, going over shoulders first, torso and head skyward. (as an interesting aside, I watched the 1976 Montreal Olympics with Dick Fosbury when I lived in Eugene and was blessed to hear his commentary while Dwight Stones was going for the gold. We sat in a friend’s backyard, drinking beer and watching Dwight with rapture on our faces. I remember it well. In fact 30 years later, I tracked Dick down in Ketcham, Idaho where he owned a surveying company and was able to convince him to do a feature for Fox Sports Net that I produced, called, “Where are They Now.” Great memories indeed.)

At fifteen Faust cleared the bar at 6-8, setting a new standard for his age group, and as he approached age 17 he was recruited to jump at UCLA. Faust lasted a month there, dropped out, and transferred to nearby Occidental College. He had been valedictorian of his high school class, but school now was all confusion to him. The seven-year plan to reach the Olympics still drove him, and he worked out twice a day, all the while feeling pangs of guilt about ‘the achievement complex.’ Jumping was his ambition and salvation; he infused it with religious symbolism.

Each jump had its own ritual; what he called the cycle of repair. He looked at the crossbar and saw the crucifix. As he approached, he imagined jumping into the arms of a loving God. He rose with penance, sorry for his sins, and descended with gratitude, thankful for love and forgiveness. Over and over again, penance and gratitude, sin and redemption, repairing himself inside and out, jumping a hundred times a day. It was all deeply personal and private. He never talked about it to others, never boasted that God was on his side. His heavenly thanks were not for how high he jumped, but simply for the act of jumping at all.

By July 1, 1960, Faust was exceptional enough to compete at the Olympic Trials at Stanford. Everything felt right that day. He was struck by the beautiful care with which Payton Jordan, the Stanford track coach, had prepared the stadium. The grass was a velvet cut of green, the track smooth and flawless, the takeoff area with just the right bounce, the landing pit soft and inviting. Hours before the competition, Faust went off by himself to meditate, visualizing his jumps. There were 13 competitors, led by John Thomas, the amazing leaper from Boston U., and Charley Dumas, the defending Olympic champ. All the attention was on Thomas, as he set a new world record, but there was a lively contest for the other tow Olympic slots. When the height reached 6-9, 7 jumpers were still around. Faust nicked the crossbar on his first 2 jumps and was on the verge of elimination. ‘I started visualizing the prayer part,’ he said later of his preparations for the 3rd try. ‘I dedicated the next jump to all the people who might be on crutches around the world. But it was not a trade-off with God. It was a feeling of, Why leave anyone behind?

He cleared the bar with ease. And then 6-10, and 6-11, and finally he soared over 7 feet for the first time in his life and clinched a spot on the team.

That moment, as it turned out, was the Olympic peak for jumping Joe Faust. A few day later he strained a disc in his lower back. Determined to fulfill the 7-year plan, he gutted it out at practice meets in Oregon and Switzerland, wincing in pain but showing enough to keep his place on the team. He was still only 17 when he reached Rome, the youngest man on the track and field squad, and he soaked it all in, joining the throngs who saw Pope John XXIII at the Vatican, mixing with foreign athletes, even coming to the aid of Leif Kvist, a young man from Sweden who had lost all his money and had been standing outside the gates of the village, broke and starving, until Joe brought him food from the bounteous Olympic cafeteria.

Then came the day of competition, the anticlimax, a jump of 6-4 ¾ and no more. He returned to California and wanted to become a Trappist monk. He fasted outside the gates of the Abbey of New Clairvaux up near Vina for 3 days and asked to be called Zachary, but could not clear his mind of images of a woman he had fallen in love with decided the monastic calling was not for him, not exactly. Over the years, he married, had children, got divorced, and struggled with questions he could not answer. He wondered what purpose God could invest in a molecule 2,000 feet underground. What part did that molecule play in the scheme of life? It was a hole in his theological construct that remained unfilled for years, until it cam to him that a single molecule had its own graceful movement in the universe. ‘That lonely molecule is not so lonely,’ he decided.

Nearly a half century after his moment in Rome, Faust, in his mid 60’s, lived a monastic life alone in a cramped room in a cottage nestled on the side of a scrubby tan hill just off the 710 Freeway not far from Cal State, L.A.. Inside his room, he had a table, a filing cabinet (folders on new high-jump landing pit designs, trash technology, mind and spirit notes), a shelf of books (The Joy of Mathematics, The Sistine Chapel, The Child’s Creation of a Pictorial World), another shelf of food (cereal, bananas, 7-grain bread, grapes, oranges), a small refrigerator, a sofa bed, and a computer. There were makeshift shelves and a grill out near the side door. It seemed all he needed. He was like a single molecule of Olympic history buried deep underground, alone, but still moving, and in his movement connected to everything else. Once he knew Rafer Johnson, Wilma Rudolph, Cassius Clay.

The backyard had the marking of a scavenger, a cluttered junkyard of collected planks of oak, sheets of plywood, scraps of iron, chunks of cement, bricks, stones, all arranged in a haphazard yet loving array. Down at the bottom third of the yard there was a clearing with an old mattress on the ground, and a further look showed two poles rising at either end, a bamboo crossbar nearby, and a worn path in the dirt coming from the left toward the tattered mattress. With no one watching, Joe Faust was high-jumping still, with a sore knee but bounce in his step, practicing his cycle of repair, rising with penance, clearing the crucifix, absolving his sins, descending with gratitude.

================

Just a footnote in the Olympic lore, but as a Culver City man, I thought worth recalling and giving some reverence to a man who might have won a medal had it not been for his damaged disc. I believe he may be the only Culver City person to ever compete in an Olympics. Not positive of that however.

This might be the most I have typed since my last term paper in 10th grade for Patty Logsdon. Whew..See you.

Rick Weingarten


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Vol. 1 No. 73 January, 1960

January, 1960
Indoor season is going full blast and the biggest name in the news is John Thomas. On Jan. 16 in Boston's Massachusetts Knights of Columbus meet he soars 7'0 ½”. Two weeks later in New York's Millrose Games he defeats last year's top ranked high jumper, Olympic champ Charlie Dumas, with a world record leap of 7'1½”. After losing last year to a foot injury, the Boston University sophomore is back.
In the K of C meet Don Bragg vaults 15'4” to erase Bob Richard's indoor record by ¼ inch. To make sure, he does it again in the Millrose meet.
The best mark on the track belongs to Houston's Australian, Al Lawrence, who runs in tandem with teammate John Macy before breaking loose in the last quarter mile to clock 13:38.0 for the three mile at Millrose.
In the week between these east coast meets there is action on the west coast, the Los Angeles Invitational, held in “the beautiful new Sports Arena”. Parry O'Brien sends the message that he is still the man to beat in the shot, throwing an almost-sort of-could have been world record of 63'1”. When his shot is weighed initially it comes up light. Additional pellets are added to bring it up to standard, but apparently they leaked out during the competition and the implement is four ounces shy when weighed for WR purposes. O'Brien doesn't worry. The challenge has been issued. Don Bragg continues his WR vaulting, this time clearing 15'5 1/2”.
The east coasters are not idle the weekend of the LA Invitational for the Washington Evening Star Games are held and Dave Sime is back. Well, sort of. This is the meet that has the 70, 80 and 100 yard sprint series that he dominated last year. Not so much this year. After tying his meet record of 7.0 for the 70, he feels a twinge and calls it a day. Ed Moran, now with the NYAC, wins the mile in a meet record 4:08.3. Before you say that isn't all that fast, please be reminded that this is the fastest time ever run on a flat track. The lack of banked curves makes John Macy's 14:01.3 three mile pretty impressive also.
This is not to say there was no outdoor action. December 30 was the date of the Sugar Bowl meet in New Orleans and many of the big guys were there. Dave Sime wins a 10.4 100 over Bill Woodhouse on a slow track. How slow it was is emphasized by Eddie Southern's winning 48.5 (Bobby Morrow 3rd in 50.0) and Rex Cawley's 14.6 hurdle win. Dyrol Burleson holds of Jim Grelle in the 1500, 3:48.5 to 3:49.0.
Speaking of Burleson, he is featured in Profiles of Champions. Notation is made of his his nickname being “Burly”. He “trains nine months a year, six to seven days a week. Does some weight training with light weights. Runs fartlek all year round mixed with cross country in the fall, some interval training in the winter and interval training and pace work in the spring and summer.”
Phil Coleman is also profiled. His program is detailed more closely than “Burly's”. I won't go into it more than to note that he trains 12 months a year, seven days a week. This would seem to parallel his academic endeavors. After graduating with a BA in English, he earned his masters in '57 and is currently working on his PhD. Coleman's athletic achievements reflect hard work, not great talent. His best high school mile was 5:00.1. As a freshman at So. Illinois he ran only 4:45. By the time he graduated he had run 4:15 and 9:27. It wasn't until he enlisted in the army that he began his steeplechasing career that led to a spot on the '56 Olympic team and national records in the steeple and two mile.
Ralph Higgins of Oklahoma State is featured in the Meet the Coach column. He is a Cowboy through and through, having graduated from Okie State (then Oklahoma A&M) in 1925 where he was Southwest Conference champion in the 100 and 440. After serving the Oklahoma City school system for eight years, he took over the XC and track reigns in Stillwater and the rest is history. His track teams won 17 consecutive Missouri Valley Conference championships and his XC team won the 1954 NCAA meet.
Bob Mathias is in the news. The 1948 and 1952 Olympic decathlon champion would like to compete in the 1960 games. He recently threw the discus 176 feet. Dan Ferris, the AAU secretary says no. He has been tainted by filthy lucre earned by his athletic fame. No big deal. An old guy like that probably wouldn't have a chance. Wait a minute, Mathias is only 29. His Olympic gold came at the tender ages of 17 and 21.
And from the It was a Simpler Time folder: Stanislaw Sawatowski, Poland's 46.9 400 man, has been suspended for six months. His offense is ….are you ready?.....drinking.
Track and Field News appears to be turning the financial corner. This issue of the magazine – still $3 for the year – has 4¾ of its 16 pages consumed with advertising.

Vol. 1 No. 70 November, 1959

NOVEMBER 1959

Al Lawrence

Crawford 'Forddy' Kennedy


The cover has photos of Forddy Kennedy leading the field en route to leading Michigan State to the Big Ten championship and Al Lawrence of Houston crossing the finish line in the NCAA meet. Lawrence also wins the AAU meet three days later.
The NCAA meet is held in East Lansing, a good thing because Michigan State puts on a show for the home folks, scoring 44 points to win easily over Houston with 120. In six previous races Lawrence has tied with teammate John Macy. This time he puts 150 yards between them. Macy edges Kennedy for second. Houston also picks up a sixth in the team scoring as Pat Clohessy finishes 8th. Unfortunately for the Cougars, their next scorers are 52 and 59. The Spartans bunch their runners within 50 seconds in the 3-4-9-12-16 positions. Iowa (134), Notre Dame (141) and Western Michigan (148) take the next three spots. Apparently word of a national cross country meet has not reached the South or West, as, aside from Houston and Air Force, the other scoring teams are from the Midwest or East.
Three days later the AAU meet is held in Louisville. This time the Cougars do better. Buoyed by the addition of Barrie Almond and Jerry Smart, they crush a less than stellar field, scoring 30 points to outdistance the NYAC (64), Idaho University TC (68) and University of Chicago TC (74). The three other scoring teams are the High Point TC, Kentuckiana Cinder Club and Berea College. Once again Macy takes second, this time only five seconds behind Lawrence, but 23 seconds ahead of third place Billy Mills.
`The Big Eight runs only three miles, but it is enough for Miles Eisenman of Okie State to establish his dominance over Billy Mills and Gail Hodgson. Cliff Cushman, the number seven ranked intermediate hurdler in the world, just to fill the time until track season is Kansas’ number two man, finishing 8th as the Jayhawks win their 13th consecutive league title. Michigan State of course wins the Big Ten.
The US Report, a compilation of the top 50 or so times in each event, fills five pages. On the first page is a photo of LSU’s Billy Cannon who has the 11th best 100 time (9.5), the sixth best 220 (20.6 straightaway) and the 33rd best shot put (54-4). He might develop into something. Oddly, though next month’s world issue will include the 400 IH and the HSJ, they are not included in this national list.
The Meet the Coach column features Bill Easton of Kansas who has had a pretty successful run in Lawrence. He ran the quarter at Indiana. His first coaching job was at Hammond, Indiana. He then coached at Drake where his cross country teams won three NCAA titles in the 40’s. Kansas called in 1947 and it has been all sunshine and bright lights ever since. His Jayhawks have won 15 indoor and outdoor Big Eight track championships and the aforementioned 13 consecutive league cross country titles. His 1953 XC team won the NCAA meet as did this year’s track team.
Other tidbits gleaned from various columns include the news that Ira Murchison now weighs 135 pounds. This is significant because he was operated on this summer for complications arising from amoebic dysentery. His weight had dropped to 84 pounds. He is running again and hopes to compete for a spot on next year’s Olympic team……Colorado half miler Mike Peake and North Carolina miler Jim Beatty are now training with the newly formed Santa Clara Valley Youth Village in California…….What are the odds of Bakersfield Junior College having next year’s Olympic 100 meter champion? Pretty good, apparently as there is a notation that Armin Hary has relocated from Germany to the southern region of the Central Valley.
Puma has a quarter page ad. So does the Adidas interloper in Lansing, Michigan. Not to worry, Clifford Severn has them both beat. His ad covers 3/8 of the back page.
Dyslexia rules the day once again. Above the Severn ad is a photo of Gene Venzke edging Glenn Cunningham in a 4:13.4 mile in Princeton, NJ in 1936. It is the third that I can remember the magazine has reversed. The curb is on the right and letters on the shirts are backwards. I wonder whether Cordner yells at Nelson or vice versa.

Vol. 1 No. 55 March , 1959

MARCH 1959
This is a transitional issue containing the last meets of the indoor season and the first results of the outdoor season, mainly Texas and California.
The cover features stories on javelin records. On March 26 Kansas’ Bill Alley breaks the NCAA record with a toss of 258-4. But wait, he is just getting warmed up. The following week he improves to 270-1½, breaking the American record by 1½ inches, but nowhere in the story is there mention of whose record it was that was broken. (It was Bud Held’s.)
Let’s get the indoor meets out of the way. World records in the mile and two mile highlight the NY Knights of Columbus meet in the Garden. Ron Delany keeps his unbeaten indoor string alive, but just barely, holding off the great Hungarian, Istvan Rozsavolgyi, 4:01.4 to 4:01.8. Aussie Al Lawrence, bronze medalist in the ’56 Olympics and now a student at the University of Houston, breaks Bill Dellinger’s indoor 2M WR by more than three seconds with a 8:46.8 in what was essentially a solo race as second place is 9:05.
Two days later Lawrence takes a beating from Max Truex who nearly takes his record as well, running 8:47.1. Lawrence isn’t close enough to see the finish, as he runs only 9:03. Oh, and Delany slips by Rosa again, this time 4:05.4 to 4:05.7.
Two weeks later the Cleveland Knights of Columbus put on their own meet and Al Lawrence loses by a second to Lazlo Tabori’s 8:47.8. Purdue freshman and local boy, Dave Mills, edges Josh Culbreath in the 600 in 1:11.8. You have to give Rozsa credit for showing up. Once again he is close, but no cigar: Delany 4:06.6, Rozsa 4:06.8.
The next week the action is in Chicago at the Daily News Relays. This time Navy ensign Lew Stieglitz (6’5”?) and Max Truex (5’5”?) put on a Mutt and Jeff Show in the 2M with Stieglitz just edging Truex 8:54.1 to 8:54.5. Hayes Jones ties Milt Campbell’s WR in the 60HH at 7.0 to defeat Lee Calhoun and Willie May. With Rozsavolgyi having said screw it and gone home, Ron Delany runs 4:06.4 for his 40th consecutive indoor mile victory.
Penn State wins the ICAAAA by 17/36 of a point over Manhattan in a clusterfuck so confusing that the meet isn’t decided until eleven days later. I couldn’t explain this if I wanted to…and I don’t. Someone’s term paper awaits.
The long awaited rematch of Bobby Morrow and Dave Sime takes place in of all places, Odessa, Texas in the West Texas Relays 100. Morrow wins in “an ‘official’ 9.35”. Sime, who had been training only three weeks, “lost at the start, but was gaining on the Olympic champion at the finish and was timed in 9.4”.
There is a photo of five very large healthy looking guys, all kneeling. The two on the outside are 58 foot shot putters Charley Butt and Bob Humphreys. The inside three, Dave Davis, Perry O’Brien and Dallas Long, have all thrown over 61 feet. The definition in O’Brien’s arms speaks to his years of weight training, not that you would kick sand in the face of any of the others.
Speaking of O’Brien, he, Don Bragg, Ira Davis Josh Culbreath and Bob Gardner are leaving on a month long good will tour of Africa. Tom Courtney has become an assistant coach at Harvard. John Thomas caught his foot in an elevator shaft (?) and will be out of action for three months.
A personal note, if I may be allowed. On the penultimate page there is a photo of four young men who have just set a national record of 3:30.7 in the high school sprint medley. The significance is that they represent Bellflower High School and the race was run on this very track in the second annual Bellflower National Record Relays, a meet that was certainly the most important on the west coast before the Arcadia Invitational came along. The anchor, Larry Canova, ran 1:53.9. The uniforms the four are wearing were ratty looking in ’59. Fourteen years later when I took the reins at BHS, they were an embarrassment. The kids ran with bags over their heads. That year when one of our kids went to the state meet, 400 miles away, we staved off ridicule by buying a tank top and ironing on a “B”. My greatest coaching achievement at Bellflower was getting new uniforms. We were slow, but spiffy.
“Profiles of Champions” outlines Bill Alley’s unique javelin training. Seems Bill carries a 10 pound sledge hammer and a double-bladed axe in his car at all times. “Every day he spends 20 minutes banging 40-penny nails into any handy tree. The axe is used for wood chopping, done intermittently after practice.” He also practices throwing a 12 pound shot in a javelin motion. In the summer he throws golf balls, a practice he picked up from Bud Held. He also uses them in a more traditional manner as driving them helps him get his hip through first. Not sure how this came about, but he is credited with throwing a three pound hand grenade 298-6. Caution, kids, don’t try this at home. It must have been hard to be Bill’s next door neighbor. The banging of spikes into your trees would be irritating, but seeing the kid with an armload of hand grenades and I’m calling 9-1-1 or whatever you called in 1959.
The magazine still costs three dollars and Cliff Severn and Adidas….yadda, yadda, yadda.