IF YOU HAVE FAITH, IT WILL HAPPEN

If you have Faith, it will Happen:

My mother taught me very early to believe

I could achieve any accomplishment I wanted to.

The first was to walk without braces.

-Wilma Rudolph(Sprinter, American)

 

 

About Wilma Rudolph(Source from WIKIPEDIA: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilma_Rudolph)

 

Wilma Glodean Rudolph was born prematurely at 4.5 lbs., the 20th of 22 siblings; her father Ed was a railway porter and her mother Blanche a maid. Rudolph contracted infantile paralysis (caused by the polio virus) at age four. She recovered, but wore a brace on her left leg and foot (which had become twisted as a result) until she was nine. She was required to wear an orthopaedic shoe for support of her foot for another two years. Her family travelled regularly from Clarksville, Tennessee, to Fisk University's black medical college hospital in Nashville, Tennessee for treatments for her twisted leg. In addition, by the time she was twelve years old she had also survived bouts of polio and scarlet fever.

 

Wilma Rudolph at the finish line during 50-yard dash at track meet in Madison Square Garden, 1961

In 1952, 12-year-old Rudolph finally achieved her dream of shedding her handicap and becoming like other children. Her older sister was on a basketball team, and Wilma wanted to follow her sister's footsteps. While in high school, Rudolph was on the basketball team when she was spotted by Tennessee State track and field coach Ed Temple. Being discovered by Temple was a major break for a young athlete. The day he saw the tenth grader for the first time, he knew he had found a natural athlete. Rudolph had already gained some track experience on Burt High School's track team two years before, mostly as a way to keep busy between basketball seasons.

While attending Burt High School, Rudolph became a basketball star setting state records for scoring and leading her team to the state championship. She also joined Temple's summer program at Tennessee State and trained regularly and raced with his Tigerbelles for two years. By the time she was 16, she earned a berth on the U.S. Olympic track and field team and came home from the 1956 Melbourne Games with an Olympic bronze medal in the 4 x 100 m relay to show her high school classmates.

At the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome she won three Olympic titles: the 100 m, 200 m and the 4 x 100 m relay. As the temperature climbed toward 110 degrees, 80,000 spectators jammed the Stadio Olimpico. Rudolph ran the 100-meter dash in an impressive 11 seconds flat. However the time was not credited as a world record, because it was wind-aided. She also won the 200-meter dash in 23.2 seconds, a new Olympic record. After these wins, she was being hailed throughout the world as "the fastest woman in history". Finally, on September 11, 1960, she combined with Tennessee State teammates Martha Hudson, Lucinda Williams and Barbara Jones to win the 400-meter relay in 44.5 seconds, setting a world record. Rudolph had a special, personal reason to hope for victory—to pay tribute to Jesse Owens, the celebrated American athlete who had been her inspiration, also the star of the 1936 Summer Olympics, held in Berlin, Germany.

Following post-games European tour by the American team Rudolph returned home to Clarksville. At her wishes, her homecoming parade and banquet were the first fully integrated municipal events in the city's history.

Rudolph retired from track competition in 1962 at age 22 after winning two races at a U.S.–Soviet meet.

She got a job teaching Grade 2 in her childhood school. Conflict forced her to leave the position. She moved to Indianapolis to head a community center. Then she moved to St. Louis Missouri, then Detroit, Michigan, and then returned to Tennessee for a time in the late 60s before moving again to California. She then lived in Chicago during the Mayor Richard J. Daley years. Wilma divorced Robert Eldridge after 17 years of marriage. She returned to Indianapolis where she raised her children and hosted a local TV show.