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WILMA RUDOLPH: FAITHFUL, UNFLAPPABLE - Essay by Emma Wisdom
First impressions, it has been said, are often lasting ones. In the case Wilma Rudolph, that couldn’t be truer. I first met Wilma in 1962 when my husband (Eddie to me and “Jack” to her) introduced us one night in Clarksville, Tennessee. Her genuine warmth and friendliness endeared me to her over the next three plus decades. Those years of friendship, admiration, and respect put us on a first name basis. As a result, when she published her autobiography Wilma in 1977 and the made-for-TV movie of her life story was released, I read her autobiography and watched the movie about her life with great interest. Years later, after the announcement of her illness in 1994, I began to study what had been written by others about the life of Wilma Rudolph. I was surprised by what I hadn’t recognized before: that a segment of her life touched and paralleled my own. That is the wonderful mystery of studying autobiographies and biographies. Both are often discoveries about other people’s lives that strike a familiar cord with your own. Still that does not answer the question of why one chooses to write a biography. Few of us, I suspect, are able to explain fully or give just one reason why we do many of the things in life that we do. So like many of those life choices, there isn’t just one reason that I can emphatically say was the impetus for my wanting to write the biography of Wilma Rudolph. Rather, it has been the culmination of three or perhaps even four separate incidents and insights, at different times that made me arrive at the conclusion to do a book about Wilma. Let me, however, try to put them in some semblance of a context. First, young people have always needed “role models,” whether they were parents, grandparents, other relatives, teachers, or simply a neighbor down the street or cross town—someone they could look to for guidance, understanding, or merely validation of parenthood. Over the centuries and maybe even since time as we know it began, the concept of connection and identity has not changed. Today, perhaps more so than ever, youngsters, as well as adults need to become aware of great men and women who overcame adversities and who made genuine contributions to society. In every sense, I think, Wilma Rudolph did that. But she struggled and survived against great odds to make them. She certainly had a glorious career. She also had her grievous moments. Her multifaceted, complex life was filled with strengths, successes, and setbacks. Indeed, there are many facets of Wilma’s life with which young people and some adults can identify, such as -Being different or feeling rejected; -Being the victim of stereotypes, labels, and name calling; -Becoming a teenage parent; -Accepting defeat gracefully; -Winning gracefully; -Being offended; -Accepting responsibility for one’s actions; -Wanting to belong; -Surviving crises and tragedies; and -Holding onto dreams when there’s every reason to give up
The second reason came about when I recalled a personal experience
article which was written by the head of Barrett notes later in the article that “opportunities for formal team competition for girls were non-existent in my high school.” Again, I could relate. By high school, I had transferred from the Texas to the North Carolina school system. It was pretty much the same for me as for Barrett---non-existent formal team competition for girls. In another part of the article, Barrett writes of being insulted by the “games played in the girls’ gum classes” and of being called a “tomboy,” another insult. “I was an athlete,” she unabashedly announces. Near the end of her article, Barrett makes yet another sentiment that remarkably parallels my own. “I do wonder how many of us were longing to break into athletics before our time.” Probably more than she or I will ever know. However, I would venture to say a good percentage of those coming out of the 1950s experience grew up a “girl athlete” in Anywhere, USA. Fortunately, Wilma Rudolph had certain opportunities during her childhood that were different from those of Barrett or mine. She was nurtured, trained, and encouraged to excel as an athlete. Finally, says Barrett, “I now live some of my own dreams through the athletic careers of my two sons.” Mostly, other people, also like Barrett, have gone on as adults to careers that don’t involve sports but who also live their dream through others involved in sports. And almost all of us applaud the Wilmas of the world who got the proper training, nurturing, encouragement, and opportunities to fulfill their dreams. In return, Wilma Rudolph, as one among a million others, gave back to the people—especially young people—that which had been given to her.
Then, evolved the third
reason. When the news of Wilma
Rudolph’s collapse while on a speaking engagement in
Wilma and my husband Edward
were classmates in school, from the second grade through high school
graduation. As I stated
earlier, I met Wilma in the fall of 1962 when I was a few months married.
During the following year after our first introduction, we
intermittently met on other occasions: at her home; at high school
reunions in
Upon retrospection, the
feelings of adolescence became acutely present as the continuing need for
role models held immediacy. I
recalled the college professor’s article about her own youth as a female
athlete growing up in Together these events seemed clear. The sequence of events was not, but it marked my reasons for wanting to write about the faithful, unflappable Wilma Rudolph. In addition, our expanding knowledge of women’s history “makes us understand more about ourselves and about the world around us,” Paula Giddings author of Where and When I Enter: The impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America, once said in USA Today (March 1990 interview). Moreover, not only is the story of Wilma a study in international Olympic history, U.S. history, Tennessee State University, world history, and women’s history, but Wilma’s story is also our story. In its proper context, perhaps the greatest lesson we can learn from the life of Wilma Rudolph is what she taught about achieving one’s goals; there is unquestionably much that we can learn from her on that score, for I need not remind you that she was an achiever even in high school, in basketball, as a student at Burt High School in Clarksville, Tennessee. The 2125 basketball career points that she scored, averaging over 30 points per game, have been documented in the record books. As a 13-year-old, she won in the 50-yard dash, 75-yard dash, 100-yard dash, 200-meter dash, and the relay team in track. Wilma won a bronze medal in Melbourne, Australia, as young teenager in 1956 even before she graduated from high school—a phenomenal achievement for one so young. Then, there’s her stellar performance in Rome, Italy, in 1960 when she won three gold medals, a feat no other American woman had ever done, earning her the title of “The Fastest in the World.” While the world applauded her achievements and bestow upon her accolades, kudos, trophies, plaques, certificates, and honorary doctorates—even naming a building and street in her hone as symbolic of our admiration and respect for her talents in track and field—there is an even more glorious story to Wilma’s life above that of her athletic victories. Her story reveals that she was a person in harmony with self. She was able to achieve happiness and meaning in life despite overwhelming obstacles. She was also able to help, motivate, and encourage others to new heights by sharing with them the lessons in life that she’d learned and by giving of herself, her time, and her talent. If we learn nothing else from the examples left to her legacy, we discover that she was a person of strength and fortitude, filled with a personal spirituality and faith.
Faith is described by author
James Olney in his book Metaphors of
Self (1972) as “living out one’s own individual destiny” (p.
146) that gives shape and order to one’s life.
“ Thus, when stricken by a series of illnesses at age four, she did wail and wring her hands but did what her doctor and parents told her would make her better. Then, she instinctively added her own healing measures. She strengthened her physical weakness at first with exercising and by sheer determination. Later, when Wilma first tried out for her high school basketball team and was benched the earlier years, she didn’t give up. She practiced, pestered Coach Clinton Gray, and practiced again every chance she got to improve until she was given a spot on the team. When Wilma made Coach Edward Temple’s Tennessee Tigerbelles and later did poorly on the track at Tuskegee Institute, she didn’t give up, but worked even harder in order to make a comeback. We know where that comeback trail eventually led her! But why would anyone who suffered seemingly more than her share of sickness, who came from a working class family with few of the material advantages society says one needed to succeed want to make a comeback? She was raised in a segregated town and strove to rise above her circumstances to reach loftier goals. She could have easily become a victim—a statistic—and no one would have blamed her for not trying. Thousands if not millions of people from better socio-economic positions have called it quits, short-circuiting their careers. Wilma Rudolph was no victim, and the statistics that she acquired have been marked boldly in black in the Ledger. Wilma had a quality personality but not the superficial kind. She turned the enemy of adversity into a friend. She made lemonade out of lemons. She had heard “the voice” that only dreamers hear and met each challenge in life without losing faith. From birth she was potential becoming reality. She was predestined. Her family sensed it; several teachers sensed it. But when she seemed well on her way to achieving her goal, she encountered yet another personal dilemma when she became pregnant during her senior year of high school. Coach Ed Temple sensed the determination embodied in the personality of Wilma, which influenced him to break his own rule and allowed Wilma to return to the Tigerbelle team after she became a mother. During her lifetime, others sensed something special about Wilma Rudolph. She manifested the adage, “If you can conceive it, and believe it, you can achieve it,” (Paraphrased, author anonymous), but her journey was certainly not trouble-free.
Her triumphs in She was not to escape adversity in her personal relations. After a brief marriage in 1962 to William Ward, Wilma and her high school boyfriend Robert Eldridge, who was the father of her firstborn child, were married in 1963. Seventeen years and four children later, that marriage, too, ended in divorce. Wilma, who grew up in a close-knit family, believed in God and family. Her disappointment over the dissolutions of her marriages, especially her marriage to Robert, came at a time when fame had almost faded but was revived by the release of her autobiography and TV movie. Her athletic success was contrasted by her struggles outside the sports arena. After her retirement from sports in 1962, what appeared at first to be promising career opportunities ended in disappointment. Of those work experiences, she once told a reporter, “It was disillusioning. I was always looked upon as an ex-athlete. No one ever sought to try to tap whatever other talents I had.” Despite the physical pain she endured to become a champion athlete; the sacrifices she made; the animosity and snide remarks from teammates; two failed marriages; career frustrations; devaluation of her talent; betrayals and exploitations; and deaths of her parents, a sister and brother, Wilma’s equilibrium was rocked but never shattered or broken. She not only remained emotionally intact, but she also kept her faith. Her resolve seemed to grow stronger in the face of adversity. As we examine the life of Wilma Rudolph from physiological, economical, sociological, and psychological perspectives, we can conclude that in our own lives these are the areas where calamities will attack. However, we are reminded very clearly, as Aldous Huxley observed, that, “Experience is not what happens to you; it is what you do with what happens to you.” That is the lesson that we learn from the life of Wilma Rudolph. Another is the example put in motion by the heroic Underground Railroad leader Harriett Tubman who taught us to go back and give back. We find in the study of the autobiography and biographies of Wilma Rudolph that a life lived, “a personality achieved, constitutes its own memorial,” according to James Olney in Metaphors of Self. In closing this brief biographical study of Tennessee’s famous achiever Wilma Rudolph, I’d like to restate my beginning question—why study the autobiography and biographies of Wilma Rudolph—and venture to answer with this observation on life made by Giant author Edna Ferber, who says it best: If
you listen long enough, and earnestly enough, And
with ear sufficiently attuned to the music
Of
this sphere, there will come to you this Reward:
The violins and oboes and ‘cellos and Brasses
of humanity which seemed all at variance With
each other will unite as one instrument; Seeming
discords and dissonance will blend Into
harmony, and the wail and blare and thrum Of
humanity’s orchestra will sound in your ear The
sublime melody of that great symphony called Life
(Ferber, 1915, “An Etude for Emma,” in Emma McChessney & Co., p.
207). Thus, the curtain closed on the life of Wilma Glodean Rudolph on November 12, 1994, but not on her legacy left to humanity. In studying the autobiography and biographies of Wilma Rudolph, I find that she heard the voice and had the spirit to follow her dream. In wonderful stories and lessons about Wilma, you’ll get to know how one person met the challenges of life with faithful, unflappable good cheer. Hopefully, we will come from that study understanding more about ourselves and the world around us. Emma
J. Wisdom is a three-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize and an
award-winning writer for short fiction and nonfiction.
Wisdom lives and writes from her home in Nashville, Tennessee.
Her email address is EWisdom@aol.com.
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