Wilma Rudolph
The Polio Survivor Who Became the Fastest Woman in the World
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The narrative follows Rudolph's path from early years through her Olympic triumphs and beyond. Chapters explore her post-Olympic career, marriage and family life, and later years as a teacher and motivational speaker. The book examines her death in 1994 and lasting legacy in American sports history.
This biography provides a complete account of Rudolph's remarkable life, from her early struggles with polio to her achievements on the world stage. Anyone interested in athletic perseverance and American sports history will find this compelling account of one of track and field's greatest champions.
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Wilma Rudolph entered the world early, at four and a half pounds, on June 23, 1940, in Saint Bethlehem, Tennessee, which is now part of Clarksville. She was the twentieth child among twenty-two from her father Ed Rudolph’s two marriages. Shortly after her birth, her family relocated to Clarksville, where she spent her childhood and completed both elementary and high school. Her father worked as a railway porter and took on various jobs in town, and he passed away in 1961. Her mother, Blanche, supported the family by working as a maid in local homes until her death in 1994.
Wilma Rudolph faced many health challenges early in life, including pneumonia and scarlet fever. At age five, she contracted infantile paralysis from the poliovirus. Though she recovered, the illness left her with weakness in her left leg and foot. For years, she wore a leg brace until she turned twelve. Her family lived in Clarksville during the 1940s, when medical care for African Americans was limited. So they traveled to Meharry Medical College in Nashville, about eighty kilometers away, to seek treatment for her condition.
Wilma Rudolph and her mother traveled by bus to Nashville each week for nearly two years, seeking treatments to help restore use of her weakened leg. Afterward, she stayed at home receiving massage therapy four times daily from family members, while also wearing an orthopedic shoe to support her foot for another two years. The combination of care she received at Meharry and the consistent attention from her loved ones allowed her to overcome polio’s effects. By age twelve, she could walk without a leg brace or special shoe for support.
Wilma Rudolph began school later than most, starting second grade in 1947 at Cobb Elementary in Clarksville at age seven, after missing kindergarten and first grade due to illness. She attended Burt High School, where she became known for her talent in basketball and track. During her senior year, she became pregnant and gave birth to her first child, Yolanda, in 1958, just before enrolling at Tennessee State University in Nashville. At TSU, she continued competing in track and joined the Delta Sigma Theta sorority. She graduated in 1963 with a bachelor’s degree in education, earning her tuition through a work-study program that required her to work two hours each day on campus.
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At Burt High School, which served as the heart of Clarksville's African American community, Wilma Rudolph first joined organized sports. After several years of medical treatment helped her regain use of her left leg, she began playing basketball in eighth grade, following in her sister Yvonne’s footsteps. She played on the high school team, becoming a starter, and soon began competing in track as well. During her second year, Rudolph scored 803 points and broke the record for high school girls’ basketball. Her coach, C. C. Gray, gave her the nickname "Skeeter" because of her incredible speed.
While playing basketball for her high school team, Rudolph caught the attention of Ed Temple, track and field coach at Tennessee State. That day, Temple recognized Rudolph as a natural athlete. She had already run on Burt High School’s track team for two years, mostly to stay busy between basketball seasons. As a sophomore, Rudolph competed in her first major track event at Alabama’s Tuskegee Institute. Though she lost that race, it only strengthened her determination to keep competing and eventually win.
At fourteen, Wilma Rudolph joined a summer training program at Tennessee State University after being invited by Coach Charlie Temple. She went on to win every event in a nine-event meet at an Amateur Athletic Union competition in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Under Temple’s direction, she continued training at TSU while still in high school. After graduating, she competed in amateur athletics with the women’s track team there, known as the Tigerbelles, for two more years. In 1958, Rudolph began attending Tennessee State as a student.
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Wilma Rudolph was sixteen years old and in her junior year of high school when she traveled to Seattle, Washington, to compete in the 1956 U.S. Olympic track and field trials. There, she earned her place in the 200-meter individual event for the upcoming Summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia. As the youngest member of the U.S. Olympic team that year, Rudolph joined five other TSU Tigerbelles who also qualified for the 1956 Games in Melbourne.
At the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, Wilma Rudolph was eliminated in a preliminary heat of the 200-meter race but went on to run the third leg of the 4 × 100 meter relay. The American team, which included Rudolph, Isabelle Daniels, Mae Faggs, and Margaret Matthews—all of whom were TSU Tigerbelles—won the bronze medal, matching the world-record time of 44.9 seconds. The British team took silver, while the Australian team, anchored by 100- and 200-meter gold medalist Betty Cuthbert, won gold in 44.5 seconds. After returning to her Tennessee home, Rudolph showed her high school classmates the bronze medal she had earned and made a decision: she would aim for a gold medal at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, Italy.
In 1958, Rudolph went to Tennessee State, where Temple stayed on as her track coach. The next year, at the Pan American Games in Chicago, she earned a silver medal in the 100-meter race and a gold in the 4 × 100-meter relay with teammates Isabelle Dan, Barbara Joe, and Lucinda Williams. She also won the AAU 200-meter title in 1959 and held onto it for four straight years. Rudolph captured three AAU indoor titles during her career.
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At Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas, Rudolph took part in the U.S. Olympic track and field trials while still a sophomore at Tennessee State. There, she ran the 200-meter dash and set a world record that would stand for eight years. She also earned her place on the team for the 1960 Summer Olympics, where she would compete in the 100-meter dash.
At the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, Wilma Rudolph took the track at Stadio Olimpico on a cinder surface, racing in three events: the 100- and 200-meter sprints, and the 4 × 100-meter relay. She won gold in each one, making her the first American woman to capture three Olympic gold medals in a single Games.
In 1960, Wilma Rudolph lit up the Summer Olympics in Rome, where she stunned the world by winning gold medals in both the 100- and 200-meter dashes. She ran the 100-meter final in 11.0 seconds, a wind-aided time that didn’t count as a world record but still made her the first American woman since Helen Stephens in 1936 to claim the top spot in that race. In the 200-meter dash, she topped the event with a 24.0-second final, having already set a new Olympic record of 23.2 seconds in heats. After those wins, she was hailed throughout the world as "the fastest woman in history."
On September 7, 1960, with temperatures climbing toward 40 degrees Celsius, thousands packed into the stadium to witness the 4 × 100-meter relay. Wilma Rudolph teamed up with her Tennessee State teammates—Martha Hudson, Lucinda Williams, and Barbara Jones—to claim the gold medal with a time of 44.5 seconds. They had already set a world record of 44.4 seconds in the semifinals. In the finals, Rudolph carried the anchor leg for the American squad. After nearly dropping the baton when Williams passed it to her, she surged past Germany’s final runner to seal the win. She hoped to honor Jesse Owens, the 1936 Olympic hero who had inspired her throughout her journey.
At the 1960 Rome Olympics, Wilma Rudolph became one of the most celebrated athletes of the Games, earning the nickname “The Tornado, the fastest woman on earth.” The Italians called her “La Gazzella Nera,” or “The Black Gazelle,” while the French referred to her as “La Perle Noire,” meaning “The Black Pearl,” and also “La Chattanooga Choo-Choo.” Alongside stars like Cassius Clay, Oscar Robertson, and Rafer Johnson, Rudolph gained international fame thanks to the first global television coverage of the Olympics. She was cast by the media as America’s leading athletic lady, praised not only for her speed and skill but also for her beauty and grace.
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After her Olympic success, Wilma Rudolph returned to Clarksville, where she was greeted with a big celebration planned by Governor Buford Ellington. The event included a parade and a banquet, but Rudolph refused to attend because it was segregated. She stood up for her beliefs, and as a result, the parade was changed to be integrated. This made history as the first integrated parade in Clarksville, Tennessee. An estimated 1,100 people attended the banquet, and thousands lined the streets to watch the changed parade on October 4, 1960.
After her gold medals in Rome, Wilma Rudolph became one of the most visible Black women in the United States and around the world. Her Olympic success helped boost indoor track events in the months that followed. In 1961, she competed in the Los Angeles Invitational, drawing thousands to watch. She was also invited to New York Athletic Club events and made history as the first woman invited to compete at the Millrose Games. Additionally, she took part in the Penn Relays and the Drake Relays.
After her Olympic wins, Wilma Rudolph became a featured subject in a 10-minute film made by the United States Information Agency, titled Wilma Rudolph: Olympic Champion in 1961. She also appeared on To Tell the Truth, a popular American television game show, in 1960, and later guested on The Ed Sullivan Show, which helped cement her status as a major sports icon.
In 1961, Wilma Rudolph married William Ward, a track team member from North Carolina College at Durham; they divorced in 1963. Before that, she retired from competition at age twenty-two after winning races at a U.S.–Soviet meet held in 1962. At the time of her retirement, Rudolph still held world records in the 100-meter and 200-meter races, as well as in the 4 × 100-meter relay. She had also earned seven national AAU sprint titles and set a women's indoor track record in the 60-yard dash. She explained she left the sport at the peak of her career because she wanted to retire while still at her best. As such, Rudolph did not compete in the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, saying, "If I won two gold medals, there would be something lacking. I'll stick with the glory I've already won like Jesse Owens did in 1936."
After her time as an athlete, Wilma Rudolph returned to school at Tennessee State University and completed her bachelor’s degree in elementary education in 1963. That year, she also took part in a month-long journey to West Africa as a goodwill ambassador for the U.S. State Department. She served as a U.S. representative at the 1963 Friendship Games held in Dakar, Senegal, and made stops in Ghana, Guinea, Mali, and Upper Volta. While traveling, she watched sporting events, visited schools, and gave interviews on television and radio. She also attended the premiere of a documentary film produced by the U.S. Information Agency that showcased her track career.
In May 1963, just weeks after coming back from a trip to Africa, Wilma Rudolph took part in a civil rights protest in her hometown of Clarksville. She joined the effort to end segregation at a local restaurant. Not long after, the mayor announced that all public city facilities, including restaurants, would be integrated. That same year, she married Robert Eldridge, who had been the father of her child during high school. The couple had three more children together before divorcing after seventeen years of marriage.
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After her time as an athlete, Rudolph found new purpose in education and coaching. She returned to Cobb Elementary School to teach, a school where she had once been a student. Later, she began guiding young runners as a track coach at Burt High School, a place where she had also competed as a student-athlete.
Wilma Rudolph lived in many places throughout her life, moving several times over the years. She called Chicago, Illinois, home at one point, and also lived in Indianapolis, Indiana. Her journey took her to St. Louis, Missouri, and later to Detroit, Michigan. She spent time in Tennessee, then moved to California before ending up in Maine. Each place became part of her story as she navigated life after her polio recovery and her rise to becoming the fastest woman in the world.
Wilma Rudolph’s autobiography, Wilma: The Story of Wilma Rudolph, came out in 1977. It became the foundation for many other books and films about her life. By 2014, at least twenty-one children’s books based on her story had been published, aimed at readers from preschool through high school.
After her racing days, Wilma Rudolph stayed active in sports and youth development. She worked with nonprofit groups and government programs aimed at helping kids, especially in Boston, where she joined the federal Job Corps program. In 1967, she served as a track specialist for Operation Champion. Later, in 1981, she founded the Wilma Rudolph Foundation in Indianapolis to train young athletes. Six years after that, she became director of women’s track at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, and also worked as a consultant on minority affairs to the university’s president.
After her days as a sprinting star, Wilma Rudolph went back to Indianapolis to host a local TV show. She also served as a publicist for Universal Studios. Later, she commented on sports events for ABC during the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. In 1987, she had the honor of lighting the cauldron at the Pan American Games in front of 80,000 people at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Two years before she died in 1992, Rudolph became a vice president at Nashville's Baptist Hospital.
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Wilma Rudolph married twice, both marriages ending in divorce. In October 1961, she wed William "Willie" Ward, a track team member from North Carolina College at Durham. They separated in May 1963. After graduating from Tennessee State in 1963, Rudolph tied the knot with Robert Eldridge, her high school sweetheart and the father of her daughter Yolanda, born in 1958. With Eldridge, she had four children: two daughters, Yolanda and Djuanna, born in 1958 and 1964, and two sons, Robert Jr., born in 1965, and Xurry, who died in 2025. The couple divorced in 1980.
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In July 1994, shortly after her mother died, Wilma Rudolph was diagnosed with brain cancer. She had also been diagnosed with throat cancer. Her health declined rapidly, and she died on November 12, 1994, at her home in Brentwood, Tennessee. She was fifty-four years old.
Wilma Rudolph overcame polio and a physical disability in her youth to become the fastest woman runner in the world. At the 1960 Rome Olympics, she earned three gold medals, a feat that made her the first American woman to do so in a single Olympiad. Her achievements helped pave the way for black and female athletes, and her success gave women’s track in the United States a major boost. Rudolph’s fame also contributed to breaking down gender barriers in events like the Millrose Games, which had previously been all-male.
Beyond her record-breaking runs, Wilma Rudolph dedicated herself to helping young people, founding and leading the Wilma Rudolph Foundation to train youth athletes. Her story has been shared widely through books, especially those written for children. The documentary films and made-for-television movies about her life have brought her legacy to many more audiences.
Walter de Hoog directed Wilma Rudolph: Olympic Champion, a documentary film produced by the United States Information Agency in 1961. The ten-minute film was made to highlight her remarkable achievements on the track. It chronicled her journey from overcoming polio as a child to becoming a celebrated Olympian. The documentary captured her determination and strength, showing how she broke barriers in sports and inspired many. This film remains a key record of her legacy, preserving her story for future generations to hear and remember.
In 1977, a made-for-television docudrama called The Story of Wilma Rudolph was produced by Bud Greenspan. Shirley Jo Finney played Wilma Rudolph in the film, which also featured Cicely Tyson, Jason Bernard, and a young Denzel Washington in one of his first acting roles.
In 2015, a film company based in the United Kingdom made a short drama about Wilma Rudolph’s life. The film was part of a project commissioned by Positive Edge Education Ltd. to inspire students in schools. The movie, titled Unlimited, was written and directed by brothers Ian and Dominic Higgins. It was one of three short films created to be shown in classrooms, focusing on stories of courage and achievement.
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Wilma Rudolph was honored as United Press International Athlete of the Year in 1960, and went on to win the Associated Press Woman Athlete of the Year award twice, in both 1960 and 1961. That same year she received the James E. Sullivan Award, given to the most outstanding amateur athlete in America. The following year, 1962, she was presented with the Babe Didrikson Zaharias Award. Rudolph also met with President John F. Kennedy in the Oval Office, and later in 1993, she was awarded the National Sports Award.
In 1984, the Women’s Sports Foundation honored Rudolph by naming her one of the five greatest women athletes in the United States. The foundation continued to celebrate her legacy in 1996 when it presented the first Wilma Rudolph Courage Award to Jackie Joyner-Kersee. A year earlier, in 1994, part of U.S. Route 79 was renamed Wilma Rudolph Boulevard, stretching from Interstate 24 in Clarksville to the Red River bridge. On November 21, 1995, the Wilma Rudolph Memorial Commission marked her grave site with a black marble plaque inside Edgefield Missionary Baptist Church. Then in April 1996, a life-size bronze statue of Rudolph was placed at the southern end of the Cumberland River Walk, at College Street and Riverside Drive in Clarksville.
In 2012, the city of Clarksville, Tennessee unveiled the Wilma Rudolph Event Center at Liberty Park, complete with a life-size bronze statue moved from its former spot on Riverside Drive. On December 2, 1980, Tennessee State University honored Rudolph by naming its indoor track after her. Nine months after her death, on August 11, 1995, the university dedicated a new six-story dormitory as the Wilma G. Rudolph Residence Center. In 1997, Governor Don Sundquist declared June 23 as “Wilma Rudolph Day” in Tennessee.
In 1999, Sports Illustrated listed Wilma Rudolph as the greatest sports figure of the twentieth century from Tennessee. ESPN also recognized her, placing her forty-first among the greatest athletes of the century. After U.S. troops withdrew from Berlin in 1994, the school they had run became the Gesamtschule Am Hegewinkel. In the summer of 2000, it was renamed the Wilma Rudolph Oberschule in her honor.
On July 14, 2004, the U.S. Postal Service honored Wilma Rudolph by issuing a 23-cent postage stamp. It was the fifth in a series called Distinguished Americans, recognizing her remarkable achievements. The stamp celebrated not just her speed, but her courage and perseverance as a polio survivor who became the fastest woman in the world.
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Overview
The 100 metres at the Olympics is one of the most celebrated events in the games, dating back to the first Summer Olympics in 1896. The women’s race was added 32 years later, with Betty Robinson winning the first title. Usain Bolt holds the men’s Olympic record at 9.63 seconds, while Elaine Thompson-Herah has the fastest time for women at 10.61 seconds. The United States leads in gold medals, with sixteen in the men’s race and nine in the women’s. Bolt is the only man to win three straight titles, and Wilma Rudolph became the second woman to win both the 100 and 200 metres at the same Olympics, in 1960. She also helped the U.S. team win gold in the 4×100 relay that same year.
Competition format
The Olympic 100 metres follows IAAF rules with separate men's and women's races opening athletics programs allowing overlap with other events. Four rounds exist: heats, quarter-finals, semi-finals, and finals. Before 1964, finals had six runners; since then, eight have competed. Athletes are seeded based on past performance to balance races. Early rounds typically advance top three from each heat plus fastest "fastest losers." Until 2012, semi-finals were two races of eight, with top four from each advancing. In 2012, a preliminary round was added for those not meeting Olympic standards, and semi-finals became three races—top two from each and the two fastest non-qualifiers made the final. False start rules changed: any reaction time under 0.1 seconds now disqualifies immediately. At the 2008 Women's 100 m final, Sherone Simpson and Kerron Stewart were both awarded silver because their times couldn't be distinguished to the thousandth of a second. The only other time medal positions were shared was at the 1896 men's race, when Alajos Szokolyi and Francis Lane tied for third.
Age
The 100-meter race demands peak physical ability, so most Olympic participants are between eighteen and thirty-five years old. In 2020, the rules were updated to prevent athletes younger than sixteen from competing. The youngest person to ever race in the event was Katura Marae, who was fourteen when she competed for Vanuatu at the 2004 Athens Olympics. Merlene Ottey holds records for both the oldest participant and the oldest medallist, winning bronze at age forty in 2000 and reaching the semi-finals again in 2004. She also competed six times in the event from 1984 to 2004, more than any other woman. Betty Robinson was the first women’s champion in 1928, and she was only sixteen. Linford Christie became the oldest Olympic 100-meter champion in 1992 at age thirty-two.
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