he stayed in the middle of the pack for the first half of the race, he set a pace at the beginning that was so fast he passed the press vehicles before they reached the first checkpoint. He actually broke the record for the first five miles of the race. By the 20th
On August 9 on a bright sunny day with mile, his main competi-
tor, once again Johnny Kelley, had caught up to him. At the last of the Newton hills, more of a gradual rising slope near Boston College, be- tween mile 20 and 21 of the race, Kelley briefly overtook him. Passing the Narragansett, Kelly patted him on the back. The gesture was ill-advised. Brown sud-
denly awakened to the fact that his competitor was now making his decisive move. This was the turning point in this famous marathon. Brown sped up, and Kelley could not keep up. Jerry Nason, the best-known newspaper reporter covering the Boston Marathon, later referred to the spot as “Heartbreak Hill” suggesting that “Tarzan” broke Kelley’s heart there. This famous site is now marked by a statue with two figures called Young at Heart. Strangely, both of the figures are of Kelley, as a young and old man. Brown, the winner of the contest, is missing. Brown’s outstanding performance won
him a place on the 1936 U.S. Olympic team, for the notorious Berlin Summer Olympics hosted by Germany’s new Nazi regime. The track-and-field contingent included African- Americans Jessie Owens and Ralph Metcalfe, as well as Marty Glickman, of the Jewish faith, at an event designed to bolster the host’s Aryan supremacist ideology.
the temperature around 71 degrees, Brown was one of the favorites to medal in the Mara- thon. At the 25-kilometer mark, he was in fourth place. Remarkable film clips of the race, available on Youtube, show him nonchalantly pausing for a drink at an aid station. However, at the 28-kilometer mark, he suffered a severe cramp in his right thigh and his leg knotted up, forcing him to stop and rub it. Allegedly, he was disqualified when a spectator came to his aid and when he veered off the course, clear violations of the rules. In disbelief that “Tarzan,” a favorite to
medal, had not finished the race, writers over the years have tried to explain what had happened. They blamed it on his taking a warm bath before the race, on his pulling a muscle fooling around imitating a British distance walker, on a chronic foot injury or on a hernia aggravated in the qualifying tri- als. A family tradition points to his alleged fight with a Nazi supporter of Hitler in a beer garden before the race and his subsequent arrest. According to the story, he was held in jail overnight and warned by authorities not to win the marathon. After returning to the United States empty
handed, he continued to run the marathon, seeking to redeem his reputation by claiming that he could run and win two marathons within 24 hours. In the fall of 1936, he de- livered on his boast, winning marathons on back-to-back days, first in Port Chester, N.Y. on October 11, and in Manchester, N.H., more
than 200 miles away on the following day! He also continued to run in the Boston Marathon for the next decade. He was a fan favorite not only because of his great athletic talent, but because he had a flair for being unpredictable. In 1937, Brown, somewhat out of condition, and suffering from problems with his feet, finished 31st
. His 1938 race has entered Boston
Marathon lore, although his wife Ethel Mae later claimed the incident happened the year before. Supposedly as a result of the swelter- ing conditions, Brown decided to abandon his quest for the championship. He ran off the course, waved to the crowd, and jumped into Lake Cochituate to cool off. In 1939, Brown reached the pinnacle of his
career. He began to take long-distance run- ning seriously again. Training vigorously, he ran two practice marathons a week between Pawtucket, R.I. and Attleboro, Mass., and ran another 17 miles twice a week. That year, he won 20 of 22 long-distance races, setting records in nearly every event! In a ten-mile race in Cranston, R.I., he equaled the world record held by Pavlo Nurmi, the Flying Finn, perhaps the greatest long-distance runner of all time. Brown also won both the 15- and 20- kilometer races at the United States National Track and Field Championship and a well-
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 45 E
PHOTO COURTESY OF BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY, LESLIE JONES COLLECTION
PHOTO COURTESY
ROADSIDEAMERICA.COM
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
