Wilma Glodean Rudolph greatly impacted the lives of thousands of people.  She had a very hard life, but she had faith that she would live.  She believed in herself and never gave up the fight.  Rudolph’s life teaches numerous people an incredibly important lesson: always persevere.   Rudolph’s life demonstrates this accurately because her childhood was filled with adversity and if she had given up, she might never have been able to walk again. Not only did Wilma triumph over disease and poverty to walk, but she went on to become one of the world’s greatest female track and field athletes. Wilma Rudolph’s life proves that perseverance truly does win the prize. 

Rudolph was born on June 23, 1940 at only four pounds and eight ounces.  She came from a large but poor family.  Her father and mother both worked to support their family of twenty two children, but because of their color they could not afford things that white people could.  Rudolph’s mother was a maid and worked six days a week and her father was a railroad porter, but neither parent made much money. Both Rudolph’s father and mother were hard working people, but in 1940 no one had much money even if they did work hard.  However, the Rudolph family survived by doing things such as making clothes out of flour sacks, but life continued to be terribly difficult.

As an infant and young child, Rudolph had a number of diseases. Her family lovingly nursed her through each one.  Some of these diseases were measles, mumps, scarlet fever, chicken pox, double pneumonia, and polio. Of all of the diseases, polio was the most devastating.  Polio is an infectious viral disease that affects the central nervous system and that can cause temporary or permanent paralysis.  She was only four years old when she contracted polio. Even though she survived the disease, Rudolph’s left leg and left foot were severely weakened.  Finally, her mother, Blanche, took her to the only black doctor in Clarksville, the town where the Rudolph’s lived.  He sent Rudolph to Fisk University, fifty miles away in Nashville, for treatment. Her mother drove her to the doctor once a week for physical therapy.  The doctor showed Blanche how to massage Rudolph’s leg.  Blanche showed the older children how to massage her leg too, so Rudolph was in good care, but the doctor told Rudolph that she would never walk again.  To this, Rudolph said, “My doctor told me I would never walk again.  My mother told me I would.  I believed my mother”(“Selected Wilma Rudolph Quotations” par. 3).

Being the nineteenth child of her twenty two brothers and sisters, Rudolph received a great amount of encouragement and comfort. When she was in her leg brace, she took advantage of her siblings and even admitted to taking her braces off.  Rudolph said,

When I was about five, I spent most of my time trying to figure out how to get my [leg] braces off, and you see, when you come from a large family, there’s always a way to achieve your goals, especially when you don’t want your parents knowing them.  I would take off my braces, then station my brothers and sisters all through the house and they would tell me if my parents were coming and then I’d hurry and put the braces back on (“Wilma Rudolph” par. 7).

 By the age of eight, Rudolph could walk with a brace on.  She also used a high-topped shoe to help support herself.  At age eleven, Rudolph could walk with no brace and no special shoe.  One day, Rudolph’s mother came home to find her playing basketball, by herself, barefooted.  Rudolph said, “when the sun is shining I can do anything; no mountain too high, no trouble to difficult”(“Selected Wilma Rudolph Quotations” par. 18)  By believing this, Rudolph proved the doctors wrong.  She became an athlete.

Rudolph was tutored at home until age seven because she was crippled.  When she was able to walk with the support of a leg brace and a high topped shoe, Rudolph went to a school in Clarksville called Cobb Elementary, but it was not a very good school.  Back then, even though slaves were no longer owned, blacks were treated awfully.  African Americans paid the same amount of taxes as white people, but the black schools were poor and did not have all the advantages that a white school had.  When she was in high school, Rudolph wanted to play basketball.  The coach did not want her on the team, but he did want Rudolph’s older sister on the team.  Rudolph’s father, Ed, agreed to only let Rudolph’s older sister play if she could play also. Rudolph’s basketball coach called her “Skeeter” because he said, “you’re little, you’re fast and you always get in my way”(“Rudolph Ran and the World Went Wild” par. 10-11).  Rudolph waited three years, but never once played in a game.  Finally, Rudolph’s coach put her in as a starting guard.  She proved to be a good basketball player, but she was great in track.

When she was fourteen, Ed Temple, the track coach at Tennessee State University, saw her playing basketball and decided that she had the potential to become a remarkable runner.  At summer breaks, Rudolph would train with Temple at Tennessee State.  He was a dedicated coach, but was extremely strict.  Every minute a girl was late for practice; Temple made them run an extra lap.  Once, Rudolph was late and had to run thirty extra laps.  The next practice Rudolph was thirty minutes early.  She trained with Temple until, at age sixteen, she qualified for the summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia, where she won a bronze medal.  She came home to say,

I remember going back to my high school this particular day with the bronze medal and all the kids that I disliked so much or I thought I disliked …put up this huge banner: ‘Welcome home Wilma.’ And I forgave them right then and there….They passed my bronze medal around so that everyone could touch, feel and see what an Olympic medal is like.  When I got it back there were handprints all over it.  I took it and started shinning it up.  I discovered that bronze doesn’t shine.  So, I decided I’m going to try this one more time.  I’m going to go for the gold (“Wilma Rudolph” par. 12).

In 1957 Rudolph started college at Tennessee State University with a degree in elementary education.  One day Rudolph stated, “I love working with kids.  It’s the motherly instinct in me” (“Wilma Rudolph” par. 19) 

Rudolph became known as the fastest women in the world at the 1960 Rome Olympics.  She accomplished this by winning the 100-meter, 200-meter races, and helped the team win the 4 x 100 relay race, after already spraining her ankle.  Rudolph’s teammate, Bill Mulliken, said, “she was beautiful, she was nice, and she was the best”(“Rudolph Ran and the World Went Wild” par. 32). In all of the races in the 1960 Olympics, Rudolph set record timings. She once said,

Believe me, the reward is not so great without the struggle.  The triumph can’t be had without the struggle.  And I know what the struggle is.  I have spent a lifetime trying to share what it has meant to be a woman first in the world of sports so that other young women have a chance to reach their dreams (“Wilma Rudolph” par. 4).

After the Rome Olympics, Rudolph became known as the “The Black Pearl” and “The Black Gazelle”(Rudolph Ran and the World Went Wild par. 18).  When she returned to Clarksville, Tennessee Governor, Buford Ellington, planned to welcome Rudolph home with a celebration. Rudolph would not attend a segregated event, so her welcome home celebration was the first integrated event in Clarksville, Tennessee.  When she returned, Rudolph was treated like a star, but not paid like one.  If she had been a man or maybe even a white woman, she might have been paid like a star and because of this thought, Rudolph struggled greatly.  She said,

You become world famous and you sit with kings and queens, and then your first job is just a job. You can’t go back to living the way you did before because you’ve been taken out of one setting and shown the other.  That becomes a struggle and that makes you struggle (“Wilma Rudolph” par. 15). 

Even though Wilma struggled, she accomplished something great and she knew she was special.  Wilma Rudolph one time said, “The feeling of accomplishment welled up inside of me, three Olympic gold medals.  I knew that was something nobody could ever take away from me, ever”(“Selected Wilma Rudolph Quotations” par. 14).

Rudolph married Robert Eldridge, her high school sweetheart, in 1963 and had four children. Her first was Yolanda born in 1958, her second was Djuanna born in 1964, her third was Robert Junior born in 1965, and her fourth child was Xurry born in 1971.  Rudolph and Eldridge eventually ended up getting a divorce.  Rudolph retired at the age of twenty two and went back to Clarksville to live and to teach.  She taught at her old elementary school, Cobb Elementary.  She was also track coach at Burt High School, which was her old high school.  Rudolph later moved to Maine to coach and then to Indiana to coach.

In 1967 Rudolph was invited by Vice-President Hubert Humphrey to participate in an athletic outreach called “Operation Champ”.  Because of her experience with “Operation Champ”, she founded her own non profit, community based sports program called The Wilma Rudolph Foundation.  This foundation was started for kids who wanted to play sports.  It provided free coaching in many different sports as well as schooling assistance.  She also wrote an autobiography called “Wilma” and NBC made a movie about her life based on the book.  Rudolph even got to work on the movie as a consultant.

Awards Rudolph received are the United Press Athlete of the Year in 1960, the Associated Press Women Athlete of the year in 1960, the James E. Sullivan Award for good sportsmanship in 1961, The Babe Zaharias Award in 1962, the Europeans Sportswriters’ Sportsman of the Year, the Christopher Columbus Award for most outstanding international Sports personality in 1960, The Penn Relays in 1961, the New York Athletic Club Track meet, The Millrose Games, the Black Sports Hall of Fame in 1980, the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame in 1983, the Vitalis Cup for sports Excellence in 1983, and the Women’s Sports foundation Award in 1984(“Wilma Rudolph” par. 12).

Rudolph died from brain cancer on November 12, 1994 in Nashville, Tennessee.  She had known she had cancer for a while and was constantly in and out of the hospital.  Her gracefulness was what people most remember her by (“Rudolph Ran and the World Went Wild” par. 32). Temple Said, “She’s done more for her country than the U.S. could have paid her for”(“Rudolph Ran and the World Went Wild” par. 20) Rudolph once said, “When I was going through my transition of being famous, I tried to ask God why was I here?  What was my purpose?  Surely, it wasn’t just to win three gold medals.  There has to be more to life than that”(Selected Wilma Rudolph Quotations” par. 16). 

Rudolph did do more than just win three gold medals.  She never gave up, she held the first integrated event in Clarksville, Tennessee, and she stood up for what she believed in. She encouraged many women athletes during her life time and her story continues to encourage both men and women today.  Rudolph’s life is also a perfect representation of perseverance.  She persevered through a number of illnesses, she persevered though wearing a leg brace, she persevered though being made fun of at school, and she persevered though brain cancer.  Rudolph’s life illustrates many valuable lessons. One of them being: perseverance truly does win the prize.