Fire on the Track

by Roseanne Montillo

  If they wanted to be taken seriously in track and field, they reckoned, they had to study the sport much like they studied their subjects in school, with the same curiosity and respect they reserved for algebra, history, and the English language, those coaches advised. The older students, who were studying physical education at the local universities, especially thirsted for the kind of knowledge that books did not share, information that they were unable to gain elsewhere and that they wished to someday impart to others.

  Betty also learned that her runs with Coach Price had been not a fluke but something deeper; that, just as he had told her, there was talent within her that needed to be explored. She looked forward to another competition, working hard to become aware of her body, from the natural lean of her back, to which she had never paid attention before, to which leg was innately stronger than the other and whether or not she had a tendency to impulsively look sideways or forward. She worked tirelessly, remaining at the IWAC for hours, well into the evening, running up and down its track until her feet hurt, often until they bled. When the afternoon darkened into evening, only then would she shower, wrap her toes in tape, and scramble back to Riverdale.

  —

  On June 2, 1928, she made her first public appearance under the auspices of the IWAC at Soldier Field, at the Central AAU Meet.

  Soldier Field had its beginnings in 1919, when the firm of Holabird and Roche was commissioned to design the stadium, which opened in October 1924 under the name of Municipal Grant Park Stadium. In 1925, it was renamed Soldier Field, thanks to the efforts of Chicago Gold Star mothers to commemorate soldiers fallen in combat. Able to hold more than 100,000 attendees, by 1928 it had already hosted several celebrated large-scale events, including the famed 1927 Jack Dempsey–Gene Tunney heavyweight boxing match. The Central AAU Meet, however, was not one of the noted episodes for which the field would become renowned; it wasn’t even well attended.

  The local papers allotted only an inch of space to the meet, and officials feared that such lackluster advertisement wouldn’t draw much of a crowd. That evening, a stiff wind blew into the stadium. Though the few spectators did not mind it, it was bad news for the competitors: referees, in gauging the wind’s direction with a handkerchief, warned the athletes that any new record set by them would not likely be confirmed due to the climatic conditions. Not every official cared much about wind direction, even though all of them knew that a breeze blowing against athletes’ backs gave them what was considered an unfair push. Prior to official wind gauges, which would not be in use until 1936, when introduced in Berlin, wind direction was determined in a more haphazard manner, generally with the aid of a handkerchief.

  But wind indeed had a profound effect on athletes. Usually, as an athlete accelerated, her body leaned forward by small degrees until she reached her maximum velocity, and then a process of slowing down began, the posture adjusting to it. Spectators would notice a more pronounced lean when sprinters ran against the resistance of a strong headwind. This forward lean allowed them to balance against the wind, though their velocity wasn’t reduced. (A tailwind, naturally, had the opposite effect, pushing the athlete forward.) That was the situation the athletes found themselves in that particular evening in Soldier Field.

  Betty waited impatiently on the sidelines. She had been training since the end of March and suspected she could beat her competitors, even those who had been running for years. Her stride had lengthened, her timing was improving, she was developing greater muscular strength, and her confidence was growing in proportion to her equally growing ego. Her mind told her that she could do this, and she listened to that inner voice, as she did to Coach Price’s words. As they trained, Price kept her abreast on whose records she was breaking, whose timing she was sinking, whose speed she was beating or nearing—so that each time she dashed down the corridor of her school or the street near her house, she felt she was running with an invisible opponent, against whom she was always victorious.

  In developing a strategy, an athlete still had to take into account things that were often beyond her control: nerves had a way of surfacing at the most random times; and—although architecturally similar—not all tracks were created the same way, so an unseen crinkle in the pattern could be detrimental during a race. As much as she had learned, a competitor could be having a much better day.

  In the stands, excited as no one else, sat Betty’s brother-in-law Jim Rochfort. As the races were about to begin, he listened to the spectators sitting behind him: the DeVry family, who were obvious fans of Helen Filkey. They cheered loudly, unafraid of making fools of themselves. Jim often turned to look at them, smiling at the young William DeVry, who smirked as he suggested that Helen could win the competition with her hands tied behind her and running backward. (A few years later, Jim would understand the passion behind William’s comment. The boy would go on to marry Helen and build an empire as the chairman of the board of directors of the DeVry Technical Institute.)

  —

  Inside the stadium, the din of the crowd resonated wildly as the official’s fingers curled around the trigger. Her own skills with a gun gave Betty a distinct advantage, as she knew the official’s maneuvers: the moment when he took the pistol in his hand, the initial intake of air into his lungs, the small twitchy movements he would make before the gun went off, and the instant he would pull the trigger.

  She felt her muscles come alive as she dashed down the track, the auditorium pulsating wildly as time seemed to stop altogether yet simultaneously blast forward faster than she could ever have imagined. The atmosphere in the building was rambunctious, not the quiet stillness of a crowd that appreciated her ballet performances. In its stead was an entity alive with energy, pushing her ahead as she broke the ribbon.

  She ran her race in twelve seconds, and to everyone watching it seemed that she had hardly broken a sweat. But the fact that her timing was four-tenths of a second better than the official record wouldn’t matter, for, as the referees had suspected, the wind blowing through the stadium had helped her achieve it.

  Studies performed decades later would show that a tailwind of 2 meters per second during a 100-meter race would have improved her time by only one-tenth of a second. But at the time, there was no gadget to provide such a sophisticated measurement. Betty didn’t much care why she had won or that her record would not be documented. Even if the wind had indeed pushed her forward, she reasoned, she would have won. What mattered to her was that she had beaten Helen Filkey.

  As she stood at the podium to receive her first-place ribbon, she went over the precise moment when she had decided to beat Helen; she didn’t have the wildest notion where it had come from, that conscious decision to leave her competition behind and go for the win. Right off the starting line, she’d sensed she was already ahead of her opponent. She had decided to let her guard down a little but then had recalled Coach Price telling her that some kind of a record was on the line, which had spurred her onward with renewed vigor until she reached the end.

  —

  By beating Helen, Betty had become a serious contender for the Olympic team. Her win also caught the attention of the Evening American, which immediately decided to sponsor her way to the Olympic trials in Newark, New Jersey, set for July 4. She would now join a group of young competitive athletes whose talents had carried them to the Garden State and on whose shoulders the United States’ inaugural women’s track-and-field team would be built.

  CHAPTER SIX

  OFF TO THE GAMES

  The first modern Olympic Games took place in 1896 in Athens, where twenty-two countries and more than 250 athletes participated in fifty-three events. None of the participants was a woman. The man known for reviving the Games was Baron Pierre de Coubertin, a French aristocrat who envisioned a rebirth of the classical Greek ideal of exposing perfect young athletes to the rigors of physical contests.

  Although in time it would be accepted that the modern Games were due to Coubertin’s efforts, the reali
ty was that international athletic festivals had already been taking place in Europe (and occasionally in North America) well before he became involved. The English physician William Penny Brookes and the Greek merchant and philanthropist Evangelis Zappas were essential early advocates. While Coubertin was aware of their attempts to bring the Games back into the limelight, he never gave them credit for providing him with the models for the Olympics he eventually created.

  Coubertin brought to the Games his own visions, ideas, and biases, particularly regarding female athletes. And though he did not discount the idea that women were capable of great things, he did not think those skills extended to sports. But some people begged to disagree with him.

  —

  The first women to officially participate in the modern Olympic Games did so in Paris in 1900, where nineteen competed in tennis and golf. In 1904, archery made its Olympic appearance in St. Louis, though it was added only as an exhibition sport. Although those athletes made it look as though women were taking strides toward inclusion, nothing could have been further from the truth. They were all upper-class ladies who most of the time studied, read poetry, and led lives of leisure. They pursued sports not for their competitive benefits or health advantages, but simply for their social perks.

  Only competitive swimming, which was added to the 1912 Games in Stockholm, seemed to add a layer of respectability and seriousness. But as increasing numbers of women entered the Games, their male counterparts and most of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) members wondered: What was to become of their beloved and esteemed male-only games?

  —

  The first female track-and-field athletes owe their admittance to the daring Frenchwoman Alice Milliat. Born in Nantes in 1884, Milliat had earned her living as a translator, though her real passion was rowing. She heartily believed that physical education could contribute to a person’s character, regardless of gender. Sport, she felt, “develops personalities, gives confidence and courage, and generates a resourceful spirit.” She believed this to be especially important for a woman, whose primary tasks—society insisted—were to procreate and to stand by her husband’s side as he rose to professional heights.

  Milliat became a sports administrator, and along the way was at the forefront of several demonstrations. Crucially, in 1912, she organized Femina Sport, a Parisian sports club that morphed into the Fédération des Sociétés Féminines Sportives de France, or French Federation of Women’s Sporting Clubs. It was through the French Federation that she lobbied the IOC and the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) to allow women’s track and field to be officially included in the Olympic competitions. She argued that although tennis and golf, and even archery and swimming, had already made their debuts, it was high time that track and field be included.

  Officials insisted that track and field was classically a men’s sport and that female athletes would develop physical traits that would render them unattractive and possibly foster lesbian tendencies or—worse—turn them into men. The sports practiced by the female Olympians at the time added prestige to the games. Track and field, on the other hand, was something that anyone could take part in, including those who had no economic advantages.

  But Milliat felt that class segregation had no place in Olympic competition. The IOC should open the games either to everyone or to no one at all. Therefore, after the IOC’s repeated refusal, the only solution was to have an Olympiad geared exclusively toward global female athletes. During those games, women would be free to compete against one another regardless of social status, in as many events as they qualified for, and without adhering to all of the IOC rules. To this end, Milliat formed the Fédération Sportive Féminine Internationale (FSFI).

  In 1921, Monaco hosted the inaugural Women’s Olympics. The event was a success, but it paled in comparison to the one held in Paris the following year, where eleven events were scheduled. Opening day in Monaco welcomed participants from England, Ireland, France, and several other European countries, as well as the United States. More than twenty thousand spectators turned out to watch, attracting the attention of the IOC. In 1923, at one of its meetings, the question posed by Milliat was once again placed on the agenda. The committee’s response to what it referred to as the “Feminine Question” was blunt: “They can do whatever they want, as long as it is not in public.”

  Despite the Women’s Olympics’ early successes, the IOC still refused to allow women equal entrance. That only spurred Milliat to go further with her own games, and in 1926, the Women’s Olympics were held in Gothenburg, Sweden. That was the biggest spectacle yet, as Milliat had invited more countries to send the best athletes they had. The opening ceremonies included fireworks, choirs, parades, and a flight of white doves. The Swedish royal family attended, providing much-needed worldwide publicity. Milliat hoped that the IOC would take note of those prominent guests. “People are interested in the Women’s Olympics,” she said. “During the last games in Gothenburg, all foreign diplomats spent a night traveling from Stockholm to watch the athletic events. Is that not proof itself?”

  The Women’s Olympics’ popularity was beginning to grate on the IOC. While the women’s games had once been presumed to be merely a passing fad on the part of women who could not come to terms with their place in society, it was now becoming a public and direct challenge.

  More irritating to the IOC was that Milliat insisted on using the same name: Olympics. How were people supposed to know the difference? Which one was the true Olympics? What worried them was the fact that Milliat had appropriated a name, a competition, and a vision that was theirs. “The Commission expressed concerns about the title ‘Olympic’ that this organization of the games appropriated itself and will take measures asking the FSFI’s help so that this title, which belongs to the IOC, be exclusively reserved to the games organized by the IOC every first year of each Olympiad,” the IOC concluded at a meeting in November 1925.

  But Milliat had never intended for women to stand apart from the rest of the competitors. She yearned for them to gain the opportunities they deserved, to be seen not as intruding in a male-dominated arena but as equals. By building and transforming the Women’s Olympics into a marquee event that was popular, distinguished, and respected—featuring disciplined athletes whose concentrated efforts had allowed them to reach the pinnacle of their careers—she had achieved her goal.

  After a barrage of IOC meetings in late 1926, an agreement was reached: the IOC would add track and field to the roster of women’s events starting with the 1928 Olympics, but it would retain the sole title of Olympic Games. If Milliat wished to continue with her female-only games, she would have to change the name to the Women’s World Games. (All of this occurred nearly two years after Pierre de Coubertin, the strongest opponent to women’s participation in track and field, had retired from the IOC.) That was how, by 1928, the first group of female Olympic track-and-field athletes were approved to attend the games. Now all they had to do was qualify.

  —

  Not a gust of air entered the room; the suffocating heat seemed to exert its full power from floor to ceiling, stifling them. The window of Betty’s cramped hotel room opened to the sounds of the city, the smells of the street below drifting inside. Voices from outside leapt into the room, while dogs barked in the distance and the occasional flash of unfulfilled lightning pierced the night sky. Betty took a breath of humid air and smelled the stench of uncollected garbage from the sidewalk, wafting heavily in the early night air.

  On learning that she would be traveling to New Jersey and New York for the Olympic trials, she had been overtaken by a sense of disorientation. She had never ventured far from home, save for Stone Lake in northern Indiana, where her family rented a cabin every summer and spent a few months indulging in swimming, fishing, and catapulting down the side of a hill sloping into the water. She strolled along the paths, taking nearly an hour to round the lake, stooping to catch the turtles that lounged among the lily p
ads or gather wildflowers and scour for the small berries that she liked. This was certainly different, she thought as she looked out of her hotel window, the haze of the hot evening enveloping the buildings. She sensed that a grand adventure was about to begin.

  New York was unlike Riverdale in every respect. The bristling sidewalks were a revelation, where a sea of humanity hurried over the sticky pavements, fanning themselves with newspapers as they rushed in every direction, so purposeful in their manners. She was curious about their lives and the places they were heading; none of them was aware of her pursuits and her desires, as lost in the crowd as anyone else. She loved the frenzy in the air, the invisible hum of the city that enlivened her body.

  She had been told that this year’s Olympics would be in Amsterdam, a place she could barely locate on a map. The Games had been awarded to Amsterdam thanks in part to the doings of Baron Frederik van Tuyll, the president of the Netherlands Olympic Committee, who in 1919, during an IOC meeting in Lausanne to decide where the Seventh Olympiads should take place, had made a bid for the 1924 Games, even though other cities, including Lyons and Rome, were already on the short list. The athletes did not know about the political finagling, and what mattered to Betty most was that they were the first Olympics where women would be allowed to participate in track and field. They were making history, being swept along in a dramatic change in women’s athletics, and she was a part of it.