D
ec. 11, 1956 was “Bobby Morrow Day” in Abilene, where the whole town and the triple gold medalist’s alma mater turned out to welcome him back from Down Under.
As a boy on the family cotton farm in the Rio Grande Valley, Bobby ran for the sheer fun of it. Determined to make the most of his amazing ability, he developed a unique training regimen that included never running more than two hours a day and getting at least 11 hours sleep every night.
After high school at San Benito, Bobby picked Abilene Christian over a host of other colleges for religious rather than athletic reasons. The track super-star soon put the small West Texas campus on the sports map.
As a freshman, Bobby was ranked second and fourth in the world at his short-distance specialties – the 100 and 200-meter dashes. The next year, he equaled the best time ever in the 100 and improved his international standing to first place in both events.
Bobby was the odds-on favorite to run away with the gold at the 1956 Summer Games, which had been pushed back to November because of the southern hemisphere site. Although some sportswriters worried that the Lone Star speedster might have peaked too early for the XVI Olympics, he arrived in Melbourne, Australia in top form.
Bobby breezed through the qualifying heats for the 100, but so did little Ira Murchison of Chicago as each tied the Olympic record in their respective races. With Kansas’ Thane Baker expected to give his teammates a run for their money, the U.S. looked forward to a clean sweep in the event.
A so-called “rolling start,” a questionable technique Bobby considered poor sportsmanship, gave Australian Hec Hogan the early lead in the 100-meter showdown. But the Texan gradually gained ground with his fluid nine-foot stride and passed Hogan at the halfway point.
Bobby glided toward the gold as Baker and Murchison battled the Aussie for the silver. Baker managed to take second place with a perfectly timed lunge at the tape, and Hogan, who died of leukemia during the 1960 Olympics, beat Murchison by a nose for the bronze.
Through the 200-meter preliminaries, Bobby nursed a groin muscle pulled in his gold-medal performance. A fierce competitor incapable of settling for anything less than his best, he would have risked aggravating the injury if challenged. Fortunately no one pressed him in the early heats allowing the muscle to heal completely.
Bobby’s body was in great shape, but his mind had a hard time handling the incredible pressure. All the talk about his repeating Jesse Owens’ 1936 double gold in the dashes had him tied up in knots, so much so that he could not sleep a wink the night before the 200-meter finals.
But the tension and self-doubt melted away at the sound of the starter’s pistol. Defending champion Andrew Stanfield of the U.S. led the pack around the curve only to watch helplessly as Bobby flew by on his way to a second gold medal and a new Olympic record.
Four days later, the speed demon savored one more golden moment. He ran the anchor leg on the victorious 400-meter American relay team.
Bobby’s Abilene homecoming was the start of a celebration that seemed to last forever. The Texas house of representatives declared a statewide Bobby Morrow Day, and Beaumont joined Abilene in honoring the native son with a daylong tribute.
The nationwide recognition was unprecedented. Sports Illustrated saluted Bobby as “Sportsman of the Year; Sport magazine hailed him as “Athlete of the Year,” as did a poll of sportswriters and broadcasters; and the Amateur Athletic Union presented him with the coveted Sullivan Award.
In 1958 the kid from the cotton patch was judged “The Greatest Sprinter of All Time” by Track and Field News and subsequently inducted into three different halls of fame: Helms Track and Field, National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics and, of course, the Texas Sports Hall of Fame.
Sprinters have a very short shelf life, yet Bobby felt he still had what it took to compete at Rome in 1960. A nagging injury kept him from qualifying outright at the Olympic trials, but he was led to believe he had a place on the team right up until the plane took off without him.
Bobby kept this disappointment to himself until 1984, when he sat down for a candid conversation with Texas Monthly. To the surprise of the interviewer, a friend and longtime admirer, the unhappy icon unloaded on everybody from U.S. Olympic officials to Abilene Christian and even his adoring fans who, in his opinion, always expected too much of him.
Bobby bubbled over with bitterness. Billie Sol Estes, the West Texas swindler, was not the only charlatan who had taken advantage of his trusting nature and religious principles.
But the interviewer was unprepared for Bobby Morrow’s closing comment. If he had it to do all over, he never would have run for the gold in the Olympics.
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