Athletics · 1960 · Rome, Italy
From Leg Brace to Triple Gold
A sprinter who could not walk unaided until the age of twelve becomes the first American woman to win three gold medals in track and field at a single Olympics.
3 (100m, 200m, 4x100m relay)
Golds at Rome
3, at the Games
World records set
"La Gazzella Nera" (The Black Gazelle)
Nickname
Wilma Rudolph was born prematurely into a large family in segregated Tennessee and contracted polio as a young child, leaving her reliant on a leg brace and unable to walk normally for years. Physical therapy, much of it organised by her mother through a Black hospital an hour's drive from home, eventually restored full use of her leg by her early teens.
By 1960 she was the fastest woman in the world. In Rome, on a track softened by rain, she won the 100 metres and 200 metres individually and anchored the US 4x100m relay team to a third gold, becoming the first American woman to take three golds in track and field at one Olympics. Italian crowds nicknamed her 'La Gazzella Nera', the Black Gazelle, for the fluid stride that made her look, witnesses said, as if she were barely trying.
She returned home to a Clarksville, Tennessee that had planned a segregated homecoming parade; Rudolph refused to attend unless it was integrated, and the town relented, holding the first fully integrated event in its history. Her Rome performance made her one of the first Black women to become a global sports celebrity, and a direct inspiration to the generation of American sprinters who followed her.
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