고등학교 공통영어2 (NE능률 민병천) 연계 글

Wilma Rudolph was born in Tennessee in 1940 into a family with more than a dozen children. As a young child, she suffered from several serious illnesses, including polio. At that time, polio was one of the most feared diseases in the United States. It left her without the use of her left leg, so she wore a metal brace for several years.

It was her mother who took her by bus to a hospital in Nashville for treatment every week. At home, members of her large family took turns massaging her weak leg. With this care and years of therapy, her leg slowly grew stronger. Before she became a teenager, she was able to walk without the brace.

In high school, she became one of the best basketball players in the state. However, it was running, not basketball, that would make her famous. When she was fourteen, she caught the attention of Ed Temple, the women's track coach at Tennessee State University. He invited her to train with his team, and she spent her summers improving her sprinting. At sixteen, she competed in the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne, Australia, and won a bronze medal in the relay.

It was not until the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome that she won an Olympic gold medal. There, she won the 100 meters, the 200 meters, and the relay. She was the first American woman to win three gold medals in track and field at a single Olympic Games. Reporters in Europe and the United States called her the fastest woman in the world.

When her hometown of Clarksville planned a celebration for her return, she refused to attend unless Black and white residents could take part together. The city agreed, and the celebration became the first integrated public event in Clarksville's history.

After she retired from running in 1962, she became a teacher and a track coach. She died of cancer in 1994. In the end, it was the people around her, as well as her own hard work, that kept her moving forward. Her life is one of the clearest examples of how support and effort can carry a person past a difficult start.