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Posts Tagged ‘1967 Boston Marathon’
She Persisted
“No dame ever ran the Boston Marathon!” was what her coach, Arnie Briggs, told 20 year-old journalism student and ardent distance runner Kathrine Switzer when she asked him to train her for the 1967 running of the prestigious race. But Briggs, gruff though he may have been, was willing to work with Switzer. Typically when…Read More
LISTEN: Marathon pioneer Kathrine Switzer speaking in Rochester Friday, WXXI Radio, by Beth Adams
WXXI News Radio Interview with Kathrine. Click on the LISTEN link to hear Switzer talk about her groundbreaking run and how she continues to empower women and girls. Listen HereRead More
Influencing Change One Stride At a Time
On any given day in Berks County, residents can be seen practicing a variety of fitness and exercise activities from a simple walk in the park, to any number of extreme sports that can be imagined. This is for good reason as fitness and wellness have become culturally connected to virtually every other aspect of…Read More
Beyond “Battle of the Sexes”: 16 Other Times Female Athletes Crushed the Competition, Mother Jones, by Becca Andrews and Edwin Rios
Kathrine is listed in this Mother Jones’ article: More than four decades ago, tennis star Billie Jean King faced off against gambler Bobby Riggs at the Astrodome in front of millions of viewers. The stakes for the so-called “Battle of the Sexes,” set to be brought to the big screen on September 22, were higher than the…Read More
The Anniversary
On April 19, 1967, 20 year old Kathrine Switzer started the Boston Marathon, then closed to women, after registering as K.V. Switzer. After 2 miles, the irate race director, Jock Semple, tried to force Switzer off the course. Her boyfriend, Tom Miller, fought Semple off, and Switzer went on to finish. Fifty years after that…Read More
The Women Who Are Running To Protest Trump Are Tapping Into History, Huffington Post
There is a long tradition of women running as a form of protest. By Erin Schumaker In the wake of President Donald Trump’s electoral victory, Alison Désir, the founder of a community running organization in New York City called Harlem Run, turned her frustration into political action. Désir’s remedy: a four-woman, 240-mile relay, beginning in Harlem, New…Read More
Empowerment
Kathrine Switzer was born in Amberg, Germany to American military parents. She grew up primarily in the Washington, DC area, the only daughter of an Army Colonel father and educator mother with an older brother who was a big influence on her life. She made sports history in 1967 as the first woman to register…Read More
Kathrine Switzer story: When only men ran marathons, BBC Witness Program video
In 1967, Kathrine Switzer became the first woman to run in an official marathon race when she ran in the Boston race, which is being held on Monday. Until then it had been assumed that women could not run the distance but with the help of her trainer, Switzer set out to prove them wrong.…Read More
8 Women Made History at Boston Marathon in 1972 –14,000 Registered in 2015 Race, Huffington Post by Beverly Wettenstein
On April 19, 1967, Kathrine Switzer, 20, a journalism major at Syracuse University, entered the Boston Marathon as “K.V. Switzer,” wearing a bulky sweatsuit. At the time, the Amateur Athletics Union (AAU) did not admit women into marathons. Switzer became the first female to officially enter and run. The photo of a race official forcibly…Read More
Kathrine Switzer Remembers the Boston Marathon, Boston Magazine
I didn’t intend to make a political statement when I ran the Boston Marathon in 1967. I was just a girl who wanted to run. Since there were few women’s sports in those days, I was training with the men’s team at Syracuse University. When I told Arnie Briggs, an assistant coach who’d run 15…Read More