1968 Olympic star Bob Beamon jumped into history by The Republican Newsroom
Tuesday November 11, 2008, 10:26 PM
By STAN FREEMAN
sfreeman@repub.com
SPRINGFIELD - He was the inspiration for the addition of a new word to the English language.
Beamonesque, adj. - something completely unexpected and completely amazing.
During the Mexico City summer Olympics 40 years ago, Bob Beamon jumped into history, leaping 29 feet, 2.5 inches in the long jump final, and shattering the existing Olympic and World records by nearly two feet.
The extraordinary jump was ranked by Sports Illustrated one of the five greatest sports moments of the 20th century.
However, Beamon, who spoke at Western New England College on Tuesday, acknowledged the 1968 Olympics are remembered today as much for their politics as their athletics.
Two days before Beamon’s jump, in a controversial civil rights protest, American runners Tommie Smith and John Carlos delivered the black power salute - raised black-gloved fists - while receiving their medals. They were ultimately expelled from the games for their actions.
However, Beamon said that protest and others during the 1960s surrounding civil rights paved the way for the election of Barack Obama.
“What happened back then is the reason why things have gone through such a major change in this country,” he said.
“But I never looked at (the presidential campaign) as a color thing. It was about whether Obama was capable of running this country. I thought his election was a breath of fresh air,” Beamon said.
Beamon’s talk, titled “For the Love of the Games: A Leap Into History,” was sponsored by the College’s Center for International Sport Business.
A motivational speaker and the author of “The Man Who Could Fly: The Bob Beamon Story,” Beamon was inducted into the inaugural class of the United States Olympic Committee’s Hall of Fame in 1983.
However, growing up in Queens, N.Y., he seemed on his way to a life of crime until he discovered track and field.
“I was such a bad kid. I was a menace. Then I did a total about-face. I probably wouldn’t be here today if I hadn’t straightened out,” he said.
During a reception for Beamon prior to his speech, one of his middle school teachers, David Cohen, of Longmeadow, now in his 90s, recalled seeing Beamon, who is 6 feet, 3 inches tall, jump high enough to grab a quarter off the top of a basketball backboard while still in high school. In fact, by the time Beamon graduated from high school, he was ranked number two in the United States in the long jump.
His record-shattering jump came on Oct. 18, 1968. He said he felt no sense of destiny when he woke up that morning, just a very good feeling.
“I had just a wonderful feeling that morning and that afternoon. But certainly the adrenaline was flowing,” he said.
It was on his first jump in the finals that he set the record. When he landed in the sand pit, he had gone so far that the automatic measuring device could not detect it. So an actual tape measure had to be used to determine its length. Because the announcement of the jump was in meters, Beamon did not immediately understand what he’d done, but when told what the leap had measured in feet, he famously dropped to the ground in shock.
“That jump was only my first jump. But everything else was downhill after that. I couldn’t concentrate anymore. How do you stay calm?” he said.
Although Beamon’s world record was beaten in 1991 by Mike Powell, the jump still stands as the Olympic record.
http://www.masslive.com/sports/index.ssf/2008/11/1968_olympic_star_bob_beamon_j.html