byJeff Benjamin
This is a free event is being sponsored by The Huntsman World Senior Games, Bright Path Strong & Running Strong For American Indian Youth.
To register please go to –
Check out the piece on the event, which we posted below!
Legends & Authorities To Discuss “Native American Olympic Stories”
By Jeff Benjamin
Boy are viewers in for a treat!
Jim Thorpe, photo by Robert M. Wheeler
This upcoming Thursday, Feb. 25th, two legends will be discussing “Native-American Olympic Stories” and you couldn’t have come up with a better combination on the subject than Billy Mills and Robert Wheeler.
Mills, an Oglala Lakota athlete, would shock the world at the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games, becoming the first (and only!) Team USA member to ever win the 10,000 meter race, defeating a world-class field (which included Ron Clarke, Mohamed Gammoudi and Gerry Lindgren) in one of the most dramatic finishes in Olympic History. With his victory Mills followed in the footsteps of the legendary Jim Thorpe towards achieving Olympic immortality.
It is the exploits of Thorpe who Wheeler has become the world-renown authority on, as his paramount Thorpe biography has helped lead the path forward towards the reinstatement of Thorpe’s 1912 Gold Medals in 1983 and is leading the current struggle to list Thorpe in the official IOC records as the sole champion in his respective events.
“I will tell some of the story of Jim’s life on and off the field and urge the viewers to sign the Bright Path Strong petition requesting the International Olympic Committee to restore his name to their record book as the sole champion of the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon,” said Wheeler who, aided by his wife Flo Ridlon, continue the fight to restore Thorpe’s legitimacy.
Billy Mills, 1964 Olympics, photo by World Athletics
“Included in my presentation will be recordings of Jim’s voice and the voices of President Eisenhower and others I interviewed.”
An event not to be missed!
Bell Lap – This free event is being sponsored by The Huntsman World Senior Games, Bright Path Strong & Running Strong For American Indian Youth.
To register please go to –
