Faggs, Mae (1932—)

African-American sprinter. Name variations: Mae Faggs Starr. Born Aeriwentha Mae Faggs in Mays Landing, New York, on April 10, 1932; married Eddie Starr (a high school principal).

First American woman to participate in three Olympics (1948, 1952, and 1956); winner of the AAU 200-meters (1954, 1955, and 1956); won the silver in the 200-meter and the gold in the 4×100-meter relay at the Pan Am Games (1955); won the gold medal in the 4×100-meter relay with a 45.9 time in the Olympics in Helsinki (1952), and the bronze medal in the 4×100-meter relay with a time of 44.9 in the Melbourne Olympics (1956).

Mae Faggs' track career began thanks to her alliance with a New York policeman. When she was in elementary school, Patrolman Dykes came to recruit members for the Police Athletic League (PAL). "Naturally, I was interested," said Mae. "I was nothing but a tomboy, anyhow." As the boys were running, Faggs looked up at him and said: "Patrolman Dykes, I can beat everyone of those boys running out there." He said, "Let's see." "So he lined up some boys with me," said Faggs, "and we took off down the school court and I beat 'em." Dykes put her on the girls' team from the 111th Precinct. Then, Sergeant John Brennan started an AAU team with young athletes from the city (1947). Soon, Brennan was predicting that she would make the Olympic team.

Brennan became her mentor. In 1948, he entered Faggs in the trials for the U.S. Olympic Team in Providence, Rhode Island. He was certain she would win; she was less so. Faggs recounts:

I was digging my holes—I didn't bother with starting blocks then—and I took off my sweats and the starter said, "OK let's make our marks." All of a sudden I just stood up and I walked to Mr. Brennan and I said, "Mr. Brennan, I can't do it." He said, "Wait a minute; you come here," and he just talked to me for a few minutes.… I walked back out on the track and I was ready. All the way back home I kept asking Mr. Brennan, "Have I really made the Olympic Team?" and he said, "Yes, you've made it."

Faggs had finished third behind two more experienced runners, Audrey Patterson of Tennessee State and Nell Jackson of Tuskegee. As the team's youngest member, Faggs was soon on board the SS America bound for London and the 1948 Olympics. The enormous city, 100,000 spectators, and 5,000 athletes from 58 countries did not intimidate her. She ran the 200-meter trial heat with Fanny Blankers-Koen , the 30-year-old Dutch housewife who went on to win four Olympic gold medals. Though Faggs was defeated in the trials, Alice Coachman , the African-American track star who won 26 national championships, consoled her: "Young as you are, you can be in two or three Olympic Games."

Mae Faggs was 15 when she ran in her first AAU national indoor meet in 1949. Her competitors were Patterson and Stella Walsh , both well-known champions. "Well, Toots, you ought to be very good in this meet," said Brennan, who was always at her side. "As a matter of fact I am expecting you to take first place in the 220." Faggs beat Walsh and Patterson with a new American record of 25.8. In 1952, Faggs anchored the Police Athletic League to win the 440-yard relay and the 220-yard dash and tied the indoor record in the 100-yard dash. In the Olympic trials, she was first in the 100 meters and second in the 200. For some time, Faggs had been competing against Nell Jackson as well as Jean Patterson and Mary McNabb . Faggs expected these African-American runners to be members of the U.S. Olympic team, but Nell Jackson dropped out of the trials; Mary McNabb pulled a leg muscle and was unable to compete; and Jean Patterson was also injured, leaving Faggs to head for Helsinki without them.

A veteran at the Helsinki Olympics in 1952, Faggs was determined to medal, but prospects were not good. This was the beginning of the Cold War and of a sports rivalry between the U.S. and USSR that would last for four decades. "The United States is not expected to do much in women's track, in which the Russians are very strong," predicted The New York Times. As the Helsinki Games progressed, these words proved prophetic. Mabel Landry , America's best broad jumper, broke an Olympic record with one jump in the qualifying trials only to come in 7th in the finals. America's Catherine Hardy was eliminated in the 100-meter qualifying rounds. Mae Faggs came in 6th in the 100-meter finals. The weather was wet and cold; spirits were low.

All that remained was the 4×100 meter relay, and the Americans' chances looked dismal. Janet Moreau from Providence, Rhode Island, Catherine Hardy from Fort Valley, Georgia, Barbara Jones from Chicago, and Mae Faggs from New York made up the relay team. Jones, only 15, was too discouraged to practice and the other two runners were almost indifferent. Only Faggs felt a medal was within reach. The key to winning a relay is passing the baton. Races have been lost when the baton is dropped or when runners waste precious seconds looking back as the baton is passed. Faggs wanted to avoid these costly mistakes and urged the team to practice for split-second accuracy. When the teenage Jones balked, Faggs threatened: "If you can't come out and train with us and get this stick passing right, then I am not going to set your hair." Jones showed up for practice.

Led by Marjorie Jackson , a two-time goldmedal winner, the Australians were slated to win the 4×100-meter relay. But by the time Faggs ran the first lap and passed the baton to Jones, the U.S. was out front by almost two yards. Jones added another yard but Moreau lost ground. When Hardy took the baton for the 4th and final leg of the race, Australia was in the lead, followed by England and Germany. Then Marjorie Jackson dropped the baton, putting the Australians out of contention. Hardy passed the German runner 30 yards from the finish, then passed the English runner two yards from the tape. The Americans, coming from behind, set a new world record of 45.9 seconds and won an Olympic gold medal.

When Mae Faggs returned to America, she began college at Tennessee State University where friends had arranged a work scholarship. Home of the famous Tennessee Tigerbelles, TSU would one day be known for its women track stars, including Wilma Rudolph and Wyomia Tyus . But Faggs arrived before the glory days and was bitterly disappointed by the status of women's track at Tennessee. She was the lone star on the women's track team. There was no money to travel to track meets, nor funds to pay Faggs' way to the AAU national meet so she could defend her title in the 220-yard dash which she had held since 1949. In retaliation, Faggs decided to win every sprint she could.

Two years later, the TSU women's track team began to whip itself into competitive shape. Isabelle Daniels of Jakin, Georgia, and Lucinda Williams of Bloomingdale, Georgia, joined the team. Faggs, Daniels, Williams, and Cynthia Thompson , a 31-year-old who had been a member of the Jamaican Olympic track teams (1948 and 1952), formed the Tennessee State 800-meter relay team which set a new American record at the AAU outdoor nationals in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in 1954. Faggs also won the 220-yard run that same year.

In 1955, the AAU indoor nationals were held in Chicago, where the TSU Tigerbelles struggled against the Chicago Comets, a Catholic Youth Organization (CYO) team. The CYO's Mabel Landry, the broad jumper, and Barbara Jones, the sprinter on the 1952 Olympic team, competed against the runners from Tennessee, winning the 440-yard relay, the 440-yard medley, the 110-yard dash, and the 220-yard dash. Several of the Comets came to Tennessee in 1956, adding new talent to the team. At the Pan American Games held in Mexico City in March 1956, Faggs beat Bertha Diaz of Cuba in the first heat of the 60-meter dash, but Diaz came back to win in the finals. In the 400-meter relay, Landry, Jones, Daniels, and Faggs won the event.

Patterson, Audrey (1926—)

American track-and-field champion. Born on September 27, 1926.

Audrey Patterson, of Tennessee State, won a bronze medal in the 200 meters in London in the 1948 Olympics.

Hardy, Catherine (1932—)

African-American track-and-field champion. Born on February 8, 1932 (some sources cite 1930), in Carrollton, Georgia.

As a member of the U.S. team, Catherine Hardy won the gold medal in the 4×100-meter relay in the Helsinki Olympics in 1952. Hardy had also won the AAU indoor 50 yards in 1951 and the AAU outdoor double in 1952.

Moreau, Janet (1927—)

American track-and-field champion. Born on October 26, 1927; lived in Providence, Rhode Island.

As a member of the U.S. team, Janet Moreau won the gold medal in the 4×100-meter relay in the Helsinki Olympics in 1952.

As the women's track program developed at Tennessee State University, Faggs remained the central athlete and her leadership was vital. Promising athletes continued to stream into the women's track program. Wilma Rudolph and Martha Hudson were two of the rookies. Inevitably, some of these younger runners beat Faggs, and she encouraged them. But Faggs never stayed beaten for long. She preferred being in first place, and in the outdoor nationals in Philadelphia (1956) Faggs won the gold in the 100-yard dash, the 220-yard dash, and the 440-yard relay.

She was the only woman chosen, along with six outstanding male athletes, to make a goodwill tour of Monrovia, Liberia, Accra, the Gold Coast (now Ghana), Lagos, and Ibada in Nigeria for the U.S. State Department. When a Nashville merchant heard that Faggs could not afford a coat for the tour, she was offered one at half price.

In the 1956 Olympics trials, the third for Faggs, she was determined to calm the nervous "Skeeter," as Wilma Rudolph was known by friends. Though Faggs and Rudolph tied the American record of 24.1, Faggs crossed the tape first. "As we came off the turn," said Faggs, "Skeeter was in front of me. But she turned to look back, and when she did, I beat her to the tape by just inches." Faggs later told Rudolph: "'As long as you live, don't you ever look back in a race again.' And she never did."

The Tennessee State women's track program had come a long way. Six of its athletes made the Olympic team in 1956. For the first time in the history of the women's Olympic track-and-field program, the Americans had a black woman coach: Nell Jackson of Tuskegee. The 1956 Melbourne games were not easy. Faggs was eliminated in the first heat of the 100 meter, and Betty Cuthbert took the gold. In the 200, Rudolph was ousted in the trial heat. The relay team was also having a miserable time. "After qualifying heats in the morning," said Faggs, "Skeeter was upset. She thought she had run out of the passing zone. Margaret and Isabel were down in the dumps because of our slow time. So I took all of them to the warm-up track in the back of the stadium, and I said some terrible words to them. I told them I didn't know what they were going to do, but I was going to have me a medal." Though Australia took the relay with the fastest Olympic time ever recorded, the all-Tennessee State team came in third, capturing the bronze. Faggs had another medal.

The 1956 Olympics ended Mae Faggs' career, but she left a powerful legacy. She had arrived at Tennessee State University as the sole track star in a woefully underfunded program; by the time she left, she had poured the foundation for one of the most successful women's track teams in collegiate history. She was instrumental in the stellar career of Wilma Rudolph and those of many others. Faggs continued her education after graduating from Tennessee State, studying toward a master's degree in special education at the University of Cincinnati. She became a school teacher, married Eddie Starr, a high school principal, and became well known in Cincinnati for promoting youth programs. In 1996, Mae Faggs was inducted into the Women's Sports Hall of Fame.

sources:

Davis, Michael D. Black American Women in Olympic Track and Field. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1992.

Page, James A. Black Olympian Medalists. Englewood, CO: Libraries Unlimited, 1991.

Karin Loewen Haag , freelance writer, Athens, Georgia