In 1928, 16-year-old Elizabeth “Betty” Robinson Schwartz became the first woman ever awarded an Olympic gold medal for track and field. A few years later, in 1931, Schwartz was in a plane crash. Mistakenly identified as dead, she was placed in the trunk of a car, and driven to the morgue where it was discovered that she was still alive but in a coma. It took her years to walk normally again but she returned to track and field and was part of the US relay team at the 1936 Summer Olympics where her team won gold.
Robinson ran her first official race on March 30, 1928, at the age of 16, at an indoor meet where she finished second to Helen Filkey, the US record holder at 100 m, in the 60-yard dash. At her next race on June 2, outdoors at 100 meters, she beat Filkey and equalled the world record, though her time was not recognized because it was deemed wind-aided.
At the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics, her third 100 m competition, Robinson was the only US athlete to qualify for the 100 m final. She reached the final and won, equaling the world record of 12.2 seconds. She was the inaugural Olympic champion in the event, since athletics for women had not been on the program before, and its inclusion was in fact still heavily disputed among officials. She remains the youngest athlete to win Olympic 100 m gold. With the American 4×100 meters relay team, Robinson added a silver medal to her record.
“I can remember breaking the tape, but I wasn’t sure that I’d won,” Robinson remembered. “It was so close. But my friends in the stands jumped over the railing and came down and put their arms around me, and then I knew I’d won. Then, when they raised the flag, I cried.”
Chicago Tribune reporter William L Shirer wrote that “an unheralded, pretty, blue-eyed blond young woman from Chicago became the darling of the spectators when she flew down the cinder path, her golden locks flying, to win.”
Robinson returned home to Chicago to parades and speeches. And once the celebrations died down, the runner set her sights on the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics. In the months that followed, Robinson continued to train and set records. But on June 28, 1931, her dream came crashing down…
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