Bob Richards
Robert Eugene Richards (born February 20, 1926), a retired American athlete, pastor, and politician.
He created three U.S. Olympic Teams in two events: the 1948, 1952 and 1956 Summer Olympics as a pole vaulter and 1956 decathlete.
He won gold medals in pole vault in 1952 and 1956, becoming the only two-time male champion in Olympic history.
While still active, Richards became an ordained minister. He ran the Populist Party ticket for U.S. President in 1984.
Athletic career
Richards was the second man to pole 15 feet (4.57 m). While a student at Illinois University, Richards tied for the national pole vault title and followed with 20 national Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) titles, including 17 in pole vault and three in decathlon.
The first guy to clear 15 feet was Dutch Warmerdam, who achieved the 1942 world record of 4.77 m (15 ft 7+3⁄4 in) years before Richards came to his top. While his time's dominant vaulter, Richards never established a world record.
Richards eventually became active in promoting physical health and in later years continued to vault.
He was the first athlete to appear on the front of Wheaties cereal boxes in 1958 (although not the first shown on all aspects of the packaging), and was also the first Wheaties representative to establish up the Wheaties Sports Federation, which supported Olympic sports participation.
Richards had four sons, also pole vaulters: Brandon, 18'2" national high school record for fourteen years from 1985;Tom won the CIF State Meeting in 1988; Bob, Junior was second in the same meeting in 1968 and later ranked #7 in the US in 1973.
He's the only male two-time Olympic gold medal winner in the pole vault (1952 and 1956), hence he's the only man defending his Olympic championship. He also won bronze in the pole vault in 1948. Russian Yelena Isinbayeva is the only other pole vaulter besides Richards who won three Olympic gold in 2012. Richards placed 13th in the 1956 Olympics decathlon.
He was elected to the 1983 U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame, and 1975 U.S. National Track & Field Hall of Fame.
As he ageed, Richards continued to participate in various events in Track and Field, especially throwing events.
He was one of the earliest regular participants in what has now become Masters athletics. Richards appeared on the panel game show, What's My Line? #346 January 20, 1957.
Ministry
He was ordained to the Brethren's Church in 1946 (which led to his being nicknamed the "Vaulting Vicar" or the "Pole Vaulting Parson").
As future church minister Billie Jean King's tennis player, Richards influenced King. One day, when King was 13 or 14, Richards asked,
"What will you do with your life?" She said, "Reverend, I'm the world's top tennis player." In 1957, actor Hal Stalmaster played Richards as a teenager in an episode of America's ABC anthology series Cavalcade.
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