Home Town Heroes

New York City has countless mascots. The Yankees are the pride of baseball, with the Mets being another figure (didn't mean to insult anyone). There are TWO football teams. Aside from that, the plethora of bridges are all named after someone important: George Washington, Giovanni da Verrazano, RFK, etc. There are so many people credited with building part of this city.


As I mentioned my previous post, my town is named after one man who most people have never heard about. Jim Thorpe is just some Joe Schmo with no credibility. As easy as it'd be to say that, it is wrong.


Two years ago I took a trip to Washington DC for a Media and Journalism Conference. One speaker, creator of C-Span network, asked students to come to the stage and say where they are from. I told him I am from Jim Thorpe. He promptly questioned if I knew who that was and I assured him I did. He and the entire crowd were shocked to hear me explain:


Jim Thorpe was an Olympic athlete deemed by King Gustav V of Sweden to be "the greatest athlete in the world" after having won the decathlon and pentathlon in the Stockholm Olympics of 1912. His athleticism didn't end there, as he went on the play professional football and had a past in Minor League Baseball. These careers, however, stripped him of his gold medals seeing as Olympians are not permitted to play in any professional sports for payment. His gold medals were returned back to his family 30 years after his death.


So how did he end up named after a town in Pennsylvania, one in which he never stepped foot? His real home was Oklahoma. Long story short, his family wanted him memorialized, and the small coal-mining town of Mauch Chunk Pennsylvania was willing to do that.


Thus, I am a graduate of Jim Thorpe High School and former Jim Thorpe Olympian. Now, I am part of St. John's Red Storm here in New York where Jim Thorpe is rarely spoken of. If we're going to talk about sports stars, we might as well talk about Babe Ruth, whose birthday is today, and who needs no introduction. Are there any notable similarities between the two sports stars? If nothing else, they both made an appearance on the Wheaties box.