Run Down
26.2 secrets of the Boston Marathon
W
hether you run it, watch it, volunteer at it, or use it as an excuse to skip work or school and drink, the Boston Marathon is the quintessential Boston spectacle. But even after more than a century, this event still has its secrets. For example, the marathon began in Ashland, not Hopkinton, when it was run for the first time on April 19, 1897 across a starting line made in the dirt by a race official on what is now Pleasant Street in front of Metcalf’s Mill, a shoebox factory on the Sudbury River. The start was moved to Hopkinton in 1924 to conform to new international distance standards. Thought you knew everything about the Boston Marathon? Here are 26.2 secrets. See if you can keep up:
Shhhh! The BAA logo, a unicorn, symbolizes something to pursue that can never be caught.
1.
The Boston Marathon is America’s oldest marathon, but it wasn’t the first. Thirty runners had competed in a race from Stamford, Connecticut to Manhattan eight months earlier.
2.
The Boston Marathon was originally called the American Marathon.
3.
Scheduled to begin at the strike of noon, the first Boston Marathon set off 19 minutes late. The honorary starter was Olympic sprinting champion Thomas Burke. He simply shouted, “Go!”
4.
Marathon organizer the Boston Athletic Association has its own marathon museum at its offices in the Back Bay, open weekdays (except just before and after the marathon), with memorabilia that includes a bronzed pair of repeat winner John A. Kelley’s Size 8s.
5.
The first Boston Marathon was won by an Irish-born New Yorker, John J. McDermott, who swore he’d never run it again. He nonetheless returned in the second year, but only came in fourth.
6.
How to join the elite at the world’s biggest fitness show
7.
The first Massachusetts resident to win the marathon was Lawrence Brignolia in 1899. He also weighed the most of any winner: 173 pounds. The lightest? Keizo Yamada of Japan in 1953, who weighed 108 pounds.
8.
The marathon was originally going to be run along the route of Paul Revere’s famous ride to warn the Minutemen that the British were coming. But the distance wasn’t long enough.
9.
For nearly its first quarter century, the marathon was 24.5 miles, until the standard distance of 26 miles and 385 yards was set. It wasn’t until 1927 that the Boston course was extended to its current length.
10.
Betting on the marathon was commonplace in its early years. Spectators bet on runners to place or show, or on teams to sweep.
11.
Since 1905, the marathon has been started by a member of the Brown family of Hopkinton every year but one: George Brown until 1937; his son, Celtics founder Walter A. Brown, until 1964; Tom Brown after him; and Walter A. Brown’s nephew, Walter F. Brown, since 1991.
12.
No one over 40 was allowed to enter the Boston Marathon for its first few decades, though many ran it anyway without numbers.
13.
Women were not allowed to run the Boston Marathon until 1972, but some did anyway, including Roberta “Bobbi” Gibb, who hid in the bushes near the start and ran as a bandit in 1966, 1967, and 1968.
14.
How to get one of the best views of the finish line—for free
15.
In 1907, a freight train crossed the marathon route in Framingham just as the runners arrived. Only the leader, Tom Longboat, beat the train, and he won the marathon by three minutes.
16.
The first known cheater in the marathon was Howard A. Pearce of New Bedford, who dropped out at the eight miles in 1909 and hitched a ride. In 1916, A.F. "Freddy" Merchant caught a ride with two miles to go and ran across the finish line, but a Boy Scout who was a witness ratted him out.
17.
The most famous cheater was Rosie Ruiz, who materialized at the 25-mile mark and was the first woman to finish. She was discovered to have jumped into the race with a mile to go, and was disqualified.
18.
Only once has the Boston Marathon not taken place in its conventional form: when, in 1918, during World War I, it was changed to a 10-man military relay race.
19.
Four-time Boston winner Bill Rodgers dropped out of the marathon on his first attempt in 1973.
20.
Boston’s was the first major marathon to include a wheelchair division after Bob Hall was promised in 1975 that he would get a finisher’s certificate if he could complete the course in less than three hours. His time was 2:58:00. Hall is now the wheelchair division coordinator.
21.
The marathon did not introduce qualifying requirements until 1970, the year after the field broke 1,000, when applicants had to prove they could finish in four hours or less.
22.
The marathon has never been canceled or postponed, even by snow squalls in 1925, 1961, and 1967, sleet in 1907, or 100-degree heat in 1905. In 1927 it was so hot a newly surfaced section of the course began to melt, and in 1976 temperatures reached 96 degrees.
23.
About 46,000 vehicles go through the Hopkinton exit of the Mass. Pike on Marathon Monday, compared to the usual 33,000.
24.
The Super Bowl is the only single-day sporting event to be covered by more journalists than the marathon, which attracts 1,100 journalists.
25.
Boston-area bicyclists, including members of the club Crack O Dawn, have created their own underground tradition of riding the marathon route early in the morning while the streets are closed and before the runners start.
26.
The “screech tunnel” created by whooping women at Wellesley College began when Dick Grant, a handsome Harvard track star, ran past the first year. He dropped out as soon as he was out of view of the women.
26.2.
Want to cross the marathon finish line without the bother of the training and miles? Go to the shoe department at City Sports on Boylston Street and look down. That’s the 2009 finish line under your feet.
Email
Print this
