Bob Mathias

2007 CALIFORNIA SPORTS HALL OF FAME INDUCTEE

Two-time Olympian Bob Mathias once said, "I have always believed that everyone has the potential to do something extraordinary if they're guided and helped along the way."

The ever-humble Mathias grew up a small town boy in Tulare, CA where he attended Tulare Union High School and competed in football, basketball and track and field. It was here that his own potential to "do something extraordinary" was helped along by his coach and mentor Vigil Jackson.

Mathias graduated high school in 1948 at the age of 17. That same year he won the National Decathlon Championship and then won the gold medal in the decathlon at the Olympic Games in London. He was the youngest person ever to win the title of the World's Greatest Athlete and appeared on the cover of LIFE Magazine.

Mathias would move on to attend Stanford University where he continued to win the national Decathlon titles in 1949, 1950, and 1952.

At the Olympic Games in Helsinki in 1952, Mathias again won the gold by a record-breaking margin of 912 points, becoming the first in the event to hold the distinction of winning consecutive Olympic decathlons. In all, Mathias attended every modern Olympic Games since 1948, except two: Moscow, which was boycotted by the United States; and Athens 2004.

In 1954, at the conclusion of his athletic career Mathias entered the United States Marine Corps as a 2nd Lieutenant and was later appointed "Good Will Ambassador to the World" by President Eisenhower. Following his military service Mathias established the Bob Mathias Sierra Boys and Girls Camps in the eastern foothills of Fresno County. These characters building camps had a nationwide reputation and fulfilled one of Mathias' great loves - working with young boys and girls during their formative years.

Among Mathias' other achievements was his election to the House of Representatives in 1966 from the Central California district that included his hometown of Tulare. In 1977, he was appointed the first director of the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, CO. He ran the USOC Training Camp until 1983, when he became the Executive Director of the National Fitness Foundation based in Indianapolis.

Among dozens of national and local awards Mathias received over the years, the three he was most proud of were the Amateur Athletic Union's Sullivan Award as the outstanding amateur athlete of the year; becoming a Charter Member of the U.S. Olympic Committee's Hall of Fame; as well as being inducted into the National Hall of Fame in 1974.