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Helen Herring Stephens was the daughter of Bertie Mae Herring and Frank Elmer Stephens, granddaughter of William Thomas Herring and Annie L. Meloy, and great granddaughter of Dabney Carver Herring and Mary Francis Simco. She was born February 3, 1918 in Callaway Co., Missouri, and was my 3rd cousin once removed. | |||||||||||||
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Helen Herring Stephens, was the winner of two gold medals in the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin Germany. The 100 meter dash and the 400 meter relay team. On August 4, 1936, eighteen-year-old Helen Stephens set the Olympic world record for the 100-meter event at 11.5 seconds. Her record stood for twenty-four years until Wilma Rudolph beat it in the 1960 Olympics. On August 9, Stephens was the anchor in the 400-meter relay team that also set a world record time of 46.9 seconds. She received a gold medal for each event. Stephens had fulfilled her childhood dream. She was the fastest woman runner in the world and held that title for 24 years.
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After winning three more U.S. national titles (50 meters, shot put, 200 meters), Stephens retired from competitive track. During her 30-month career, she competed in more than 100 races, winning every one of them. She and Jesse Owens headlined a tour before Stephens moved on to briefly play professional basketball and softball.
Stephens initiated another first in 1938 when she started "The Helen Stephens Olympic Co-Eds," becoming the first woman to create, own and manage a semiprofessional basketball team, which remained active until 1952. During the war, Stephens worked at an aircraft plant in St. Louis before enlisting in the Women’s Reserve of the U.S. Marines. Afterwards, she became a research librarian for the Defense Mapping Agency Aerospace Center in St. Louis. She held this job for thirty years, until her retirement in 1976. During the 1980s, while in her 60s, Stephens returned to competitive track-and-field in senior events, maintaining her perfect record. She enjoyed bowling, golf, and swimming. She competed in multiple events in several Senior Olympics and clocked the fastest speeds and longest distances in her age category. At age sixty-eight, Stephens ran the 100-meter dash in 16.4 seconds, just 4 seconds slower than when she was eighteen. She carried the torch for the first nine Show-Me State Games in Columbia, Missouri, as well as the Senior Olympic games.
Helen was 6 feet tall, her height inherited from the Herring side of the family. She was several inches taller than her father when she was a young teenager. When Stephens entered high school in Fulton, the athletic director discovered her running talent. In 1933, when she was 15 years old, all the students had to run the 50-yard dash in physical education class. The coach, Burton W. Moore, measured her time--an incredible 5.8 seconds. That time matched the current world record set by Elizabeth Robinson. An incredulous Moore went to town and had his watch checked for accuracy by a jeweler, who verified that it was keeping correct time. Moore was astounded but unsure how to handle this prodigy who was not even fully-grown and who seemed to run so easily. In gym class she matched the current women's world record for the standing broad jump, but she loved to run more than anything. Moore decided she would make a good sprinter and began training her for international competition.
The William Woods University Helen Stephens Sports Complex in Fulton, Missouri, was built and named for Helen. There is a book titled "The Fulton Flash" about her life. There are more than a few inacuracies in this book. Physical descriptions of Fulton and where relevent places in the area are many times incorrect. There are several references to my father in the book which are totally inaccurate. The author also seemed to think no one in the county named Herring was any relation to Helen except for her mother and grandparents. The book also assumes that the name Herring must have been from German descent, but it was English. The book is interesting, has a lot of information about things that went on at the 1936 Olympics, but not everything in this book is accurate. Helen Herring Stephens had a very interesting life without the author embelishing and changing some of the facts. Helen Herring Stephens lived in Florissant, Missouri with her partner of 41 years, Mabel Robbe, until Robbe's death in 1986. Helen died January 17, 1994 in St. Louis Missouri. She is buried in Callaway Memorial Gardens, Fulton, Missouri, near her parents graves. | |||||||||||||
