<P> Wilma Glodean Rudolph (June 23, 1940--November 12, 1994) was an American sprinter from Clarksville, Tennessee, who became a world - record - holding Olympic champion and international sports icon in track and field following her successes in the 1956 and 1960 Olympic Games . Rudolph competed in the 200 - meter dash and won a bronze medal in the 4 × 100 - meter relay at the 1956 Summer Olympics at Melbourne, Australia . She also won three gold medals in the 100 - and 200 - meter individual events and the 4 x 100 - meter relay at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, Italy . Rudolph was acclaimed the fastest woman in the world in the 1960s and became the first American woman, and the first African American woman, to win three gold medals in a single Olympic Games . Due to the worldwide television coverage of the 1960 Summer Olympics, Rudolph became an international star along with other Olympic athletes such as Cassius Clay (later known as Muhammad Ali), Oscar Robertson, and Rafer Johnson who competed in Italy . </P> <P> As an Olympic champion in the early 1960s, Rudolph was among the most highly visible black women in America and abroad . She became a role model for black and female athletes and her Olympic successes helped elevate women's track and field in the United States . Rudolph is also regarded as a civil rights and women's rights pioneer . In 1962 Rudolph retired from competition at the peak of her athletic career as the world record - holder in the 100 - and 200 - meter individual events and the 4 × 100 - meter relay . After competing in the 1960 Summer Olympics, the 1963 graduate of Tennessee State University became an educator and coach . Rudolph and her achievements are memorialized in a variety of tributes, including a U.S. postage stamp, documentary films, and a made - for - television movie, as well as in numerous publications, especially books for young readers . </P> <P> Rudolph was born prematurely at 4.5 pounds (2.0 kg) on June 23, 1940, in Saint Bethlehem, Tennessee (now part of Clarksville, TN). Rudolph, who was born into poverty in the racially segregated South, was the twentieth of twenty - two siblings from her father's two marriages . Shortly after Wilma's birth, her family moved to Clarksville, Tennessee, where she grew up and attended elementary and high school . Her father, Ed, who worked as a railway porter and did odd jobs in Clarksville, died in 1961; her mother, Blanche, worked as a maid in Clarksville homes and died in 1994 . </P> <P> Rudolph suffered from several early childhood illnesses, including pneumonia and scarlet fever, and contracted infantile paralysis (caused by the polio virus) at the age of four . She recovered from polio, but lost strength in her left leg and foot . Physically disabled for much of her early life, Rudolph wore a leg brace until she was eight years old . Because there was little medical care available to African American residents of Clarksville in the 1940s, Rudolph's parents sought treatment for her at the historically black Meharry Medical College (now Nashville General Hospital at Meharry) in Nashville, Tennessee, about 50 miles (80 km) from Clarksville . </P>

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