GBTC Remembers 1975! By Jeff Benjamin
To the younger and within the go Boston School college students, the gathering of bunch of older folks within the Athletic recreation corridor might sound trivial and of no consequence.
But it surely certainly was not.
A grand gathering final Thursday harkened again reminiscences of the late 1970’s, when this group of people comprised not solely America’s, however the WORLD’S GREATEST Distance Operating Staff.
The Higher Boston Monitor Membership (GBTC)!
The legendary Invoice Rodgers and Wheelchair pioneer Bob Corridor have been the key honorees on their fiftieth Anniversary ground-breaking performances that fateful April day. However the corridor was additionally full of a who’s who of hardcore devoted and proficient distance runners, all who honed their abilities underneath the late nice coach Invoice Squires.
Names like Mark Duggan, Bobby Hodge, Dick Mahoney, Freddie Doyle, Jack McDonald, Dave McGillvray, Jim Roy, Invoice Babcock, Doug Simonton, Bob Flamigetti, John Ellis, John Berit, Dan Ricciato and others of native working lore joined in for the salutes.
Additionally becoming a member of the gathering was 1968 Boston Champ Amby Burfoot & 1976 Boston Champ Jack Fultz.
One of many Sport’s nice chroniclers, Paul Clerici, attended as properly.
“For those who go searching this room,” Rodgers stated, “Lots of them ran 100 miles per week in coaching every!”
In 1979, that coaching led to a global exhibiting, as seen by these Boston Marathon outcomes :
The performances of Rodgers (1st), Hodge (third) Randy Thomas (eighth) and Mahoney (tenth) confirmed a membership depth which has been hardly ever seen.
As chronicled by THE Boston Marathon historian and GBTC member Tom Dederian in his masterpiece ebook “Boston Marathon” :
“Not solely did the Higher Boston Monitor Membership beat all the opposite golf equipment entered within the race, they beat all the opposite nations!”
“We had enjoyable,” stated Rodgers about these occasions. “We had a real brotherhood of men.”
Everybody agree it was due to Coach Squires.
“My dad talked to all of us right here not solely about working however about our different pursuits and what we’d do in our lives,” stated son Invoice Squires Jr.
“There was a real feeling of caring like household.”
And it’s nonetheless there!
