The Princeton Mile

When the landscapist was laying out the football field in Princeton's Palmer Stadium in 1914. he decided that the sides of the field should be banked, started grading by digging a deep marginal moat. Belatedly it was pointed out that the proposed embankment would be dangerous to footballers forced out of bounds. Thereupon, the moat was turned into a cinder track whose unusual depth of ballast surprised one & all by providing a remarkably springy surface. Thus an accident accounts for what many a runner considers the world's fastest track, a smooth, black 440-yd. oval on which in the past two years two successive world's records for the mile have been set.

No accident but a fine piece of respectable pressagentry accounts for the prestige of the Princeton Invitation Track Meet, most notable event of its sort to be founded since the War. After swift William Robert ("Bonny") Bonthron (Class of 1934) turned Princeton's eyes once more to track & field events, Graduate Manager Asa Smith Bushnell and freckled, good-natured Publicity Director Frederick Spring Osborne hit upon the idea of staging a post-season track meet in Palmer Stadium for the elite. So well was the idea promoted that no less than 40,000 spectators turned up in the concrete horseshoe one blistering afternoon last week to see the second annual Princeton Invitation Track Meet.

Those who came to see records smashed were disappointed. Yale's slim Keith Spalding Brown, who holds the world's indoor pole-vaulting record, was outsoared by Southern California's William Graber in a vault-off. Sam Allen of Oklahoma Baptist came nearest to setting a world mark. Over the 120-yd. high hurdles two reserve and one regular timer caught him at 14.1 sec., a tenth of a second better than the record. Unfortunately for Allen, the other two regular timers averaged 14.3 sec.

But no lack of records could dampen the excitement of the last of the six events, the mile race contested by four young men from both sides of the world who have been individually chasing each other to fabulous marks for the past three years but who had never before met collectively. In the eight times that Princeton's Bonthron, Glenn Cunningham of Kansas and Gene Venzke of Pennsylvania have raced together, Cunningham has come home in front five times, Bonthron thrice. Bon-thron meantime has had a separate series with John Edward Lovelock, the little New Zealand medical student with a collection of blazers from Otago, Oxford and London Universities. With Lovelock, Bonthron has come out on top only once in four races. At Princeton in 1933 Lovelock lowered the world record to 4 min., 7.6 sec. Thereupon Cunningham at Princeton last year dropped it to 4 min., 6.7 sec. Princeton's enthusiastic Coach Matt Geis looked to Lovelock to do something even more extraordinary last week. "Bonthron and I expect he will be able to do 4:05," said he.

Although in England the race aroused greater sporting interest than the Baer-Braddock fight punctilious, curly-haired Jack Lovelock was making no promises. "My condition does not displease me," he admitted. But he deplored anticipating records on the ground that "it might stimulate too high a degree of expectancy in the public." He said he preferred the "British race": beat the other fellows and let the records go hang.

As the gun banged, Cunningham sped out in front of the quartet. By the first quarter they were dogging each other in Indian file. At the half they spread in echelon, Cunningham in the lead. A slow third quarter saw Venzke trailing and by the time the gun rang out for the last lap it looked as if the long office hours in a Manhattan accounting firm were going to put Bonthron out of the race. Then things began to happen. Sailing down the home stretch with his mincing gait, Jack Lovelock stepped a full eight yards out in front of Cunningham, whose stocky figure suddenly went dead beat. Thereupon, "Bonny" Bonthron began pumping his hairy legs like pistons, passed Cunningham too. But by that time Lovelock had crossed the tape. Time: 4 min., 11.2 sec., no record.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.