Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1908-07-29
HISTORIC RACE
HAS ITS REPLICA
MODERN MARATHON. RUN
THRILLS THOUSANDS IN
OLYMPIC STADIUM.
ITALIAN LEADER SINKS AT THE
GOAL AND AMERICAN
is WINNER.
EXHAUSTED RUNNER cHEERED
BY MULTITUDE AS HERO
OF THE DAY.

London. July 25.-It would be no
exaggeration in the minds of any of
the 100000 spectators who witnessed
the finishing struggle of the Marathon
race at the Olympian arena yesterday
TO say it was the most thrilling ath-
Ietic event that has occurred since
the Marathon race in ancient Greece,
when the victor fell at the goal and
with wave of triumph died.
Veteran athletes of Europe, Amer
lea, Africa and Australia, who have
seen the greatest struggles of every
sort on land and water for athletic
supremacy, declared there was no.
thing comparative to the great race
of yesterday within their memories
or in other Olympiads since the mod
eTn cycle of these began.
It was a spectacle the like of which
no one living had ever seen and none
who saw it expect ever to see re-
peated The race itself. with So of
the best men winnowed from the run,
ners of four continents; the arena
where it was finished in the presence
of an enormous cosmopolitan assem-
blage, with the queen of England,
royal representative of several ma
tions, and hosts of finely dressed
-77sen and women from the most fash.
NNble circles of Europe, as we'll as
eeveAal thousands of Americans, and
me fanatic and exciting denouement
ST The end combined to make his
toric day It~~las an American day
and the resentmenJs of Thursday,
which ranked strongly in the breasts
of the Americans here when they
came to the stadium yesterday, were
forgotten, not only in the victory of
John f. Hayes, the Irish American
Athletic club runner, but in the splen-
did records made by other Americans
who were well. to the front in the
line OF those that flushed.
England Thought Twas a cinch.
Since the beginning of the Olympic
games great rivalry has been between
England and America, and while min
or competitions On track and field, In
which the two nations specialized,
were fought out, the Englishmen con-
soled themselves for all American sue
cesses by the thought that IN the do
main of long distance running they
always had been supreme, and what
ever prizes they failed to grasp in
this the colonists would pick up. The
SEQUEL may be told briefly. Six Amer
leans started in the Marathon race
and nine English runners. OF the
first 10 men to reach the coveted goal,
four were Americans, and they are
officially placed as follows:
Hayes, first; Joseph Forshaw, Mis-
souri, A. c., third A. R. Welton. Law
renee Y. M. c. -, fourth; Lewis Te-
Wilma. Carlisle Indian. ninth, The
second man was Hefferon, south
African. The first Englishman who
crossed was w T. Clarke, who came
in 18th.
Triumph for America.
IT is considered generally that the
race was not only triumph for the
United states. but, in larger sense
ser America, because seven of the
leaders at the end were from North
America. The three Canadians, Wood,
the Indian: Simpson and Lawson, fin
ished fifth, sixth and seventh respect
lively. and with the representatives OF
the United States deprived England
of its claim to the long distance run
ming branch of athletics.
Days Hero an Italian.
It will not snatch any laurels from
the brow of Hayes, who won a good
race. to say the hero of the day was
an Italian, Dorando. The admiration
and sympathy of every person in the
stadium went out to the gallant Ital-
an. who. although he I'D not win,
deserved to win and did more within
the limit of his powers than any other
man who ran. The crisis in battle
on which the fife of a nation hung
could hardly have been more impress
sive than Dorando's entrance into the
stadium. Ten minutes before the
megaphone announced, ''the runners
are in sight, guns had proclaimed the
arrival of the leaders at the nearest
station of the course Intense silence
overhung the stadium while thou