As you will read this web log you will become acquainted with how "The Running in America Coalition" concept came into being. As previously stated, it started with a flooded 'track' at one of two middle schools in Alexandria, Virginia. This requires a little explanation, cause it's a little complicated.
Alexandria, Virginia is located directly outside of Washington, D.C. (in fact it was part of the original boundaries of the Pierre Charles L'Enfant plan for the nation's capitol.) It is a city of 140,000 and its high school was made famous in the movie "Remember the Titans" staring Denzel Washington. Racial tension were present in Alexandria, Virginia, but they were significantly embellished for the movie. T.C. Williams High School saw the integration of black and white students when it opened in the fall of 1965, not in 1971, when the movie is based. By then many of the racial barriers had already fallen. What is lesser known is that T.C. Williams resulted in the consolidation of three of the city's high schools.
Alexandria City, like most southern towns, had separate schools for blacks and whites. Parker-Gray, established in 1920, relocated and improved in 1950, was the "black" school, and George Washington was the "white" school. In 1956 Francis Hammond High School opened on the city's Westside to accommodate increasing white student enrollment. Remember that three years earlier the 1954 Brown vs the Board of Education overturn the legal basis for separate school for blacks and whites. Alexandria resisted until 1959, until a legal ruling forced the schools to finally begin integrating.
Beginning in 1959 and continuing into the early 1960's integration grudgingly, and mostly peacefully, came to Alexandria. T.C. Williams High School opened in 1965, and Parker-Gray was torn down (although the school's building and running track barely fifteen years old, were reportedly in fine condition). In 1971 Hammond mostly white and George Washington recently integrated merged into T.C. Williams following a important Supreme Court decision involving busing (Swann v Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education).
The three schools merged into one T.C. Williams High School. The former Hammond and George Washington High Schools were converted into middle schools. In early 2000 renovations at the former middle schools eliminated the running racks at the schools (they were used as convenient staging areas for the construction). The running tracks were not restored were construction was finished. Meanwhile, construction began at the new T.C. Williams High School, and guess where they used as a staging area- the running track. So, for three years a city that once had four running tracks, now had none. I told you it was complicated.
The new T.C Williams school opened in the fall of 2008 returning a running track to the city. But a city with a once proud track and field tradition ( they were state champions indoors and outdoors in the early 1990) was grossly underserved- especially the children.
In about 2005, I began agitating for the restoration of the running tracks at the middle schools to serve both a community need, but also to combat what I understand as the advancing blight of childhood obesity rooted in expanding sedentary lifestyles.
And so The Running in Alexandria Coalition (TRAC)- membership of one, was begun. I figured the same arguments I was making for Alexandria applied to all of the entire country, so if you're going to do, it do it big, and The Running in America Coalition has begun . . . please join in.
For further information the Parker-Gray High School high school history click here, for T.C Williams Titans click here. A good sumary of the school can be found here. The offical site is here.
