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University Daily Kansan, April 16, 1982
Wes Santee, show. here running in Memorial Stadium in the early 50s, was a dreetime NCAA champion during his years at KU. Santee is now president of an insurance company in Lawrence.
"Looks good, Feels good"
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Santee remembers triumphs, frustrations
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of the race. Santee had to run the whole distance.
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OPEN SATURDAY TIL NOON LOCATED AT THE END OF THE AUTO PLAZA
While most of the 12- and 13-year-old boys seemed intimidated by the distance, one of them, tall and lanky for his age, his muscles and endurance strengthened by hours of hard work on rock, 400-acre cattle work, wasn't bothered.
He suitably battened on his cocky face. Santée had a reason to be cozy after winning 29 straight mile races while competing for Ashland High, including smashing Glenn Cunningham in Kansas state high school record of 4:28.4 by rumor, and being named KU and immediately established himself as one of the country's premier miler.
On a warm, windy spring day on the plains of western Kansas several years ago, the track coach from Ashland High School went to the town grade school to assess his future talent. To see what kind of distance runners he could have, he made some of the boys run from the school to a distant grain elevator and back.
BUT WHILE Santee readily admits to being a success both as an athlete and a businessman, he still puts it all in perspective.
distance. He still beat them by 200 yards.
The Ashland Antelope was off and running.
"I've enjoyed the limelight," he said. "But I never felt that I was cockey. I might be a better runner than you are. I know more about selling insurance than you, but that doesn't make me a better person."
THE BOY was right. He won the race.
"I said big deal," he recalled many years later. "I knew I'd win because I had the stamina to do it better than anybody else could."
After setting several new freshman records, he won the NCAA outdoor 5,000-meter championship in 1952, his first varsity year. The following year, he won his first NCAA mile title in 4:03.7, leading the Jayhawks to their first national cross country title. All in all, he won the Big Seven indoor and outdoor mile titles all three years he competed for KU.
Soon the name Wes Santee would become a household word all over the country and the world, as a self-confidence beard as a teenager in Ashland, Santée, 50,
went on to become one of the great names in track and field, as well as a successful businessman, Marine Corps Colonel and controversial figure.
This word was used most frequently by sports writers and others describing the brash young miler going to KU in 1984, when he joined him the "Dizzy Dean of the cinders."
Most successful people, athletes in particular, usually downplay their achievements. Mention a successful athlete in your essay and they shrug it off or say, "oh it was nothing."
But not Wes Santee. He was good and not afraid to admit it.
THE WALLES of his spacious, wood-paneled office at the Hays-Richardson-Santee Insurance Agency, of which he was the chief officer of him during his glory days at KU. On a table behind his desk, underneath the Marine Corps emblem hanging conspicuously above his chair, is a plaque bearing the name of his track and Field Hall of Fame in 1975.
"This young man," said one writer, "is cocky to the point of exasperation, but he can run. At the drop of a pencil, Santee predicts he will run the four-minute mile 'probably within a year or so.'"
NOT EVEN his fraternity brothers at the Acacia house could keep him in line. In an effort to cut him down to size, they challenged him to a race from Tonganoca to Lawrence—a distance of about 14 miles. But there was one catch; his 28 brothers were running a relay, with each one running only a part
But, mostly, there are pictures—pictures of the champion relay teams an anchored in the 1950s. Pictures of the NCAA cross country champion team of 1953, KU's first-ever cross country championship. And lots of pictures with celebrities. Esther Williams. Ed Sullivan. And a personal favorite of his, an autographed picture of him with then-president Richard Nixon.
you've arrived when you make the "25 years ago" columns and the crossword puzzles," he said.
"I kid people when I'm out speaking by telling them that you know when
BUT WHAT made Santee a household word in the early 1950s was his quest for the four-minute mile. Although he failed to win a medal at the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki, where he competed in the 5,000 meters, he continued himself as one of the top contenders to shatter the elusive barrier.
In 1953, Santee set his first world See SANTEE page 8
FRANK SEURER
KANSAS UNIVERSITY
KELLY KNIGHT
DEON HOGAN
'82 - '83 ALL-SPORTS SEASON TICKET SALE
MON., APRIL 19-
WED., APRIL 21
in front of WESCOE HALL
FREE T-SHIRT TO FIRST 1,000 TICKET PURCHASERS.
9:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m.
—K.U. I.D.s REQUIRED—
Includes These K.U. Home Events:
BASKETBALL-ALL 14 GAMES*
FOOTBALL-ALL 6 GAMES*
TRACK-KANSAS RELAYS
(REGULAR SEASON GAMES ONLY—DOES NOT INCLUDE PRE OR POST-SEASON GAMES)
TICKET PRICE—$45.00
HOW IT WORKS:
— Receipts will be issued to purchasers. The ticket office will have copies if you lose your receipt over the summer.
Tickets may be picked up next fall according to the SR., JR., Soph. Fresh. schedule.
Allen Field House Student Seating is limited to 7,000. Therefore, Basketball-Only Student Season Tickets will be available only if less than 7,000 All-Sports Tickets are sold.
BLOCK SEATING in Football will be available by turning your receipts in together next fall.
Football-Only Student Season Tickets go on sale next fall.
—For more information—contact
ATHLETIC TICKET OFFICE
ALLEN FIELD HOUSE
864-3141