Thursday, April 18, 1968
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
5
Coaches selected 1968 KU Relays referees
Frank Potts, now in his 41st and final season as Colorado track coach, will referee the university division of the 43rd KU Relays.
Following an outstanding career as a pole vaulter at Oklahoma, Potts took the Colorado coaching post in 1927 and he has been there ever since.
Next fall Potts will be one of
KU Relays have a long tradition
The first KU Relays were April 21, 1923. The meet was attended by 790 athletes from 77 universities, colleges and high schools. This year's meet marks the 43rd annual Relays.
Traditionally a "spring homecoming," the Relays were begun through the efforts of Dr. John Outland, a former KU student then in Kansas City; Forrect C. Allen, director of athletics in 1923, and Karl Schlademan, then the track coach.
Outland was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and wanted to create the Kansas Relays to compare with the Penn Relays. Lack of proper facilities made the creation impossible until KU students and alumni built Memorial Stadium. The Relays began.
Since then, the Relays have been held every year with the exception of 1943-45 during World War II. The Relays resumed in 1946 and have been an annual event ever since.
Several activities have traditionally been held in connection with the Relays. The Engineering Exposition is one. Usually attracting almost as large a crowd as the Relays, the Exposition displays the uses of engineering in the world and serves as an open house for the School of Engineering and Architecture.
Another spring homecoming activity was the parade. Begun by track coach Bill Easton, the parade was a joint effort by the various living groups and downtown merchants. Awards were given for the floats. In recent years the parade has not been held.
A Relays queen has always reigned over the track and field meet and related events. She has in the past been announced prior to the Relays weekend, then reigned at the meet, the parade and a dance.
A dance comparable to the Homecoming Dance has been held, often semi-formal. In the last few years, the dance has gone informal and occasionally been free of charge.
In the past, there have been concerts, operas and International Festivals in connection with the Relays.
For years, the Relays were free. Then in 1960, an admission fee had to be charged so the Relays could break even financially. The fee was 50 cents for KU students. The Relays was announced as a financial success.
the assistant coaches of the United States Olympic track team. He was manager of the U.S. team at the 1955 Pan American Games and in 1959 was head coach of the American squad that defeated Russia in the first international track dual ever held in this country.
Potts has coached numerous national champions, including such recent standouts as sprinter Ted Woods, decathlon ace Bill Toomey, vaulter Chuck Rogers and the versatile Don Meyers, who bagged the NCAA long jump in 1961 and the NCAA pole vault the next year.
Meyers is presently Potts' assistant and has been named to succeed the retiring coach at the end of the season.
This will be the second time Potts has refereed the KU Relays. The first time was 1948, the year Michigan's Charles Fonville broke the world record in the shot put and Harrison Dillard of Baldwin-Wallace smashed the world mark in the high hurdles.
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Bruce Drummond, former University of Oklahoma distance star and for the past 12 years track coach at Oklahoma Baptist, will referee the college division of the 43rd annual Kansas Relays.
Drummond has coached several outstanding runners at OBU, including current ace Pat McMahon, twice NAIA national cross-country champion and winner of the KU Relays 10,000 meters two years ago.
Down through the years OBU teams have been strong contenders for honors at the Relays as well as at Texas and Drake, the other stops on the midlands Triple Crown baton circuit.
presently is president of the NAIA Cross Country Coaches Association, chairman of the Oklahoma AAU Track and Field Committee and a member of the National AAU Track and Field Committee.
The 37-year-old Drummond
Last summer he was on the coaching staff of the United States national team that defeated the British Commonwealth at Los Angeles. In 1964 Drummond coached a U.S. squad that toured Europe for meets in Switzerland, Germany, France and Great Britain.
As a competitor at Oklahoma in the early 1950's Drummond won the Glenn Cunningham Mile at the 1953 KU Relays. He also won the open mile at the Texas Relays and broke the conference record in winning the Big Eight outdoor two-mile in 1953.
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Elton Brown, highly successful track coach at Hoisington the past 18 years, will referee the high school division of the 43rd KU Relays.
While at Hoisington Brown's teams have won three state track championships and finished runnerup four times. In addition to coaching track he's also the school's athletic director.
Brown was an outstanding half-
miler for Doc Weede's great Pittsburg State teams in the early 1930s, and sparked the Gorillas to Central Conference track titles all four years he competed—1931-32-33-34.
He was the backbone of Pittsburgh relay teams that won 10 baton titles at the KU Relays during the span. In 1934 he won the National AAU junior 800 meter crown in 1:52.1 and the following day finished second in the senior 800 to world recordholder Ben Eastman.