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All American: The Rise and Fall of Jim Thorpe

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As the youngest son of Jim Thorpe, I want to thank Bill Crawford for finally bringing out the truth in writing as to what happened to our father. For years our family and others have tried to clear his name. Much still needs to be done. Although his Gold Medals from the 1912 Olympics have been returned, dad is only named co-winner. His trophys from the games are still held by the IOC.

Mr. Crawford writes a wonderfull book. But,there is still a lack of understanding of the Indian culture,and what took place in the Indian School System during the early years of the last century, the Indian were not citizens of the United States and held on legal status. Dad did what he was told to do and suffered for his lack of knowledge and having no legal support.

As a family, we still want his name fully cleared and his full honors returned. Then the day would come when he can be put to rest.

All American: The Rise And Fall Of Jim Thorpe is the biography of one of the greatest athletes of the twentieth century - who was also at the center of one of the greatest scandals. Jim Thorpe was a grand football running back, a proud Native American, a college player who led his Carlisle Indian Industrial School team to victory, and the winner of gold medals for the decathlon and the pentathlon at the 1912 Olympic Games. Yet a scandal ensued over whether he was truly worthy of "amateur" sports status, whether playing in certain professional ball games required that he be stripped of his titles. The scandal dragged his reputation through the mud and left a black mark on his life, even though he would go on to play professional baseball and become president of what would one day be the National Football League. All American is the candid portrayal of a courageous and dedicated athlete, and one who was essentially used as a guinea pig to determine the rules - who is an amateur, and who is a pro, and what amateurs and pros are allowed to do or not do. Enjoyable in its own right, All American is a welcome addition to prominent Native American biography collections, and highly recommended for American sports history shelves.

This book provides the most detailed history yet of America's greatest athlete. In an era where athletes could not enhance their performance with drugs, Jim Thorpe was clearly, naturally the best. Bill Crawford's detailed account of Thorpe's life leaves no doubt in my mind. I am amazed by the amount of information Crawford provides on Thorpe as well as other athletes of the time. The history he provides of Carlisle and the Indian school system in general illustrates how poorly the BIA and the US government treated Indians. "All American: The Rise and Fall of Jim Thorpe" should be required reading for all BIA officials as well as strongly recommended reading for others in government. Certainly student athletes and athletic officials would enjoy and learn from it.

Bill Crawford's "All American: The Rise and Fall of Jim Thorpe" is a well crafted, insightful and poignant portrait of one of the 20th century's greatest athletes. That alone would be sufficient to give it all-star status among the scores of sports books published in recent years. "All American," however, is far more than that because paints a unique and compelling picture of "amateur" intercollegiate athletics in its infancy and thereby helps us to understand behemoth that it has become today.

Jim Thorpe's story has been told in other biographies as well as in a grade B movie. Crawford's contribution is its investigation of the complex relationship between Thorpe and his legendary coach, Glenn "Pop" Warner - the same Pop Warner who is the namesake of the youth football leagues that are supposed to instill in young men the spirit and ideals of honest and fair competition. Yet, as early as the first decade of the century, Warner, the football coach at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, was earning more than his school's president, was recruiting "student athletes" who were far more athlete than student and was disbursing under the table cash. Although Warner won the trust and loyalty of Thorpe, he ultimately betrayed him by denying that he knew that he had played semi-pro baseball for petty cash. As a consequence, the Amateur Athletic Union and the American Olympic Committee ruled that Thorpe had compromised his amateur status and stripped him of his 1912 Olympic medals. In fact, Crawford makes clear, Warner not only was aware of what Thorpe had been doing in football's off-season, he most likely made the arrangements.

"All American: The Rise and Fall of Jim Thorpe" should be required reading for anyone wishing to gain a perspective on the sports scandals du jour. It's an important book and a great compliment to the daily sports section.

Bill Crawford has written a fairly thorough and detailed account of Jim Thorpe, without a doubt the greatest athlete of the 20th Century. Mr. Crawford, however, fell short when relating, on pages 231-232, Thorpe's passing and eventual burial. At his death he was brought back to Shawnee, Oklahoma, by his family. He was NOT BURIED, as Mr. Crawford states, but his body lay in the mausoleum at Fairview Cemetery. Many local people visited the site in respect, myself included. During the months his body rested there several prominent citizens began work on a project to build a permanent monument for him. Designs for a burial place and a museum were developed and funds began to be raised. Preliminary plans were to put it between the football and baseball field on the west side of town. However, before the total could be raised and the plans finalized Thorpe's body disappeared, literally, in the middle of the night - much to the surprise of his family and to Shawnee citizens. It was a terrible disappointment. In 1949, on one of his trips back to Oklahoma, he had stated that he was born May 28, 1888 "near and south of Bellemont - Pottawatomie County - along the banks of North Fork River . . hope this will clear up the inquiries as to my birthplace", signed Jim Thorpe. (Bellemont was on the county line between Pottawatomie and Lincoln counties, 8 miles off Hwy 18 - Shawnee is the county seat of Pottawatomie County and about 11 miles from the site). Thus, Shawnee citizens were very proud to be known as the home of the greatest athlete of all time. When the town didn't get to be the resting place of Thorpe's body it was decided to name the football stadium in his honor anyway, and it's known as Jim Thorpe Stadium to this day. It was surprising to read in Mr. Crawford's book that "Shawnee refused to erect a memorial for her husband". It just wasn't so and a little further research on his part, maybe perusing copies of the Shawnee News-Star in the local library. Also, just a few years ago (haven't been out there in a while), there was a marker on the vault at Fairview describing that was where Jim Thorpe's body had lain.

All American: The Rise and Fall of Jim Thorpe is an interesting biography of the greatest athlete of the 20th Century, albeit with some flaws. Thorpe, a Sac and Fox Indian, grew up on a reservation with a tough father and mother. He was placed in a number of boarding schools and kept running away but did finally wind up in his early teens at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The boarding school, dedicated to the education and acculturation of Indian youth into white society, is where Thorpe came under the tutelage of Glen Scobey "Pop" Warner who helped coach and guide him in track and football. Thorpe's biggest claim to fame was the infamous gold medals he won in the pentathlon and decathlon in the 1912 Olympics, thereafter being proclaimed the greatest athlete in the world. He was also a football star for the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, helping the team beat such notable gridiron institutions such as Harvard, Penn, and Army.

While at Carlisle Jim Thorpe played "summer baseball" being paid to play on semi-professional baseball teams in North Carolina. Thorpe had a limited source of income from his holdings in Oklahoma so made a little spending money playing baseball in the summer. It was a very common practice for college athletes at the time. Given the choice of making money doing hard labor on a farm or playing ball it wasn't a tough choice. Unfortunately this created a huge scandal because of the odious Olympic definition of "amateur athlete" and Thorpe was stripped of his medals after being sold out (according to Crawford) by Pop Warner and James Sullivan, the head of the Amateur Athletic Union that controlled the Olympics in America. These medals were later reinstated long after Thorpe's death.

In addition to being a biography of Thorpe and telling us a bit about his early life and his athletic career at Carlisle, the book has a theme, and that is the exploitation of amateur athletes, like Thorpe. Amateur athletics bring in large amounts of money for coaches, schools, and hangers on, money that is made on the athletic prowess of these "amateur athletes." Meanwhile the athletes themselves get nothing (or maybe a little under the table) and in fact their lives are carefully controlled by those profiting from their efforts. The last chapter is an indictment, somewhat, of the Olympics and National Collegiate Athletic Association NCAA) and the exploitation of college and amateur athletes.

Overall this is a fine book providing a clear picture of Jim Thorpe, Pop Warner, and the real situation around Thorpe being unfairly stripped of his Olympic medals. The primary flaw of the book is it covers very little of Thorpe's professional athletic career in football and baseball, which was disappointing. And it is also a bit stilted in writing style. These are minor flaws as the entire work is definitely worth reading.

As the New Millenium approached, ESPN ran a provocative series on the fifty top athletes of the 20th century. It was slick, well-researched and thoughtful. It was a tough assignment, and left the network open to second guessers.

In my opinion, Jim Thorpe should have been named Athlete of the Century hands down. He was a crossover star in College football, he dominated the 1912 Olympiad, played Major League Baseball, and came back to play football until the age of 42. He was All-American, but also the first household name sports star.

This book does a nice job in painting a picture of the life and times of the athlete in the early 20th century. Of the role of the coach, Pop Warner, a legend himself, and the prejudices faced by the native American, of which Thorpe was one.

It also explained how the athlete of the time was exploited to make big money for the Institution he played for, a system which has evolved, and continues to the present.

Where the book falls short is in really getting to know the subject. While his exploits are chronicled comprehensively, there really is little explanation of who Thorpe really was. What was his motivation? What did he really care about? What was his passion and/or beliefs?

As with many biographies, this book also goes sketchy with details after Thorpe retired from football. Only ten pages or so cover the last twenty two years of his life. While the reader can surmise these years were a struggle for him. I would have liked detail on what he did to survive, how did he spend his years and how he was recieved by the public. It is difficult when writing about someone who has been gone for many years, as there are few if any slive sources to speak to.

Having said that, I found this book very readable. It is an excellent subject, and I now know much more about Jim Thorpe than before I read the book. A recommended read.

Jim Thorpe was an American icon to several generations, and new generations will discover him through this.