Bobby Joe Morrow
San Benito, Cameron County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Born in nearby Rangerville to Bob Floyd (1907-1983) and Mattie Lucille (1908-1996) Morrow, Bobby Joe Morrow (1935-2020) grew up in a simple clapboard house on a 600-acre cotton farm. Morrow began running by chasing jackrabbits. He attended San Benito High School where he played football and, in 1951, started competing in track and field. Morrow won state championships in the 100-yard dash (twice) and the 220-yard dash. After high school, he attended Abilene Christian College where he won around 80 sprint championships, including the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) championship in the 100-meter dash when he was a freshman. His coach, Oliver Jackson, said in an interview, "Bobby had fluidity of motion like nothing I've ever seen. He could run a 220 with a root beer float on his head and never spill a drop." During college, he competed in the 1956 Olympic games in Melbourne, Australia. At the age of just 20, he won three gold medals for the 100-meter, 200-meter, and 4x100 meter relay, becoming the first man since fellow American and his personal hero, Jesse Owens (1913-1980), to win all three events. Only two men since Morrow have matched the feat. His Olympic performance also tied the world record for the 200-meter dash with a time of 20.6 seconds. Morrow received international acclaim for the achievement. He went on to set 14 world records and appear on the covers of famous magazines including Life and Sports Illustrated. Morrow is a member of the Texas Sports Hall of Fame, the U.S. Track and Field Hall of Fame and the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame. After not participating in the 1960 Olympics, he returned to the family farm and maintained a quiet life in Texas until his death. (2022)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Born on a cotton farm near Rangerville, Bobby Joe Morrow (1935–2020) grew up chasing jackrabbits and starring in track at San Benito High School before winning some 80 sprint titles at Abilene Christian College. At the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, the 20-year-old took three gold medals in the 100-meter, 200-meter, and 4x100 relay—the first man since his hero Jesse Owens to sweep those events. He set 14 world records and graced the covers of Life and Sports Illustrated before returning to a quiet life on the family farm.
Why it matters
Morrow's rise from a South Texas cotton farm to Olympic immortality is a signature American story of talent, humility, and homecoming.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Bobby Joe Morrow
- · Oliver Jackson
- · Jesse Owens
Related events
- · 1956 Melbourne Olympics
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Getsemani Presbyterian Church
San Benito, TX
As Mexican immigrants settled the new town of San Benito in the early 1900s, Presbyterian families among them organized the Mexican Presbyterian Church of San Benito in 1911, led by missionary and teacher Anne E. Dysart, who had fled the Mexican Revolution and opened a school. The congregation built its first church in 1912 and joined the Presbyterian Church of the U.S.A. in 1919. Renamed 2nd Presbyterian in 1961 and Getsemani Presbyterian in 1979, it has long run food banks, clothing closets, English classes, and outreach missions.
St. Benedict's Church
San Benito, TX
The first St. Benedict's Church rose in 1910, two years before the congregation became a parish, but fire destroyed it in 1923. This brick church replaced it in 1925 under Father Yvo Tymen, O.M.I., who led the parish from 1921 to 1937 and also oversaw a rectory and the repair of school buildings damaged by a 1933 hurricane. The church reflects the Catholic institutions that took root in the Rio Grande Valley's boom years.
San Benito Bank and Trust Company
San Benito, TX
Chartered in 1908, just a year after San Benito was founded, this bank was started by brothers W. Scott and Alba Heywood. In 1911 it moved into this Spanish Colonial Revival building, whose second floor held offices and the city library, organized here in 1914. Flags flown from the building even warned area farmers of coming bad weather, making it a hub of Rio Grande Valley town life.
A.C. Purvis House
San Benito, TX
When Albanus Clemens Purvis came from Ohio to the Rio Grande Valley seeking better health, San Benito was little more than a town on paper with no Anglo-American residents. He became its first justice of the peace, sold real estate, and farmed, while his daughters taught the town's first school in 1907 and served as an early postmaster. In 1911 the former mill owner built this house, which has remained in his family's hands ever since.