She and her long-passed husband, Irving. But especially her.
Gladys Moses provided the guiding light and shining example for her son Edwin — the Olympic gold medal hurdler, two-time world champion, accomplished scholar and now globe-touring social Samaritan — and his two brothers, Irving Jr. and Vincent, right up until her death Sunday morning.
Her son said she passed away in her sleep at home in Trotwood. She was 87.
“She was like a superstar,” Edwin said Monday afternoon from his home in Atlanta.
You could say it takes one to know one and he certainly fits the bill.
He was undefeated in the 400-meter hurdles for 10 straight years, winning 122 straight races, taking gold medals at the 1976 and 1984 Olympic Games — and likely would have won gold at the Moscow Olympics in 1980 had the U.S. not boycotted. He ended his long reign with a bronze at the 1988 Seoul Olympics.
ESPN named him one of the 50 greatest sports figures of the 20th century. Back here at home — he grew up on Kimberly Circle in West Dayton and graduated from Fairview High School in 1973 — the city renamed a pair of streets Edwin C. Moses Boulevard.
And yet, when the praise comes his way, he often defers to his mom.
Gladys and Irving were both longtime educators with the Dayton Public Schools, so it was natural they stressed education with their boys.
“It always was about learning how to take care of yourself in the world, that’s why we stressed academics,” Gladys once explained to me. “In the summer our three boys had to read at least 10 books each, that or go to summer school in the mornings.
“If they knew the importance of education, they’d realize it would take them further than anything else. Kids have to know what’s in their reach. They have to know they have a better chance to be an astronaut, engineer or doctor than they do an NBA star.”
Edwin would embrace that concept, going to Morehouse College in Atlanta, where he had a 3.85 grade-point average and earned of a B.S. in physics. He later got his and a master’s degree in business administration at Pepperdine University.
His dad, Edwin said, was a Tuskegee Airman and he passed on his military training to his boys. By the time he was 10, Edwin said he knew how to press his pants and shirt and shine his shoes so they would pass military inspection.
“We were expected to work as well,” he said. “I had a newspaper route and my mom would take me along to Head Start to be a volunteer.”
Once a week, one of the boys would cook breakfast.
“Our boys took turns with the meals and on Saturdays it was a big deal for them to make us breakfast in bed,” Gladys once explained with a laugh as she reflected on some of their waffle, egg and sausage offerings.
Gladys and Irving also passed on a social awareness, Edwin said:
“I remember they were involved with the Board of Education when it had discussions about school busing and integration. I remember they had meetings over at our house and I’d listen in on the conversations at our dinner table. It was a very diverse crowd who thought the schools should be diversified, too.”
Sports after his book work was finished was a big part of Edwin’s life and along with his own participation, his parents made sure he met some sports heroes who transcended their games, guys like Jesse Owens and Jackie Robinson.
And then there were the boxing gloves. Brotherly disputes were handled in the backyard, Gladys once told me.
Not always, Edwin said Monday.
“We used to box in the kitchen,” he laughed. “We’d put the kitchen timer on for two minutes and then the three of us boys would beat each other up until the timer went off.”
‘An Olympic Mama’
Over the years, Gladys used to send me notes or call me, telling me what Edwin was doing, commenting on something I’d written or suggesting someone she thought might make a good story.
That was the case four years ago when she introduced me to Antonio Blanks, a former Dunbar High hurdler who was then an Ohio State freshman and had just qualified for the U.S. Olympic Trials before the London Games.
They went to the same church — Bethel Baptist — and when she learned he was a hurdler she began to take an interest in him. He was 20, she was 83, but that didn’t deter her.
Eventually she’d hook him up by phone with her son, but that was after she had been mentoring him: suggesting everything from training regimens to telling him what his weight should be in order to bolster his endurance.
“I saw him kind of grow up in our church and he seems to be a nice, honest, pleasant young man who listens to you,” Gladys said at the time. “I know he’s embracing academics and athletics, so I’m in his corner. I talked to him like he was my own son.”
Antonio listened, but not just because he was being kind to his elders.
Gladys was into track and field.
“She actually was a runner herself in college at Kentucky State,” Edwin said Monday.
She has subscribed to US Track and Field News since 1976 and once told me she read it religiously — cover to cover — each month.
“Even after I retired she used to go on the tours,” Edwin said. “She went to Japan, to Greece, to the world championships and the Olympics. She had a group of friends she’d always connect with and she was like a superstar. She was an Olympic Mama.”
Smart, influential
After she retired from Dayton Public Schools, Gladys made her mark in a variety of other ways.
“She was the first woman trustee at Bethel Baptist, the first deaconess in the history of the church,” Edwin said.
He said the trait that stands out most about her was her compassion:
“She was very compassionate. I’ve met so many people she adopted along the way. They became like sons and daughters. I meet middle-age women now who talk about how influential she was in their lives, how smart she was and how much she cared about them.”
And then there was her own family. Along with her three sons, she is survived by her sister Nettie and three grandchildren, Erin, Darren and Julius.
Her funeral arrangements are not finalized. Edwin said she donated her body to the anatomy department at Wright State’s Boonshoft School of Medicine, where she volunteered.
“We’ll have a memorial service sometime before Easter,” he said.
As for him, he’s now chairman of the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) and chairman of the board of Laureus World Sports Academy Sport for Good Foundation, the London- and New York-based charity that funds and promotes sports worldwide as a tool for social change.
Over the years through the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation, he has tackled such social issues as youth homelessness, HIV and AIDS awareness in South Africa, landmine injuries in Cambodia, discrimination in Germany, orphaned children in Peru, street violence in the United States — some 100 projects in six continents.
And much of it reflects back to his mom.
“She’s the one who made this a success story,” he once told me. “She’s the one who gave me the lessons I now try to pass on.”
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