One Hundred Ten Years Running on the Banks of the Red Cedar
A Social History of Michigan State University Cross Country
This one-of-a-kind book set tells the amazing story of the program that founded, hosted, and nurtured the NCAA Men’s Cross Country Championship during the Great Depression and helped pioneer women’s intercollegiate cross country in the wake of Title IX. All that and everything that happened before and since!
This Spartan cross country caricature from MSC’s 1942 yearbook was included in honor of Michigan State’s historically most successful varsity sport.
Book Set Contents
A central thesis of this five-volume book set is that Michigan State was integral in establishing and shaping intercollegiate cross country competitions in the United States. Michigan State played the dominant role in nationalizing men’s intercollegiate cross country and a key role in establishing women’s cross country. This book endeavors to tell the story of every race comprising Michigan State University’s long and proud cross country history. In addition to focusing on great teams, athletes and coaches, the goal is to produce a history filled with human interest stories and some sense of the role that running played prior to athletes’ college careers, during their time at MSU and (for most) after they left campus. The book set includes 20 history-focused chapters and 18 social science-focused interludes. Distinctions between the history-focused and social science components are permeable.
The book set contains race-by-race accounts dating from 1907 through 2021. Because sport does not occur in a vacuum, these stories are infused with notes of broader historic and social interest. Often that broader coverage is included to provide context for the lived experiences of athletes and coaches, but a number of intersections and interactions are explored wherein team members play important roles in challenging societal norms related to race, gender, physical activity participation over the lifespan; as well as through the Great Depression, in wartime (20 MSU cross country alums died in wars spanning WWI through Korea), and other major nationally significant events including the aftermath of JFK’s assassination and MSU’s initial and ongoing response to Title IX. Because cross country is, more than any other intercollegiate sport, set within natural and built outdoor environments, place attachment also emerged as a dominant theme. In fact, for its first 50 years, Michigan State’s courses traversed the built portion of campus. With respect to experiential aspects of distance running, over a third of the book set is focused on social science rather than history per se, and hundreds of voices are heard via survey and interview responses. While generally a “happy” story, these volumes do not shy away from confronting controversial topics. As a result of the just-described breadth and depth of coverage, it is longer than most books on this topic.
Outstanding Teams
Michigan State has fielded more than 165 varsity (115 men’s and 50 women’s) cross country teams over the years. All are outstanding in their own right. This page includes team photos or composites of those who won major championships. You can see them organized by championship by clicking on the various links below. Or you can click on “All” and view them in somewhat random order.
But the page is just a teaser in the sense that these photos capture little of the blood, sweat and tears that went into those championship seasons. And this page doesn’t even include images of the remaining 100+ squads. Fortunately, you can learn the “full story” about all 165+ of MSU’s cross country teams and their respective athletes in the book!
- State Intercollegiate Champions
- Central Collegiate Champions
- Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America Champions
- Big Ten Champions
- NCAA Regional Champions
- NCAA Champions