Seattle author Doug Levy’s book, “Hero Redefined,” focuses on Olympians who may not have won medals, but who made a huge impact, including the late Mel Wakabayashi.
A former Chatham Maroon skated his way to unsung hero status.
Mel Wakabayashi is the focus of a chapter in author Doug Levy’s book, “Hero Redefined: Profiles of Olympic Athletes Under the Radar.”
The Seattle author is in town this week to talk about the book and attend the Chatham Sports Hall of Fame ceremonies where Wakabayashi was enshrined in 2005. He passed away two years ago.
Levy’s book centres around stories of individuals who were unsung heroes; people who made an impact on their respective sports, but not for hoisting a trophy or medal.
As a fan of the Olympics, he wanted to focus on stories away from the medal podium.
“In the U.S., we’re very focused on the winners. The theme of unsung heroes was really interesting to me,” he told The Voice. “A couple of athletes in the book were the drivers for that.”
Neither athlete was Wakabayashi, but Levey said his tale was captivating.
“I took a couple of athletes I knew I wanted to profile and I researched a lot of other Olympic games and examples of sportsmanship. Mel’s story really interested me.”
Wakabayashi, born in 1943, was brought into this world in an internment camp in B.C. and then moved to one in Northern Ontario. Japanese Canadians were rounded up during the Second World War and sent to these camps.
Chatham-Kent was home to an internment camp just north of Rondeau Provincial Park on Talbot Trail.
But it wasn’t just spending time as a toddler in a camp that caught Levey’s attention. It’s what Wakabayashi did despite the many hurdles placed before him that garnered the interest. His family moved to Chatham after the war. He played for the Maroons in the early 1960s before lacing up the skates for the University of Michigan, earning MVP and first team All American honours.
The Detroit Red Wings signed him in 1967, but he never made it to the NHL level.
Instead, he opted to head to Japan to play professionally there.
“He fell in love with the game of hockey at a time when (NHL) hockey was not a friendly place to non-Caucasian players,” Levy said. “So, he goes to Japan and really raises the level of that game in that country.”
In 1980, it was Wakabayashi who coached the Japanese men’s Olympic hockey team.
“I saw him as a really quiet hero who really changed the game of hockey for an entire country,” Levy said.
Wakabayashi, along with brother Herb, had a lasting impact on the sport.
“The game of hockey before and after Mel and Herb came and went was very different,” Levy said. “The Wakabayashis left it in a better place than they found it. That’s a pretty good indicator (of being unsung heroes).”
As for the two Olympic athletes that inspired Levy’s book, one was Swiss marathoner Gabriela Andersen-Scheiss, while the other was U.S. runner Manteo Mitchell.
Andersen-Scheiss persevered through dehydration to limp to the finish line of the inaugural women’s Olympic marathon in Los Angeles in 1984. Mitchell was a 400-metre relay runner.
Both encountered adversity in their respective events.
Andersen-Scheiss was 39 when she raced at the Olympics. It was a hot, humid day, and she missed the final water station as she ran.
“She got severely dehydrated. She entered the stadium and looked like she was going to faint,” Levy said. “And yet she didn’t.”
Rounding the track despite severe leg cramping, Andersen-Scheiss’s final staggering steps that day defined perseverance, and with a full L.A. Coliseum crowd cheering her on, she managed to cross the finish line.
Fast forward to 2012. Mitchell, in a qualifying heat at the London Olympics, took off from the starting line as per normal, being the lead in the four-man team. But at the 200-metre mark, halfway through his stage, he heard something snap.
“He knows that something is very wrong,” Levy said.
What was “very wrong” was the fact Mitchell had fractured the fibula in his left leg. He somehow managed to complete his section of the race, passing off the baton to the next runner.
“These are fantastic stories about people wo did uncommon things,” Levy said of his book.
The author will be at Turns & Tales at 11 a.m. on Sept. 25 for a book-reading and signing event.
He’ll then take in the Chatham Sports Hall of Fame ceremonies that evening at the Bradley Centre.
Author Doug Levy