Sears makes good use of primary sources....The biography of George Seward is a first rate sport history well worth the attention of track and field fans everywhere.
Keith McClellan
Journal of Sport History
Mr. Sears has burrowed through the reams of newspaper cuttings, and while neither he nor anyone equally diligent can tell us for sure just ... Read morehow swift Seward was, the fact is that it makes for a rousing good tale and another entertaining and historically valuable contribution to the surprisingly large number of books published in the last year or two on the subject of Victorian-era-ethics.
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Track Stats, August 2008, Vol. 46, No. 3
Ed Sears has magnificently brought back to life one of America's great athletes, and one the world's greatest athletes of all time. It is a fascinating story of talent, resilience and persistence. I could not put it down. Perhaps now George Seward will begin to receive some of the respect and recognition that has been denied him over the past 150 years!
Peter Radford, Professor of Sport, Brunel University George Seward: America's First Great Runner, by Ed Sears, proves that the sport of track did not begin, as the 'gentleman amateur' historians say, in 1852. George Seward was a silver plater from New Haven, Conn., whose phenomenal sprinting power made him a celebrity in Britain's vibrant, unregulated Victorian sporting world of match races, tracks scratched on grass behind public houses, high stakes, huge gambling crowds, and saturating news coverage. A century before his time, in 1844 Seward probably ran 9.25 for 100 yards. He often beat a sequence of rivals one by one, up to 10 in separate sprints within an hour. Such exploits fill this painstakingly researched story.
Running Times, December 1, 2009
|s|aBjorn Sandahl|fOct 2009|jIdrottsforum.org Thanks to his meticulous research into the races Seward ran, the author provides not only a chronological record of Seward's accomplishments but meaningful insights into Seward and his thought processes. ... Sears' skill with storytelling, coupled with his enthusiasm for racing, is an added bonus. Highly recommended.
CHOICE, November 2008
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