Keene Fitzpatrick

Keene Fitzpatrick

Keene Fitzpatrick, c. 1904
Biographical details
Born	December 25, 1864 Natick, Massachusetts
Died	May 22, 1944(1944-05-22) (aged 79) Princeton, New Jersey
Alma mater	University of Michigan
Coaching career (HC unless noted)
1890–1891	Yale (trainer)
1896–1898	Yale (trainer)
1894–1895	Michigan (trainer)
1898–1910	Michigan (trainer)
1910–1932	Princeton (trainer, kicking)

Keene Fitzpatrick (December 25, 1864 – May 22, 1944) was an American track coach, athletic trainer, professor of physical training and gymnasium director for 42 years at Yale University (1890–1891, 1896–1898), the University of Michigan (1894–1895, 1898–1910), and Princeton University (1910–1932). He was considered "one of the pioneers of intercollegiate sport."

Fitzpatrick was born in either 1864 or 1865 in Massachusetts. His father was born in Ireland.

As a young man in the 1880s, Fitzpatrick was a sprinter with the national champion Natick Hook and Ladder Company team. As a coach, he is credited with inventing a new pole-vaulting technique and with coaching numerous Olympic gold medalists, including Archie Hahn, Ralph Rose, Charles Dvorak and Ralph Craig. He was also the trainer for the Michigan Wolverines football teams from 1894 to 1895 and 1898–1909, including Fielding H. Yost's legendary "point-a-minute" teams from 1901 to 1905. Fitzpatrick was born in Natick, Massachusetts in 1864. He died in Princeton, New Jersey at age 79 in 1944.

In the late 1870s and 1880s, New England was "the home of the professional athlete." Teams of professional sprinters formed in New England. For a decade, the sport thrived, and Fitzpatrick was one of the leading sprinters. Sprinters took up residence in small towns and competed with the local fire companies that engaged in hose races with other companies. Fitzpatrick "was one of the first to organize the famous hose, hook and ladder teams, when racing of this kind was so popular and the rivalry between Massachusetts towns was keen."

The "Natick Hook and Ladder Company" was the most successful of the New England teams, becoming "the world's championship organization." The Natick team in the 1880s included Fitzpatrick and some of the leading sprinters of the era, including Mike Murphy, William F. Donovan, Sid Peet, Johnny Mack, Steve Farrell, and world champion Piper Donovan. In 1885, the only sweepstake race to determine the national champion of American professional sprinters was held and won by Natick's Piper Donovan. Several members of the Natick Hook and Ladder Company went on to become leading trainers at American universities, leading to Massachusetts being called the "mother of athletic mentors."