PA Hall of Fame Inductees

Brady Gehret – Altoona (2010). The winner of two PIAA outdoor and three PTFCA indoor individual event state championships, Brady Gehret also keyed his teams to four state relay titles. A 200- and 400-meter specialist, he won both PTFCA titles as a senior and duplicated that double with 3A wins at the PIAA meet. His best outdoor marks of 21.12 and 46.39 placed him 6th on the state all-time lists, his 400 performances earning him 4th team All-America status. Gehret’s indoor 400 best of 47.69 placed him 5th on the all-time state list. But he shone most brightly with his skillful handling of banked turns as he lowered the state record for the indoor 200 to an auto-timed 21.22, as well as a hand-timed 20.9.

 

Dick Bartholomew – Coach, Altoona HS (1931-1946), Elwood City HS (1929-1930). The coach of Altoona High, Pennsylvania’s dominant track team of the 1930s and early ‘40s, Bartholomew was the most successful track coach in the PIAA’s first 20 years. In his 16 years at Altoona, only the Great Depression and the last year of World War II could stop Altoona High, as the PIAA did not conduct the state meet in 1933 and ’34, and Bartholomew’s team finished out of the top five for the only time in 1945. In the 14 years in which the PIAA held the state meet, Bartholomew’s Altoona teams won nine state titles. The PIAA first held a state cross country championship in 1939, and Bartholomew’s team won the title, finished 2nd in 1940, and tied for the championship in 1941 before the meet was suspended for the war year of 1942. Bartholomew left coaching having barely reached 40 years of age.

 

Jim Gehrdes – Altoona (1943). The leading point scorer for Altoona’s state championship team of 1943, Gehrdes won both PIAA class A hurdles titles and finished 2nd in the 220-yard dash, tallying 14 of the maximum possible 15 points. His 120-yard high hurdle title successfully defended his championship from the year before, and his time of 14.8 was both a meet record and Pennsylvania record, each lasting until 1947. His 1943 season was actually his junior year in high school, but after turning 18 and concluding the school year, Gehrdes enlisted in the United States Army, foregoing what likely would have been an equally dominating senior year.

 

Donn Kinzle – Altoona (1936). A state record holder in both the 120-yard high hurdles and the 220-yard lows, Donn Kinzle was one of only three Pennsylvania hurdlers to hold records in both the short and long hurdles since the advent of the PIAA in 1925. A two-time PIAA 220 hurdles champ when the 120 hurdles were not contested in the PIAA, Kinzle lowered the state record twice, from 24.5 down to 23.8, a time which placed him equal-7th on the national all-time list, and which would not be bettered in similar events until 1953. In the 120 hurdles, Kinzle took the record from 15.6 to 15.2.