A LASTING INSPIRATION Fifty years after her unsanctioned running of the Boston Marathon , Gibb was recently honored as the Grand Marshal of the 2016 marathon .
Gibb was personally congratulated at the finish line by the governor of Massachusetts . She took a taxi home to find scores of reporters in her living room . The next morning , the front page of the Boston Herald proclaimed “ Hub Bride First Gal to Run Marathon .”
Fifty years later , Gibb made headlines again earlier this year when she was named the Grand Marshal of the 2016 Boston Marathon , celebrating the half-century since her rogue run first broke the race ’ s gender barrier .
“ I really hoped that what I had accomplished would change how people looked at women — and how women looked at themselves ,” Gibb says . “ Many , many people worked hard to get women onto the superhighway we are on today , but I like to think that by running the Boston Marathon for the first time , it ’ s like I was out there with a machete , cutting back some of the jungle to make way for first a dirt path , then a road .”
Her groundbreaking run remains an inspiration to women runners the world over . The winner of the 2016 Marathon women ’ s division , Atsede Baysa of Ethiopia , even gave Gibb her trophy , saying she had inspired her so much .
“ I was so surprised , I didn ’ t know what to do ,” says Gibb . “ I didn ’ t want to keep it , but I couldn ’ t hand it straight back to her . So I told her I ’ d keep it for just one year — that next year I ’ d travel to her home in Ethiopia to return it to her .”
Running has since remained a constant throughout Gibb ’ s life , from that groundbreaking day in 1966 , through the years of her UC San Diego education , to the nights thereafter when she put herself through law school and on through a successful career in patent and real estate law .
Even today , at age 73 , Gibb still runs at least an hour a day , and epitomizes the spirit of the Revelle renaissance scholar . When she ’ s not in Massachusetts , Gibb spends several winter weeks in San Diego each year visiting friends . She can be seen running around campus , La Jolla and Torrey Pines . Gibb also feeds her perpetual scientific curiosity when in town — she attends neuroscience seminars at UC San Diego or looks up neuroscience research papers at Geisel Library .
She is also an accomplished artist who creates busts and full body sculptures — particularly the human figure while running , of course — and paints large murals of nature as she imagines it . Gibb says her creativity originates from deep foundations in science and art .
Never one to stand down in any facet of her life , Gibb is applying this love of art back to breaking barriers at the Boston Marathon . The 26.2 Foundation , a nonprofit group based in Hopkinton , Mass ., is now trying to raise funds for The Bobbi Gibb Marathon Sculpture Project , which would allow Gibb to take on the biggest challenge in her sculpting career — a lifesize statue of herself running .
“ There are statues of runners all over the Boston Marathon course , but they ’ re all men ,” Gibb says . “ Now we ’ re trying to make sure female runners get the same recognition .”
Learn more about Bobbi Gibb ' s historic run and see her sculptures at tritonmag . com / gibb
26 TRITON | FALL 2016