The Long Approach of Maggie Vaults Over The Moon By Ralph Hardy
In 2010, Wichita native Grant Overstake, journalist, pastor, journalist again, and masters decathlete, sat down to write a novel. He’d been a writer for decades, winning awards for his feature writing and long-form journalism, but he’d never written fiction. The resilience of the human spirit exemplified in his stories about people facing long odds, and athletes overcoming insurmountable obstacles, resonated with his readers, in Kansas, where he began his journalism career, and also in Miami, where he wrote for the powerhouse, Miami Herald. Later, his pastoral work in rural Kansas and the hard streets of Chicago taught him that grace abounded, but in places where you least expected it. Grant wanted to spread that message, but not through sermons. He knew he had a novel in his heart and his head; he just had to find a way to tell it.
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He also wanted it to be about sports. As an athlete himself, he knew that competing in sport at the competitive level was a crucible, a trial from which you came through a stronger person. Sometimes, anyway. But how do you tell that story? Can it be as simple as writing what you know? Because Grant knew a lot.
T A K E O F F T A K E O F F
M A G A Z I N E M A G A Z I N E
There was a time in the ‘60s when the eyes of the track world were focused, perhaps improbably, on the midwestern state of Kansas. There, a tall, wiry, running prodigy named Jim Ryun was burning up the cinder tracks, setting record after record. In 1964, still a high school junior, he broke 4 minutes in the mile. Ryun went on to break four minutes five times while still in high school. Newspapers throughout Kansas, and across the country, covered Ryun’s exploits. Grant, ten years younger than Ryun, knew he was never going to be a great miler, but he loved track and field, particularly the pole vault. Still, you can only vault so high with a hoe or a rake. He saved his money, and one Saturday, Grant rode his Stingray bike to the local fishing supply store and rode back home, clutching their stiffest bamboo fishing pole. He marked his line, and clutching his new pole, soared over his homemade crossbar, landing on bales of hay. He was a natural. He kept at it, running youth track on the same cinders Jim Ryun had run upon. Grant was also a quarterback, basketball player, and regional champ in track in high school, qualifying for the state meet three
times. “I wasn’t great at any of the track and field events I competed in, but I was pretty good at all of them,” he laughs. And so, a decathlete was made. Then Earl Bell came to town. Maybe you’ve dreamed of stringing Serena’s racquet or handing Usain his starting blocks. Well, in 1976, Earl Bell, who belongs on the Mount Rushmore of American pole vaulters, was vaulting at Wichita State, at the USATF National Championships. There to catch the breakable fiberglass poles? Nineteen-year-old Grant Overstake. Twenty steps later, Bell cleared 18’7”, a world record. Grant caught the pole so it wouldn’t break. Maybe, just maybe, a seed was planted that sunny afternoon. By then Grant was attending Butler Junior College where he became a USATF All-American decathlete, placing 5th at USATF Nationals, all while writing sports part-time for the Eagle and Beacon, Kansas’ largest daily newspaper. In 1978, he married his high school sweetheart, Claire Brewer, who had been a two-time state champion high school sprinter and a record-setter at Wichita State. Together they transferred to the University of Kansas, where, as 20-year-old
