From foster child to fame

London, Aug. 7: Tori Bowie’s dream of one day seeing a sign in her home community saying ‘welcome to Sand Hill home to Tori Bowie’ looks almost certain to be realised after her 100m win at the world athletics championships.

For the sport of athletics the 26-year-old American’s victory — courtesy of her habitual hurling herself at the line which denied diminutive Ivorian Marie Josee Ta Lou the gold — will be a welcome antidote to the largely hostile reception of her compatriot and two-time dope cheat Justin Gatlin’s win in the men’s race the night before.

For Bowie — who finally tasted gold in an individual event after lesser medals in the Olympic 100 and 200m as well as the 2015 100 world final — it will also be a moment of glory shared with her paternal grandmother and her role model, Bobbie Smith.

But for Smith, Bowie says she and her sister Tamara would have been taken on by foster parents. “My mother dropped us off at a foster care centre when I was just two,” Bowie told NBC last year.

“But my grandmother ended up fighting for us and winning custody of us.

“We didn’t have much but she gave us character,” added Bowie, who has shortened her name from the unusual Fentorish.

Smith for her part had no hesitation in assuming her responsibilities to her discarded grand daughters even though she had five children of her own to bring up in the tiny enclave in Mississippi which is so small Bowie says there are no ‘stop lights’.

She said her own grandmother had taken in six grandchildren, including herself. “So I knew if she could take in six, I could take in two. That helped motivate me and let me know I could do it,” the 70year-old told the ClarionLedger.

Bowie, who has done some modelling and is keen to get into acting with her goal to attract the attention of gospel film legend Tyler Perry, says she and Tamara are eternally cognisant of their grandmother’s sacrifices. — AFP