Olympian Byron LaBeach passes at age 91
BYRON LaBeach, a quarter-miler who was a member of Jamaica’s 4×400 metres team to the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki, Finland, died in California on Sunday at age 91.
His daughter, Monique LaBeach, confirmed his death in an interview with the Jamaica Observer. She said her father died in his sleep.
LaBeach was the alternate member of Jamaica’s famed 4×400 metres relay team that won that event in Helsinki. Les Laing, George Rhoden, Arthur Wint, and Herb McKenley comprised the winning team.
Wint, McKenley, and Laing died in 1992, 2007, and 2021, respectively.
In 2019, LaBeach was honoured with an Olympic pin by the Jamaica Olympic Association for his contribution to athletics. In 2003, he was among the first eight people inducted into the Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association’s Hall of Fame.
At the time he told the Observer that, “This [recognition] is way way overdue, I was shut out since the 1960s. I felt very neglected. Everyone here knows me but didn’t want to recognise me and I didn’t know why.”
LaBeach competed in the 100 metres at the 1952 Games but was eliminated in the second round. At the Central American and Caribbean (CAC) Games in Mexico City two years later, he was fourth and fifth in the finals of the 100 and 200-metre events, respectively.
His only gold medal performance for Jamaica came at the CAC meet when he was a member of the winning 4×100 metres team that also included Laing, Rhoden, and Keith Gardner. It was the last time he competed for Jamaica.
The youngest of six sons, LaBeach was born in Kingston to Jamaican parents who had lived for a time in Panama. He competed at Boys’ Championships and played on the St George’s College teams that won the Manning Cup football titles in 1947 and 1948.
His brothers, born in Panama, were also athletes. Lloyd was a bronze medallist for Panama in the 100 and 200 metres at the 1948 Olympics in London, while George (the eldest) and Harold competed at Boys’ Championships in the 1940s for Kingston College.
Another brother, Sam, ran as a quarter-miler for Panama.
LaBeach attended and competed in athletics for Morgan State University in Maryland. At Morgan State he was a consistent performer; being a member of their winning team at the Penn Relays in 1952 helped him clinch a place on the Olympic team to Helsinki.
“Herbert McDonald [Jamaican track administrator] was in the States at the time as a representative for the farm workers programme and he was organising the [Olympic] team and came to see me,” LaBeach recalled. “I got very good recommendation from my coach and I was selected as an alternate.”
Going into the Olympics, LaBeach says Wint and McKenley, in particular, were not in the best of form.
“He [McKenley] had finished last in the 400 metres in California in May and was very distraught, he wanted to give it up,” LaBeach stated. “Our win in Helsinki was an upset because we started out with two weak links.”
LaBeach earned degrees in physical education and sociology at Morgan State. He also had a business degree from California State College.
Violet, his wife of 57 years, died this year. He is survived by two daughters and a son, four grandchildren, and his brother Sam.
