We Grew Wings Takes Flight

June 1, 2012

Why should Prefontaine be the only Oregon track star for little girls to look up to? This is the simple question that inspired the creation of We Grew Wings, a forthcoming documentary on the history and achievements of the UO women's track and field team. Lundquist College of Business students recently had the opportunity to watch a preview of the film and hear from its executive producer, former Nike executive Ellen Schmidt-Devlin, a UO alum who is currently enrolled in the college's Portland-based Oregon Executive MBA program. Thanks to her background as a UO runner and participant in the 1980 Olympic Trials, Schmidt-Devlin was well aware of the rich past and vibrant present of Oregon's track women. Soon after leaving Nike in 2009, Devlin realized that she had a unique opportunity to tell this story, and that--with the fortieth anniversary of Title IX occurring the same year as the 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials--the timing couldn't be better. Working with Portland filmmakers Erich Lyttle and Sarah Henderson, Schmidt-Devlin has created a work that weaves together the past--as embodied by Leann Warren, Quenna Beasley and others--with the stories of Oregon's present-day track and field competitors Jamesha Youngblood, Jordan Hasay, Melissa Gergel, and English Gardner. Watch the above preview and find out more about the film's June 30 premiere as an official event of the 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials.