University of North Carolina Athletics
Paul Wellstone, Champion Of The Little Guy
October 30, 2002 | Wrestling
Oct. 30, 2002
By Dave Lohse
Associate Athletic Communications Director
 Dave Lohse pictured with Paul and Sheila Wellstone in 1996.  |
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But on Tuesday night, while watching the Memorial Service for United States Senator Paul Wellstone and the others who died in last Friday's tragic airplane crash in Northern Minnesota, I knew that the time had come that I had to put pen to paper. There on my TV screen due to the efforts of C-SPAN2 was a packed Williams Arena on the campus of the University of Minnesota, filled to the brim with 20,000 people celebrating the lives of Paul and Sheila Wellstone, their daughter Marcia Wellstone Markuson and the five others who perished in the plane crash.
I knew then that I must write this column. You see, I didn't know Paul and Sheila Wellstone that well, but once I did meet them that meant I was their friend for life. That is why I wish every one of you could have met them as well. They were just amazing people. They were part of our Tar Heel family. And I loved both of them with all my heart.
I first heard the name of Paul Wellstone in the summer of 1990 when I was working for the United States Olympic Committee at the U.S. Olympic Festival -- '90 in Minneapolis. While reading the local papers there, I first came upon the name of Paul Wellstone. He was an activist in Democratic Party politics in Minnesota and a 21-year professor of political science at Carleton College in Northfield, Minn. And he had this odd notion that he could upset two-term Republican U.S. Senator Rudy Boschwitz in the election of 1990. I also found out at that point that he was a graduate of the University of North Carolina, earning his Bachelor of Arts degree here in 1965 and his Ph.D. in 1969. Beyond that he was a magnificent college wrestler at Carolina, going undefeated his freshman and sophomore years and winning an Atlantic Coast Conference wrestling championship in 1964.
Later that fall, Paul Wellstone pulled off a political upset of immense proportions. Despite being outspent by a ratio of 8-to-1, he upset Boschwitz by two percentage points and became the only challenger to upset an incumbent U.S. Senator running for reelection in November of 1990.
That Paul Wellstone would overcome the odds and win that race should have come as no surprise to anyone. From his birth on July 21, 1944 at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C. in 1944 to his death last Friday, Paul Wellstone was the ultimate fighter for what he believed in. Diminutive in stature at 5-5, Paul Wellstone would never back down from a fight, whether it was on the wrestling mat at the University of North Carolina or in debate on the floor of the United States Senate.
Those attributes made Paul so special. Paul's father was a Jewish immigrant from the Ukraine who worked as a writer. His mother was from the Lower East Side of Manhattan. She worked as a cafeteria worker. Paul attended Wakefield and Yorktown High Schools in Arlington, Va., where he grew up. He finished second in the Virginia high school wrestling championships for three straight years and was also sixth in the state high school cross country meet his senior year.
He moved to Chapel Hill in the fall of 1962 to enroll at Carolina. He had other offers. "I was a serious high school wrestler and committed high school distance runner. I considered several schools. Although UNC had a non-scholarship wrestling program at the time, I fell in love with the school and knew I needed to be in Chapel Hill."
As a freshman, he wrestled for Coach Sam Barnes' team in 1963, compiling an 8-0 record and meriting a spot on the team's media guide cover for the following year. That year he also married Sheila, his high school sweetheart from Arlington. To the day of their death the two always acted like high school sweethearts. Sheila left the University of Kentucky to be in Chapel Hill that summer. While she worked in Wilson Library, Paul was pursuing his degree in political science, wrestling for the Tar Heels and working 30 hours a week officiating intramurals to make ends meet.
Wellstone's sophomore year on the mat was even more spectacular. He went undefeated again at 13-0-1 while leading UNC to a second-place team finish in the ACC. At the league championship meet, he became only the third UNC wrestler to ever win an individual ACC championship, decisioning Gary Langer of Maryland 4-3 in the finals. Unfortunately he did not earn a bid to the NCAA's that season.
Fate intervened and Paul's chance to make nationals never materialized. Sheila became pregnant and shortly thereafter their first child David, now 36, was born at what was then called North Carolina Memorial Hospital in Chapel Hill. "Between school, work, wrestling and family, I had little time to do anything else," Paul, reflected. Something had to go. Wellstone sacrificed his college wrestling career and accelerated his undergraduate studies so he could graduate in 1965. "One thing Coach Sam Barnes told me was absolutely true. He knew I had the talent to wrestle at nationals and he thought I should continue one more year. He knew by my junior year I would get there. Looking back, I wish it were something I could have done. My entire family has remained ardent wrestling fans. I have two sons who were wrestlers and we try to attend the NCAA Wrestling Championships as often as possible."
Soon, he was working on his Ph.D. at Carolina, which he finished in only four years. Shortly before the Wellstone family left Chapel Hill, their second child, Marcia, was born at North Carolina Memorial Hospital. Marcia also died in last Friday's crash. She was a mother of one child and step mom of three. She attended the University of Wisconsin and was a Spanish teacher and high school cross-country coach in the Minneapolis area at the time of her death. She was on sabbatical to work on her father's campaign this year....[continued]
