Norm Green, chair of the Masters Hall of Fame Subcommittee, today announced the 10-member Class of 2008 — seven active athletes with at least 10 years in masters track and three old-timers who have been out of competition for at least five years. The new inductees bring the Masters Hall of Fame to 162 members. They are: Kathy Bergen of La Canada, Calif.; Joe King of Central Point, Ore.; Tom Langenfeld of Edina, Minn., Audrey Lary of Frederick, Md.; Marie-Louise Michelsohn of New York; Roger Pierce of Essex, Mass.; and Bob D. Ward of Dallas as the active active athletes, joined by old-timers Bill Morales, 92, of Santa Ana, Calif.; and the late Ladislav Pataki and Nate White. But the Masters Hall of Fame is still homeless — with no place to display plaques or memorabilia. But that could change.

MassVelocity Track Club leader Larry Libow, a coach and computer guru in Springfield, Mass., spoke up at a joint meeting of the Masters T&F and LDR committees today, asking why the Hall of Famers didn’t get more recognition than they do. No physical Hall of Fame or public presentation with the honorees taking bows.
I’ve been harping about this for a dozen years, but Larry is the first to stick his neck out. He volunteered to head a committee to seek a location for a Masters Track Hall of Fame, which could include plaques and memorabilia.
Once upon a time, reps of the National Track and Field Hall of Fame at the Armory track in Manhattan pledged to install a masters HoF kiosk or something. But that fell through a few years back when the 2006 masters indoor nationals they’d been awarded failed to materialize. (Boston rescued the indoor nationals that year.)
So here’s the deal, Larry is going to look around for a suitable place to base a Masters T&F Hall of Fame and begin assessing what kind f material it could house. A natural first step is raiding the storage locker off Interstate 8 in San Diego where David and Linda Pain keep banners and others materials dating back to before the first masters nationals in 1968. I’ve offered Larry help with that.
But if your town has a sports museum that might host our Hall of Fame, write Lawrence “Larry” Libow..
At the joint meeting where he announced the Hall of Fame class, Norm also listed 11 nonwinning nominees on the active-athlete list who will carry over to next year’s ballot.
They are Ann Carter, Georgia Cutler, John Elwarner, Ray Feick, Mary Hartzler, William Joe Johnston, Robert Keating, Linda Lowery, Charley Miller, Lillian Snaden and Irene Thompson.
Because the annual Hall of Fame ballot traditionally has 25 names, these 14 other recent actives will be on next year’s ballot: George Cohen of California, Bill Daprano of Georgia, the late Ken Dennis of California, Bill Fortune of New York, Kathy Frable of Texas, Mary Harada of Massachusetts, Kathy Jager of Arizona, Ken Jansson of Kansas, Bob Lida of Kansas, Bob Matteson of Vermont, Bruce McBarnette of Virginia, Vince Sempronio of Oregon, Gerald Vaughn of North Carolina and Ruth Welding of Indiana.
Norm listed these old-timers as carry-overs for the 2009 Hall of Fame ballot: Norm Cyprus, Tim Dyas, Herb Miller, Bill Weinacht and the late Anna Cirulnick.
Old-timers added to the ballot for the first time are: Haig Bohigian, Jerry Crocket, Marilyn Fitzgerald, Bert Morrow, Howard Rubin, Marion Sanchez, George Vernosky, Algene Williams and the late Carl Klehm and Bill Olrich.
In his remarks before 60 people today, Norm noted that he sent out ballots to 209 eligible voters. (I wasn’t one of them.) Some 124 ballots were returned before the deadline, for a 59 percent response rate. However, existing Hall of Famers returned their ballots at a 75 percent rate. Figures, Norm said, because they appreciate what the honor means.