In Hampton Roads, Olympian Blair was one who got away

His 41st year was a nerve-wracking one for Pete Blair, a devout Catholic.

As a child, he had promised God that if He would allow Blair to grow 6 feet tall, gain admission to the United States Naval Academy and wrestle in the Olympics, the Good Lord could take him at age 40.

Blair hit that milestone Feb. 14, 1972. A career Naval officer, he stood 6-foot-2, was a proud member of the Annapolis class of 1955 and owner of a bronze medal from the 1956 Melbourne Games.

"He was scared," said Blair's widow, Margot, laughing.

It all had seemed so unlikely. In 1948, Blair was a skinny, 16-year-old at Granby High who stood 5-6. Billy Martin launched varsity wrestling at the school that year, but Blair didn't make the team.

Blair left Granby before graduating, enlisting in the Navy. Martin won his first of 21 state titles there the next year. Martin's 22-year dynasty produced state and NCAA champions and a two-time Olympian. At Granby, though, Blair - No. 38 on The Virginian-Pilot's list of the greatest athletes from South Hampton Roads - would become known as The One Who Got Away.

The son of an admiral, Blair shot up 6 inches during his Navy training, and he added two more over two years at the Naval Academy Preparatory School, where he went undefeated as a wrestler. When he got to the Naval Academy, he was a strapping 6-2 and 177 pounds.

"I told them I was from Granby," Blair recalled in a 1978 interview. "And they thought I was already an established wrestler."

He made varsity as a plebe. He won NCAA titles in 1954 and 1955 at 191 pounds, going unbeaten both seasons. He would bless himself before stepping on the mat. A coach once asked if that really helped.

"Well, you've got to know how to wrestle, too," Blair said.

Blair did.

"When he grew up, the guy was a bear," said Gray Simons, a Granby grad who wrestled in the Olympics in 1960 and 1964. "He was one tough guy."

Blair won the AAU title and the Olympic Trials in 1956 and was chosen captain of the U.S. team. It was the Cold War era, and U.S. competitors sometimes had to deal with more than the opposing wrestler. The wrestling venue held no scoreboard, and matches were decided by a referee and two judges. Politics were known to intrude.

"You knew what you thought the score was, but it wasn't always quite that way," Simons said.

Blair lost to Boris Kulayev of the Soviet Union 3-0 in his next-to-last match, then 3-0 to Iranian Gholamreza Takhti in his final match. His coach had told him before that he would need a pin to win, that a decision was not likely to go Blair's way.

"Pete never really talked about it," Margot Blair said. "But he never showed any bitterness."

In fact, Blair was shaken years later when he learned that Takhti, a national hero in Iran, might have been assassinated for his political beliefs. The Iranian government declared it a suicide, but many in Iran believe Takhti was killed for opposing the Shah.

"He said it made him realize how lucky he was to be the United States," Margot Blair said.

Blair survived his 41st year and many more. A fun-loving soul known to grab old Annapolis classmates and playfully wrestle them to the ground, he served on submarines and ships and taught at the Academy before retiring in 1974 and beginning a second career as an executive for a shipbuilding firm. He died at 62 after a bout with cancer. He and Margot had seven children and 13 grandchildren. Many plan to be in Stillwater, Okla., in June, when Blair is inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.

Ed Miller, 446-2372, ed.miller@pilotonline.com