Commentary: Two of Island’s running pioneers — who recently died — carved their own paths

Two of Staten Island’s running pioneers passed away within the past weeks, leaving another void in the running community.

Bill Kelly, 97 years young, and Joe Kloiber, 82, Millrose A.A. teammates, passed away recently.

Kloiber, Kelly, and I were part of an Island Millrose A.A. contingent in the late 1950s and 60s that included Bill Welsh, George Rachmiel, Ed Larkin, Bob Watson and Glenn Cole.

Kelly was part of an Island running revival that took place after World War II. Running was unsophisticated — no super shoes, no treadmills, no internet, no dry-fit clothing. And those hardy souls competed under all conditions.

A national AAU 20K championship in the early 1960s was held in Needham, Mass., on July 4, with starting time at 3 p.m., with temperatures in the high 80s, and a Met AAU 15K championship in Yonkers featured lightning after the second mile. The race was not stopped.

Kelly, a Grymes Hill resident, was a part of that early running revival.

A St. Peter’s HS and Wagner College graduate, the soft-spoken Kelly was one of the Island’s top road racers in the 1940s and 50s.

Rarely competing in off-Island races, he was nevertheless one of the top finishers in the Island’s road racing circuit, which included the weekly S.I. Harriers handicap races at Clove Lakes, the Muche-Struck Run in Stapleton, and the Lou Marli run, which was a handicap affair until the early 1960s.

In, addition the Metropolitan Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) conducted several races on the Island.

In October 1948, Kelly won an AAU 10-mile race at Clove Lakes in one hour, one minute, 13 seconds, winning by nearly a minute. He continued to run well until the early 1960s, when his growing family took him away from serious racing. He remained a recreational runner throughout his life.

But that was not the end of Kelly’s involvement with track and field.

He continued to show up at nearly every local road race, inconspicuously lending a hand, and for a few years served as one of the directors of the…