Often credited with having spurred the running boom of the 1970s, Frank Shorter was one of America's greatest Olympic performers. He is best remembered for his victory in the marathon during the ill-starred games in Munich in 1972, and for his runner-up finish four years later in Montreal. The Munich games were marred by the terrorism meted out against Israeli athletes, but they are also recalled for swimmer Mark Spitz's unprecedented seven gold medals and Shorter's long-distance triumph. On the day of the marathon, September 10, 1972, Runner's World later contended, "distance running was changed forever … transformed from the cult exercise of an eccentric breed of skinny men into what would become for many a way of life." An international television audience watched as the tousle-haired Shorter, born in Munich in 1947—his father was an American army physician stationed in Germany after the war—and a graduate...