The word was sacrilegious
The Victoria Advocate carried the result on 27 May 1942 under the flat headline El Paso Schoolboy Wins Spelling Honors. Earnhart, 11 years old, had taken the national championship on sacrilegious — a word whose trap is its first half, since it descends from sacrilege rather than from religious, and the spelling follows the ancestry rather than the ear.
He had been assigned contestant number thirteen, a coincidence the coverage enjoyed. The runner-up was Margaret Montgomery, 15, of Iowa, four years his senior. TIME devoted a piece to him on 8 June 1942 under the title Meet the Champ.
The youngest since 1925
Earnhart was the first 11-year-old to win the national bee since 1925. That is the sharpest measure of the result: the contest had run for the better part of two decades without an eleven-year-old champion, because the field skews to thirteen and fourteen-year-olds who have had two or three more years to memorise word lists and their origins.
The prize was $500 and a two-day trip to New York City. Asked about Manhattan, Earnhart gave the National WWII Museum's later account its best line: it was swell, he said, but he would kind of like to get back to normal life sometimes.
The bee the war closed
The 1942 championship was the eighteenth edition and the last for four years. Scripps postponed every further contest until the war had been concluded successfully, and the National Spelling Bee did not run again until 1946.
That makes Earnhart an unusual kind of champion. He held the title not for the customary twelve months but for the length of American involvement in the Second World War — through Guadalcanal, Normandy and the Pacific — because there was no successor to hand it to.
What is documented — and what is not
The documented record is the 1942 result, the age, the home town, the word, the prize, the contestant number and one quotation. The sources used here also place a 1942 champion in the middle of a national emergency, which is most of why the story survived at all.
Nothing in them says what Earnhart did afterwards: no college, no career, no later interviews, no date of death. His birth year is given in the research record as 1931. Anyone who tells you more about his adult life is going beyond the 1942 reporting.
How rare the title is
One speller a year wins the national bee, and in the 1940s a champion emerged from a field assembled by newspapers across the country, each paying to send a regional winner forward. A child who takes that title at 11 has beaten opponents with several extra years of reading behind them.
Earnhart has no Wikipedia page of his own; his name is handled inside the entry for the Scripps National Spelling Bee. The contemporary sources — a Texas newspaper, TIME, and a museum blog written seventy-four years later — are the whole of the public record.
| Person | Country | Milestone | Age / Stat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Richard Earnhart | United States | Winning the 1942 National Spelling Bee at 11 | Age 11 |
| Arvind Mahankali | United States | Won the 2013 Scripps National Spelling Bee at 13 | Age 13 |
| Kerry Close | United States | Won the 2006 Scripps National Spelling Bee at 13 | Age 13 |
| Hugh Tosteson García | Puerto Rico (United States) | National Spelling Bee champion 1975 | Age 14 |
| Roy Seligman | Bahamas | First speller from the Bahamas to reach the Scripps National Spelling Bee… | — |
What is documented — and what is not
✓ Documented
- He won the 1942 National Spelling Bee at 11 with the word sacrilegious.
- The prize was $500 and a two-day trip to New York City; he was contestant number thirteen.
- The 1942 edition was the eighteenth, and the contest did not run again until 1946.
- He was the first 11-year-old champion since 1925.
? Unverified, disputed or wrong
- His school, family and exact birth date.
- What he did after 1942; no later record appears in these sources.
- Whether he is still living.
- The size of the 1942 field.
Questions people ask about Richard Earnhart
How old was Richard Earnhart when he won?
Eleven. He was the first 11-year-old to win the National Spelling Bee since 1925, and the research record gives his birth year as 1931.
What word did Richard Earnhart win on?
Sacrilegious, in the 1942 final. The word is spelled from sacrilege, not from religious, which is what catches most spellers.
What did he win?
$500 and a two-day trip to New York City, according to the National WWII Museum's account of the 1942 championship.
Why was there no spelling bee after 1942?
Scripps postponed the contest until the Second World War was over. The National Spelling Bee did not run again until 1946.
Who came second in 1942?
Margaret Montgomery, 15, of Iowa — four years older than the champion.
Is Richard Earnhart on Wikipedia?
Not with an article of his own. His name is covered within the Scripps National Spelling Bee entry and its list of champions.
Where is Richard Earnhart now?
No source used here says. The record stops with the 1942 coverage; there is no later interview, career note or date of death in these sources.
Did he say anything about the trip to New York?
Yes. Asked about Manhattan he said it was swell, but that he would kind of like to get back to normal life sometimes.
Quick quiz: how well do you know Earnhart’s story?
Which word made Richard Earnhart champion in 1942?
What was his prize?
When did the National Spelling Bee next run after 1942?
Sources
- Meet the Champ — TIME, 1942-06-08
- El Paso Schoolboy Wins Spelling Honors — Victoria Advocate, 1942-05-27
- 1942 Scripps National Spelling Bee Championship — National WWII Museum, 2016-05-27
Checked by the Geniuses.club editorial team. Ages are given as of September 2026.
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