40 years ago, an athlete died, who for a long time was the same symbol of speed, as for the current generation - Usain Bolt. American Jesse Owens has gone down in sports history forever thanks to his triumph at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. His victories, won before the eyes of Adolf Hitler, became a symbol of the struggle against Nazi ideology, despite the fact that the athlete himself lived in a state full of racial prejudice.
From poverty to highscore
James Cleveland Owens was born in September 1913 in the small settlement of Oakville (Alabama). He was the youngest of ten children in a poor African American family who moved in search of a better life to the north of the United States. During the roll call in the new school, he called the teacher his initials - "JC". She decided that this is one word, and recorded the future Olympic champion as "Jesse." So this name was assigned to him.
As a child, Owens had to combine studies with part-time work. Delivering groceries from stores, he realized that he liked to run. But playing sports at school was possible only in the evenings, when he needed to help his family earn money. Fortunately, the school coach allowed me to train before class, and this helped Owens to reveal himself in athletics.
The first success for a young runner came in 20 years, when he was in high school. At national competitions in Chicago, Owens repeated the world record in running 100 yards (91.44 meters), stopping the stopwatch at 9.4 seconds. Soon, his family managed to get a beginner athlete at Ohio State University, which allowed him to reach a new level.
May 25, 1935 Owens forever entered the history of world sport thanks to a unique achievement, which is impossible to repeat. On that day, he felt unwell due to an injury, but had to represent his university in four finals at once in one session. At first he won the 100 yards race with the same time of 9.4 seconds, again repeating the best time in history. Owens then took part in the long jump competition, limiting himself to just one attempt, in which he broke the world record - a jump of 8.13 cm allowed him to remain a guide for others for the next 25 years.
Then Owens took part in the 220-yard race with a smooth and hurdling run, where he rewrote a record book. Since this distance is slightly longer than the classic 200 meters, Owens's record seconds were true for her. From the first to the last exit to the start of the 21-year-old athlete, only 45 minutes passed. Today, the establishment of six world records in such a short period can not be imagined even in swimming.
Triumph in the heart of Nazi Germany
Owens suddenly became a superstar athletics, and the whole world was waiting for his appearance at the Olympic Games in Berlin. Moreover, his speech could not but acquire a political color. The owners of the competitions used them as propaganda of Nazism, and this ideology had to be opposed by a dark-skinned man, who himself suffered from racism in his homeland and repeatedly faced with the fact that he was not allowed to visit institutions for whites.
Despite all the negative circumstances, Owens arrived in Berlin with the American team and was warmly received by the local audience. Before the competition, Adolf Dassler, the founder of Adidas, approached him and offered to try his running shoes. Owens was impressed by her quality and agreed to perform at the Olympics.
On August 3, 1936, the finals in the 100m race were held. Owens ran to the finish line first, leaving his compatriot Ralph Metcalf with silver. The next day, Owens returned to the Olympic Stadium and won the second gold - this time in the long jump. According to legend, the German athlete Lutz Long, who got silver, helped him to avoid a qualification failure. Accurate information about whether this is true or not has not been preserved, but it is reliably known that the two athletes made good friends after this, and their families continued to communicate for decades.
Owens soon became a three-time Olympic champion, winning the 200-meter race. Owens won four tenths of a second from his closest rival, Mack Robinson from the USA - since then, no one except Bolt has had such an advantage in the Olympic finals.
Finally, after four days, Owens won another gold - in the relay 4 × 100 meters. Interestingly, the current champion in personal races was not originally supposed to go to the start. However, at the last moment, head coach Lawson Robertson included Owens and Metcalf instead of Marty Glickman and Sam Stoller - the only Jews in the US athletics team. They were told that in this way they would be able to confront the Germans who allegedly kept very fast runners in reserve, but hardly anyone believed in this version.
Owens himself was not happy to take someone else's place in the team and complained of fatigue, but was forced to obey. In the final, the Americans won a landslide victory, first running out of 40 seconds in the sprint relay. Owens was the first athlete to win four gold medals at the Olympics alone. This record only in 1984 was able to repeat Carl Lewis.
It is widely believed that Adolf Hitler who attended the competition refused to congratulate Owens on his incredible successes and shake hands with a black athlete. In reality, Hitler initially intended to congratulate only German athletes, but the International Olympic Committee advised him to either welcome everyone or anyone. Hitler decided to completely abandon this practice, and it so happened that the first person he did not congratulate was the black champion in high jump Cornelius Johnson. Owens himself recalled that after his first victory in the 100-meter race, he managed to approach Hitler’s bed, and he waved his hand. The athlete answered in the same way, after which the Reich Chancellor immediately left the stadium.
Hearty welcome at home
Owens was treated much worse in his own country. Immediately after the Games in Berlin, the American team was supposed to go to competitions in Sweden, but the owner of four Olympic medals wanted to return home and get his moment of glory. For this, Owens was deprived of amateur status, which automatically ended his athletic career.
In New York, a parade was held in honor of Owens, but he was still forbidden to appear in institutions for whites, and US President Franklin Roosevelt not only did not invite the main character of the Olympics to the White House, but did not send him a congratulatory telegram. Owens spoke about this publicly during speeches in support of the Republican presidential candidate Alfred Landon, whom the athlete decided to support to the peak of Roosevelt.
Owens' life after sports could hardly be called happy. To earn a living, he competed with ordinary people, whom he gave odds at the start, and ran racing with horses. In response to the reproaches that such a titled athlete should be ashamed to participate in such shows, he objected that although he has gold medals, he cannot eat them.
Later, Owens nevertheless received a well-deserved recognition. He was invited to the Olympic Games in 1960 and 1972, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and an honorary doctorate in his native university. Owens called on President Jimmy Carter to prevent a boycott of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. Owens did not live up to the competition itself - he died on March 31 at the age of 66, after several months of fighting lung cancer.