A year later, in Aug 1936, he won four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics: 100 metres, 200m, long jump and 4x100m relay. Amazing!
observe the Olympic Games in Berlin, August 1936.
HistoryNet
When Owens arrived in Berlin in July 1936, the German press featured the rise of Das Negerfest in American sport; they attributed Owens' speed and jumping prowess to animal qualities. Albert Speer, Germany's war armaments minister wrote that Hitler was annoyed by Owens' presence: People whose antecedents came from the jungle were primitive; their physiques were stronger than those of civilised whites and hence should be excluded from future Games.
The reaction was much the same in the Berlin Stadium in Aug 1936, when Owens was doing very well. Up in his box in the main stand, German Chancellor Adolf Hitler loathed the graceful style and sublime body as Owens easily won the men's 100 metres. But all around the vast arena, waving swastika banners, 110,000 spectators were mesmerised.
See Owens' long jump victory in Olympia, the film made by German director Leni Riefenstahl, intended to offer enduring proof of Aryan superiority. Or better still, my evidence comes from the BBC film Jesse Owens: The Olympics' Most Powerful Icon, 2012.
Note that Berlin had already modernised for the Games with racist graffiti taken down and Fascist publications removed from newsstands. Hitler had already passed the Citizenship Laws, stripping Jews of their nationality. But the Führer wanted to maximise the Berlin Games as a propaganda exercise for Nazism, covering over their brutal excesses.
Of course the German press glorified the victory won by heavyweight boxer Max Schmeling against the undefeated American Joe Louis in New York, just before the opening of the Games. It was hailed as a triumph of the Aryan super race. German magazines said Schmeling clearly demonstrated the superiority of white intelligence.
Despite personally congratulating two German gold medallists and a Finnish winner on the opening day of competition, Hitler left the stadium immediately after Owens' black team-mate Cornelius Johnson won the high jump. There were no official invitations to Hitler's box after that, the Führer saying that Americans should be ashamed of themselves for letting their medals be won by a Neger.
Every day Owens got a standing ovation from the multitude of Germans who loved his athletic ability. But a bigger surprise was to come. Owens fouled his first two attempts in the long jump qualifying round and faced being eliminated! His German competitor Luz Long, Owen’s strongest long jump rival, advised Owens (in English) how to adjust the run-up in the qualifying round and for Owens to get into the final. The German looked like a tall, blond model of Aryan manhood, something the two athletes joked about.
In the final, Luz Long’s last jump created great jubilation for the ordinary viewers, and for Hitler, Goebbels, Goering, Hess and Himmler. But Owens re-established his superiority with his last jump. Hitler jumped up and left the stadium.
Neither was the Führer present when Long took the silver medal behind Owens. The two athletes walked around the entire oval together, arms around each other. As a symbol of sport being a celebration of our common humanity, Owens’ relationship with the man who finished as silver medallist could hardly be bettered.
Owens' final gold medal occurred by accident. The two Jewish athletes in the US relay team, Sam Stoller and Marty Glickman, were dropped at the Germans’ insistence. Apparently the US Olympic Committee president Avery Brundage had agreed to throw the American Jews out, to avoid exacerbating the Führer's feelings. Putting black athletes into the relay team was offensive to the Nazis, but less offensive than maintaining the two Jewish athletes.
After Owens’ successes in Berlin, he faced the sobering reality of a life back home where black people had to ride at the back of the bus and were banned from white restaurants. And President Roosevelt gave no White House reception for this US Olympian star. Apparently Roosevelt was scared of a backlash from southern voters.
Two weeks after the Games, Owens was banned by the American Amateur Athletic Union for returning home instead of joining the US team on an extended European tour. As a result he was virtually unemployable in the USA, so he was forced to race against horses and to work as a playground supervisor.
Owens and Long’s warm friendship via letters lasted until the middle of WW2. Long died in a military hospital after being fatally wounded in battle in 1943, fighting for Germany.
Owens died of lung cancer March 1980, aged 66. But the friendship between the two families still continues.
The reaction was much the same in the Berlin Stadium in Aug 1936, when Owens was doing very well. Up in his box in the main stand, German Chancellor Adolf Hitler loathed the graceful style and sublime body as Owens easily won the men's 100 metres. But all around the vast arena, waving swastika banners, 110,000 spectators were mesmerised.
See Owens' long jump victory in Olympia, the film made by German director Leni Riefenstahl, intended to offer enduring proof of Aryan superiority. Or better still, my evidence comes from the BBC film Jesse Owens: The Olympics' Most Powerful Icon, 2012.
Note that Berlin had already modernised for the Games with racist graffiti taken down and Fascist publications removed from newsstands. Hitler had already passed the Citizenship Laws, stripping Jews of their nationality. But the Führer wanted to maximise the Berlin Games as a propaganda exercise for Nazism, covering over their brutal excesses.
Of course the German press glorified the victory won by heavyweight boxer Max Schmeling against the undefeated American Joe Louis in New York, just before the opening of the Games. It was hailed as a triumph of the Aryan super race. German magazines said Schmeling clearly demonstrated the superiority of white intelligence.
Despite personally congratulating two German gold medallists and a Finnish winner on the opening day of competition, Hitler left the stadium immediately after Owens' black team-mate Cornelius Johnson won the high jump. There were no official invitations to Hitler's box after that, the Führer saying that Americans should be ashamed of themselves for letting their medals be won by a Neger.
Every day Owens got a standing ovation from the multitude of Germans who loved his athletic ability. But a bigger surprise was to come. Owens fouled his first two attempts in the long jump qualifying round and faced being eliminated! His German competitor Luz Long, Owen’s strongest long jump rival, advised Owens (in English) how to adjust the run-up in the qualifying round and for Owens to get into the final. The German looked like a tall, blond model of Aryan manhood, something the two athletes joked about.
In the final, Luz Long’s last jump created great jubilation for the ordinary viewers, and for Hitler, Goebbels, Goering, Hess and Himmler. But Owens re-established his superiority with his last jump. Hitler jumped up and left the stadium.
Neither was the Führer present when Long took the silver medal behind Owens. The two athletes walked around the entire oval together, arms around each other. As a symbol of sport being a celebration of our common humanity, Owens’ relationship with the man who finished as silver medallist could hardly be bettered.
Owens' final gold medal occurred by accident. The two Jewish athletes in the US relay team, Sam Stoller and Marty Glickman, were dropped at the Germans’ insistence. Apparently the US Olympic Committee president Avery Brundage had agreed to throw the American Jews out, to avoid exacerbating the Führer's feelings. Putting black athletes into the relay team was offensive to the Nazis, but less offensive than maintaining the two Jewish athletes.
After Owens’ successes in Berlin, he faced the sobering reality of a life back home where black people had to ride at the back of the bus and were banned from white restaurants. And President Roosevelt gave no White House reception for this US Olympian star. Apparently Roosevelt was scared of a backlash from southern voters.
Two weeks after the Games, Owens was banned by the American Amateur Athletic Union for returning home instead of joining the US team on an extended European tour. As a result he was virtually unemployable in the USA, so he was forced to race against horses and to work as a playground supervisor.
Owens and Long’s warm friendship via letters lasted until the middle of WW2. Long died in a military hospital after being fatally wounded in battle in 1943, fighting for Germany.
Owens died of lung cancer March 1980, aged 66. But the friendship between the two families still continues.
100 metres, Berlin
Long Jump, Berlin
cooling down after the long jump
Conclusion All Olympians absolutely want to win their events, but because Hitler insisted German athletes were members of a Master Race, German nationalism ran even higher in 1936. Thus Black athletes were competing in a very threatening setting in Berlin, where Hitler and Goebbels were rousing hysterical levels of patriotism.
To maintain a peak of achievement in such an ugly moral environment was a mark of Jesse Owens's courage and athletic brilliance. To befriend a black athlete in the huge Berlin stadium was a mark of Luz Long’s courage and compassionate humanity.
Did Owens deliver a lasting blow to the confidence of Third Reich's ideology? Of course not .
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15 comments:
Although excluded from the relay team, Marty Glickman went on to become one of America's leading sports broadcasters. Max Schmeling was later defeated by Louis in a rematch but they became friends. Schmeling even supported the destitute Louis later in life. Riefenstahl's Olympia eventually became a tribute to the human spirit.
Jesse Owens said he was welcomed by most ordinary Germans. It was back at home, after the Games, that he suffered the worst racism. So he had to work as a playground janitor and petrol station attendant, before filing for bankrupcy and prosecuted for tax evasion.
Ozy.com
October 30, 2016
Hello Hels, It is typical of bigots and idiots to extrapolate victory from a single event, and to ignore the bulk of the data.
The U.S.(and often the rest of the world) frequently treats its heroes shabbily. How often do we hear of people who made a real contribution to society dying penniless and forgotten?
--Jim
Although well aware of Hitler's attitude towards Owens, I didn't realize how badly he was treated on his return to the USA.
Dr F
Thanks for responding. I am not sure at all that Riefenstahl's Olympia eventually became a tribute to the human spirit. Undoubtedly her film was innovative, long, detailed and full of the spirit of the Berlin Olympics. But it was always intended to be a propaganda piece for the Nazis.
Joseph
Owens understood that he would still not be able to eat in white-only restaurants when he got home, nor would he be allowed into hotels via the front door. But he knew he won the most individual medals at a single Olympics ever (or since, except for Michael Phelps) and expected to earn a decent living. Instead, as you noted, Owens he could only find work as a petrol station attendant etc and his family suffered badly.
It took another long 20 years before he began to give speeches to corporations and foundations like the US Olympic Committee. He travelled across the USA and was well paid for his speeches.
Parnassus
I know you are correct, but it doesn't make the remotest sense for a nation to treat its own heroes shabbily.
The Australian hero Dawn Fraser won gold and silver swimming medals back in 1964, adding to her haul of 8 Olympic medals. One Friday night after the Games, she was partying in Tokyo with other athletes and stole a flag outside the Emperor's Palace. The Australian authorities promptly banned Fraser from competitive swimming for 10 years :(
Fun60
There was enormous debate before the 1936 Games, about whether sending a national team to Germany would endorse the Nazi regime. Even the American ambassador to Germany urged his own nation to take a moral stand and not send a team. But Avery Brundage fought hard to send a US team to the 1936 Olympics, claiming that a "Jewish-Communist conspiracy" was working to keep the United States out of the Games.
So as well as Hitler boycotting Owens' medal ceremonies, everyone knew that Brundage and the American Olympic Committee would treat Owens like dirt at home, after the Games were over.
The Leni Riefenstahl documentary that I saw many years ago was interesting and revealing. That such a great sportsman was treated so badly upon his return to the US is a disgrace......but would it have been different if he was an Australian aborigine returning to Australia? Maybe.
Andrew
I tried to find examples of brilliant aboriginal athletes before the 1980s and found very few. So I believe you are right. An aboriginal cricket team went to Britain in the late 19th century and played many matches, quite successfully. But as soon as they returned, they were subject to the new Protection Act that all but banned their movement. And Tom Dancey won the Stawell Gift in 1910, but had the money prize taken away and got no public acclaim.
Boxers and wrestlers seem to do better.
Nothing good ever comes to those who try and support a stranger. Poor Luz Long.
LMK
Luz Long was having a very good life, winning many athletic medals and breaking European records; marrying happily and having a son; and finishing law school at the University of Leipzig with good marks and getting into a fine law practice. How sad that it all ended in war in 1943, when he was only 30.
Hi Hels - it's a story that informs if one follows the whole - and life for some is sadly still not fully recognised - thankfully people like Long are around to help, as too the other way ... eg Mandela and the South African rugby team - a white man's sport. I'm understanding more (a very little) about indigenous lives ... having had that time in Canada and thus American influence. Thanks for this - and that BBC 2012 film is informative. Take care and look after that wrist/hand - Hilary
Hilary
Athletes in highly competitive situations almost never support their opponents, let alone a black man who Hitler and his team didn't want to come to Berlin. But Luz Long was hugely popular in Germany in 1936, handsome tall Aryan-looking and a truly wonderful athlete, so perhaps he knew that he wouldn't be badly punished. Or perhaps he simply responded spontaneously. In either case, Long was an incredible human being.
Does anybody know of athletes who risked their successes with moral, superb behaviour towards another athlete? Here is one such case.
In the 1956 Australian mile championship Ron Clarke, who later held every world record up to 20 ks, crashed down after clipping another competitor’s heel. John Landy, who was very close behind, pulled up. With other runners streaming past him, Landy jogged back to Clarke and check his injuries.
Landy was assured that the injury wasn’t too serious. With Clarke on his feet and urging him on, Landy began to chase a field of runners that had gone a long way past him. At the bell lap Landy was flying and amazingly, he won the race. His act of chivalry sacrificed the chance of a world record but the crowds adored him.
Send me any other you know of.
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