Jesse Owens struck blow at Aryanism

Press, 2 April 1980, Page 44

Jesse Owens struck blow at Aryanism

NZPA Chicago The black American athlete, Jesse Owens, who died in Tuscon on Monday night, struck a major blow at Hitler’s white supremacy views by his series of triumphs at the 1936 Berlin Olympics and encouraged other members of his race to follow in his footsteps. The former shoe-shine boy. gifted with winged heels, has been acclaimed as the greatest athlete in track and field events of the century. Owens collected four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics for the United States while Hitler f-mrnd and stormed out of the stadium. , Fifteen months earlier, Owens performed an incredible feat in athletics by breaking five world track and field records and tied a sixth. The record-shattering day took place at the Western Conference College Championships in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on May 25, 1935. when Owens was a student at Ohio State University. Fans blinked in disbelief as the lean. long-leg?»d Owens smashed the records within an hour, although he said he was not feeling well. One of the world marks set that day — his long jump of 26 feet 8 inches (8.2 metres) — stood for a quarter of a century. In Berlin, Owens won the 100 and 200 metres races, the long jumo and a fourth gold medal as a member of the 4 x 100 metres relay team. He returned in glory to America, but his career as an amateur ended swiftly. He accepted offers to turn professional after only 15 months at the peak of his amateur career. By then a household name, Jesse Owens ran exhibition races in baseball parks and even took part in sprints against horses. Later he helped to promote tours of the famed Negro basektball team, the Harlem Globetrotters. Owens was born in Danville, Alabama on Sep-

tember 12, 1913, the second youngest child in a family of 11 children, three of whom died in childhood. He had no first name, just the initials J.C. given to him by his father. When the young boy first went to school, the white teacher asked his name and the shy boy answered rapidly J. C. Owens. The teacher repeated “Jesse Owens” and the confused Owens mumbled agreement. “From that point I have been Jesse,” he said. Later, when he moved to Fairmount Junior High School, Owens came under the eye of the school’s elderly track coach, Charles Riley. He persudaded him to report for track practice. Under Riley’s wing Owens began his track career. Although wellknown in schcolastic athletics, Owens did not come to world prominence until he equalled the world record for the 100 yards of 9.4 seconds at the National Inter-Scholastic meeting in Chicago in 1933. After he graduated from high school, 28 colleges sought Owen’s service, but he decided to stay close to home and his coach, Riley, and entered Ohio State University. In 1936 the 1.78-metre Owens went to Berlin. Adolf Hitler had hoped to use the Olympics partly as a propaganda exercise to prove the supremacy of Aryans. But Owens won the 100 metres and then the long jump—perhaps his finest single competitive performance. When Owens won the 200 metres Hitler stormed out of the stadium in a rage instead of presenting the medals. In. Munich in 1972, Owens recalled the snub by Hitler. “Hitler had earlier refused to shake hands with me. But athletes haven’t time to continually worry about people in the stands. I found the German people great sports lovers and I have many fans there today,” he said.