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1936 Berlin Games

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Jesse Owens

What is Jesse Owens known for?

What was jesse owens’s life like before the berlin olympics, was jesse owens snubbed by hitler at the berlin olympics, what was jesse owens’s life like after the berlin olympics.

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Berlin, 1936 - Jesse Owens of the USA in action in the mens 200m at the Summer Olympic Games. Owens won a total of four gold medals.

Jesse Owens

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Jesse Owens

Jesse Owens was an American athlete. He is best remembered for his performance at the 1936 Berlin Olympics , where he won gold medals in the long jump, the 100- and 200-metre dashes, and the 4 x 100-metre relay. He was the first American track and field athlete to win four gold medals at a single Olympic Games.

Jesse Owens was born on September 12, 1913, in Oakville, Alabama. He was the 10th and final child of two sharecroppers; his grandparents had been slaves. As a child, Owens picked cotton with his family. He excelled as an athlete in high school and college, breaking three world records in one day at the Ohio State University.

After the Olympics ended, stories claiming that Jesse Owens had been snubbed by Adolf Hitler circulated widely. While it is true that Hitler did not shake hands with Owens, it is worth noting that Hitler did not publicly congratulate any gold medalists after the first day of competition—one day before Owens won his first gold medal. Learn more.

Jesse Owens struggled to find work after the Olympics. He raced against horses for money and worked as a gas station attendant and a playground janitor. Using his fame to his advantage, Owens began working in public relations in the 1950s, traveling the country and making paid appearances at public events.

How did Jesse Owens die?

A heavy smoker, Jesse Owens died of lung cancer on March 31, 1980, in Tucson, Arizona. He was 66. Four years after his death, a street in Berlin was renamed in his honour. In 1990 Owens was posthumously awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.

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The 1936 Berlin Olympics and Nazi propaganda

Jesse Owens (born September 12, 1913, Oakville, Alabama , U.S.—died March 31, 1980, Tucson , Arizona) was an American track-and-field athlete who became one of the sport’s most legendary competitors after winning four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin . His victories were a blow to Adolf Hitler ’s intention to use the Games to demonstrate Aryan superiority.

Owens was the youngest of 10 children. The family initially lived in Alabama, where Owens’s father worked as a sharecropper. When the younger Owens was nine years old, the family moved to Cleveland. At his new school, a teacher misheard his name—he was then known as “J.C.”—and instead began calling him “Jesse.” Owens started competing in races at age 13, and he quickly became a standout runner, known for his graceful style.

Usain Bolt of Jamaica reacts after breaking the world record with a time of 19.30 to win the gold medal as Churandy Martina (left) of Netherlands Antilles and Brian Dzingai of Zimbabwe come in after him in the Men's 200m Final at the National Stadium during Day 12 of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games on August 20, 2008 in Beijing, China. (Summer Olympics, track and field, athletics)

As a student in a Cleveland high school , Owens won three events at the 1933 National Interscholastic Championships in Chicago . In one day, May 25, 1935, while competing for Ohio State University (Columbus) in a Western (later Big Ten ) Conference track-and-field meet at the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), Owens equaled the world record for the 100-yard dash (9.4 sec) and broke the world records for the 220-yard dash (20.3 sec), the 220-yard low hurdles (22.6 sec), and the long jump (8.13 meters [26.67 feet]). The latter record stood for 25 years.

For a time, Owens held alone or shared the world records for all sprint distances recognized by the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF; later International Association of Athletics Federations ).

jesse owens biography in english

Owens’s performance at the 1936 Berlin Olympics has become legend , both for his brilliant gold-medal efforts in the 100-meter run (10.3 sec, an Olympic record), the 200-meter run (20.7 sec, a world record), the long jump (8.06 meters [26.4 feet]), and the 4 × 100-meter relay (39.8 sec) and for events away from the track. One popular tale that arose from Owens’s victories was that of the “snub,” the notion that Hitler refused to shake hands with Owens because he was an African American. In truth, by the second day of competition, when Owens won the 100-meter final, Hitler had decided to no longer publicly congratulate any of the athletes. The previous day the International Olympic Committee president, angry that Hitler had publicly congratulated only a few German and Finnish winners before leaving the stadium after the German competitors were eliminated from the day’s final event, insisted that the German chancellor congratulate all or none of the victors. Unaware of the situation, American papers reported the “snub,” and the myth grew over the years.

"Perhaps no athlete better symbolized the human struggle against tyranny , poverty and racial bigotry.”

—U.S. Pres. Jimmy Carter

Despite the politically charged atmosphere of the Berlin Games, Owens was adored by the German public, and it was German long jumper Carl Ludwig (“Luz”) Long who aided Owens through a bad start in the long jump competition. Owens was flustered to learn that what he had thought was a practice jump had been counted as his first attempt. Unsettled, he foot-faulted the second attempt. Before Owens’s last jump, Long suggested that the American place a towel in front of the take-off board. Leaping from that point, Owens qualified for the finals, eventually beating Long (later his close friend) for the gold.

After retiring from competitive track, Owens engaged in boys’ guidance activities, made goodwill visits to India and East Asia for the U.S. Department of State , served as secretary of the Illinois State Athletic Commission , and worked in public relations . In 1976 Owens received the Presidential Medal of Freedom . Four years later he died from lung cancer . In 1990 he was posthumously awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.

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Biography

Jesse Owens Biography

jesse-owens

“The battles that count aren’t the ones for gold medals. The struggles within yourself — the invisible, inevitable battles inside all of us — that’s where it’s at.”

– Jesse Owens (from autobiography)

Short bio – Jesse Owens

Jesse Owens

Jesse Owens rose to national prominence in 1933, when he equalled the world record (9.4 seconds) for the 100 yard dash. He attended Ohio State University but, without a scholarship, he had to continue working part time. In the 1930s, America was a highly segregated society, and when travelling with the team, Jesse had to suffer the indignities of eating at separate restaurants and staying in different hotels.

One of his great athletic feats occurred in 1935; during one particular track meet, he broke three world records. This included the long jump (Owen’s record stood for 25 years), 220 yards and 220 yards hurdles. He also equalled the record for 100 yards.

Jesse Owens at 1936 Olympics

Jesse Owen’s finest moment came in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. He won Olympic gold in the 100m, long jump, 200m and 4* 100 metres relay. (An achievement not matched until Carl Lewis in 1984). It was a convincing rebuttal to the Nazi’s hopes of displaying ‘Aryan superiority’. Hitler gave medals to German athletes on the first day, but, after Owen’s victories, decided not to give any more medals. Albert Speer later wrote that Hitler was annoyed that the negro, Jesse Owens had won so many gold medals.

“….but he was highly annoyed by the series of triumphs by the marvelous colored American runner, Jesse Owens. People whose antecedents came from the jungle were primitive, Hitler said with a shrug; their physiques were stronger than those of civilized whites and hence should be excluded from future games.”

With great irony, Jesse Owens was treated well during his stay in Germany; he didn’t experience the segregation that he did back home in the United States and many Germans sought his autograph.

During the Games, Jesse Owens displayed the sportsmanship that he became renowned for. During the long jump final, he found time to massage his German rival, Lang. Lang later acknowledged the great spirit of sportsmanship that Jesse Owens embodied. Jesse Owens was grateful for the friendship that Lang displayed. Later, Jesse Owens remarked:

“It took a lot of courage for him (Lang) to befriend me in front of Hitler… You can melt down all the medals and cups I have and they wouldn’t be a plating on the 24-karat friendship I felt for Lutz Long at that moment. Hitler must have gone crazy watching us embrace. The sad part of the story is I never saw Long again. He was killed in World War II.”

Despite achieving a remarkable athletic achievement, Jesse Owens was denied the commercial reward or praise that he might have expected. He was never given a reception by F.D. Roosevelt or future US presidents. In 1936, the American Olympics association rescinded his Olympic status after Owens refused to travel to Sweden because he felt the financial need to pursue some commercial enterprises back in America.

Jesse was forced to take part in various ‘athletic showcases’ such as racing against horses or racing against local runners with a 10-yard head start. As Jesse Owens wryly remarked

“After I came home from the 1936 Olympics with my four medals, it became increasingly apparent that everyone was going to slap me on the back, want to shake my hand or have me up to their suite. But no one was going to offer me a job.”

He moved into business but it was not successful, and it ended in bankruptcy in the 1960s. He was even prosecuted for tax evasion. However, in 1966, with the civil rights movement gaining impetus, Jesse Owens was given the opportunity to act as a goodwill ambassador speaking to large corporations and the Olympic movement.

Citation: Pettinger, Tejvan . “ Biography of Jesse Owens” , Oxford, UK – www.biographyonline.net . Last updated 7th August 2017

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Jesse Owens Biography

Born: September 12, 1913 Oakville, Alabama Died: March 31, 1980 Tucson, Arizona African American track star

American track star Jesse Owens became the hero of the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, Germany, as his series of victories scored a moral victory for African American athletes.

A young track star

James Cleveland Owens was born in Oakville, Alabama, on September 12, 1913, the son of a sharecropper, a farmer who rents land. He was a sickly child, often too frail to help his father and brothers in the fields. The family moved to Cleveland, Ohio, in 1921, for better work opportunities. There was little improvement in their life, but the move did enable young Owens to enter public school, where a teacher accidentally wrote down his name as "Jesse" instead of J. C. He carried the name with him for the rest of his life.

When Owens was in the fifth grade, the athletic supervisor asked him to join the track team. From a skinny boy he developed into a strong runner, and in junior high school he set a record for the 100-yard dash. In high school in 1933 he won the 100-yard dash, the 200-yard dash, and the broad jump in the National Interscholastic Championships. Owens was such a complete athlete, a coach said he seemed to float over the ground when he ran.

Record setter and Olympian

A number of universities actively recruited Owens, but he felt that college was only a dream. He felt he could not leave his struggling family and young wife when a paycheck needed to be earned. Owens finally agreed to enter Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, after officials found employment for his father. In addition to his studies and participation in track, Owens worked three jobs to pay his tuition. He experienced racism (the idea that one race is superior to others) while a student at Ohio State, but the incidents merely strengthened his desire to succeed. At the Big Ten Conference track and field championships at the University of Michigan in 1935, he broke three world records and tied another. His 26 foot 8 1/4-inch broad jump set a record that was not broken for twenty-five years.

Jesse Owens. Reproduced by permission of AP/Wide World Photos.

In 1937 Owens lent his name to a chain of cleaning shops. They prospered until 1939, when the partners fled, leaving Owens with a bankrupt business and heavy debts. He found employment with the Office of Civilian Defense in Philadelphia (1940–1942) as national director of physical education for African Americans. From 1942 to 1946 he was director of minority employment at Ford Motor Company in Detroit, Michigan. He later became a sales executive for a Chicago sporting goods company.

Ambassador of sport

In 1951 Owens accompanied the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team to Berlin at the invitation of the U.S. High Commission and the army. He was appointed secretary of the Illinois Athletic Commission (1952–1955), and was sent on a global goodwill tour as ambassador of sport for the United States. Also in 1955, he was appointed to the Illinois Youth Commission. In 1956 he organized the Junior Olympic Games for youngsters in Chicago between the ages of twelve and seventeen. Owens and his friend, boxer Joe Louis (1914–1981), were active in helping African American youth.

Owens headed his own public relations firm in Chicago, Illinois, and for several years had a jazz program on Chicago radio. He traveled throughout the United States and overseas, lecturing youth groups. Not especially involved in the civil rights movement, which pushed for equal rights among all races, Owens admired civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. (1929–1968). Owens and his childhood sweetheart, whom he had married in 1931, had three daughters.

Forty years after Owens won his gold medals, he was invited to the White House to accept a Medal of Freedom from President Gerald Ford (1913–). The following year, the Jesse Owens International Trophy for amateur athletes was established. In 1979 President Jimmy Carter (1924–) honored Owens with a Living Legend Award.

In the 1970s Owens moved his business from Chicago to Phoenix, Arizona, but as time progressed, his health deteriorated. He died of cancer on March 31, 1980, after a lengthy stay in a Phoenix hospital. He was buried in Chicago several days later.

The highest honor Owens received came a full ten years after his death. Congressman Louis Stokes from Cleveland pushed tirelessly to earn Owens a Congressional Gold Medal. President George Bush (1924–) finally gave the award to Owens's widow in 1990. During the ceremony, President Bush called Owens "an Olympic hero and an American hero every day of his life." Owens's fabled career as a runner again caught public attention in the 1996 Olympic Games—the sixtieth anniversary of his Berlin triumph—as entrepreneurs (risk-taking businessmen) hawked everything from Jesse Owens gambling chips to commemorative (having to do with honoring someone or something) oak tree seedlings similar to the one Owens was awarded as a gold medallist in Berlin.

Racism at home had denied Owens the financial fruits of his victory after the 1936 games, but his triumph in what has been called the most important sports story of the century continued to be an inspiration for modern day Olympians like track stars Michael Johnson (1967–) and Carl Lewis (1961–). In Jet magazine (August 1996), Johnson credited Owens for paving the way for his and other black athletes' victories.

For More Information

Baker, William J. Jesse Owens: An American Life. New York: Free Press, 1986.

Josephson, Judith Pinkerton. Jesse Owens, Track and Field Legend. Springfield, NJ: Enslow, 1997.

Mandell, Richard. The Nazi Olympics. New York: Macmillan, 1971.

Nuwer, Hank. The Legend of Jesse Owens. New York: F. Watts, 1998.

Owens, Jesse. Blackthink: My Life as Black Man and White Man. New York: Morrow, 1970.

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Jesse Owens: 4 Time Olympic Gold Medalist

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During the 1930s, the Great Depression, Jim Crow Era laws, and de facto segregation kept African-Americans in the United States fighting for equality. In Eastern Europe, the Jewish Holocaust was well underway with German ruler Adolf Hitler spearheading a Nazi Regime. 

In 1936, the Summer Olympics were to be played in Germany. Hitler saw this as an opportunity to show the inferiority of non-Aryans. Yet, a young track and field star from Cleveland, Ohio had other plans. 

His name was Jesse Owens and by the end of the Olympics, he'd won four gold medals and refuted Hitler's propaganda. 

Accomplishments 

  • First American to win four Olympic gold medals
  • Earned an honorary doctorate of athletic arts from Ohio State University in 1973. The University awarded Owens with this doctorate for " his unparalleled skill and ability" as an athlete and for "his personification of sportsmanship ideals."
  • 1976 Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded by President Gerald Ford .

On September 12, 1913, James Cleveland “Jesse” Owens was born. Owens’ parents, Henry and Mary Emma were sharecroppers who raised 10 children in Oakville, Ala. By 1920s the Owens family was participating in the Great Migration and settled in Cleveland, Ohio.

A Track Star Is Born

Owens's interest in running track came while attending middle school. His gym teacher, Charles Riley, encouraged Owens to join the track team. Riley taught Owens to train for longer races such as the 100 and 200-yard dashes. Riley continued to work with Owens while he was a high school student. With Riley’s guidance, Owens was able to win every race he entered.

By 1932, Owens was preparing to try out for the U.S. Olympic Team and compete at the Summer Games in Los Angeles. Yet at the Midwestern preliminary trials, Owens was defeated in the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash as well as the long jump. 

Owens did not allow this loss to defeat him. In his senior year of high school, Owens was elected president of the student council and captain of the track team. That year, Owens also placed first in 75 out of 79 races he entered. He also set a new record in the long jump at the interscholastic state finals.

His biggest victory came when he won the long jump, setting a world record in the 220-yard dash and also tied a world record in the 100-yard dash. When Owens returned to Cleveland, he was greeted with a victory parade. 

Ohio State University: Student and Track Star 

Owens chose to attend Ohio State University where he could continue to train and work part-time as a freight elevator operator at the State House. Barred from living in OSU’s dormitory because he was African-American, Owens lives in a boarding house with other African-American students.

Owens trained with Larry Snyder who helped the runner perfect his starting time and altering his long-jump style. In May 1935 , Owens set world records in the 220-yard dash, the 220-yard low hurdles as well as the long jump at the Big Ten Finals held in Ann Arbor, Mich. 

1936 Olympics 

In 1936, James “Jesse” Owens arrived at the Summer Olympics ready to compete. Hosted in Germany at the height of Hitler’s Nazi Regime, the games were filled with controversy. Hitler wanted to use the games for Nazi propaganda and to promote “Aryan racial superiority.” Owens’ performance at the 1936 Olympics refuted all of Hitler’s propaganda. On August 3, 1936, Owners won the 100m sprint. The following day, he won the gold medal for the long jump. On August 5, Owens won the 200m sprint and finally, on August 9 he was added the 4 x 100m relay team. 

Life After the Olympics 

Jesse Owens returned home to the United States with not much fanfare. President Franklin D. Roosevelt never met with Owens, a tradition usually afforded Olympic champions. Yet Owens was not surprised by the lackluster celebration saying, "When I came back to my native country, after all the stories about Hitler, I couldn't ride in the front of the bus….I had to go to the back door. I couldn't live where I wanted. I wasn't invited to shake hands with Hitler, but I wasn't invited to the White House to shake hands with the president, either."

Owens found work racing against cars and horses. He also played for the Harlem Globetrotters. Owens later found success in the field of marketing and spoke at conventions and business meetings.

Personal Life and Death 

Owens married Minnie Ruth Solomon in 1935. The couple had three daughters. Owens died of lung cancer on March 31, 1980, at his home in Arizona. 

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Triumph: Jesse Owens and the Berlin Olympics

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jesse owens biography in english

Explore Jesse Owen’s triumph over Adolf Hitler, and his resilience against racism.

Related content.

How Jesse Owens Foiled Hitler’s Plans for the 1936 Olympics

How Jesse Owens Foiled Hitler’s Plans for the 1936 Olympics

10 Things You May Not Know About Jesse Owens

10 Things You May Not Know About Jesse Owens

“Triumph: Jesse Owens and the Berlin Olympics” is executive produced by LeBron James and Maverick Carter’s award-winning athlete storytelling brand UNINTERRUPTED and Cinemation Studios in association with GroupM Motion Entertainment. It explores the dramatic tale of Owen’s athletic dedication, perseverance, and triumph over Hitler’s Aryan supremacy agenda and his resilience against racism both abroad and at home in the U.S. The documentary also features archival Olympic footage and interviews from Owens, smartly executed animation and first-hand interviews from family members, journalists, historians, and reputable athletes including 9x Olympic Gold Medalist Carl Lewis, and Owen’s daughters Marlene and Beverly Owens, among others.

Set during the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany, and just three-years before the start of WWII, African American track and field athlete Jesse Owens took the world stage and launched into international fame by making Olympic history after winning four gold medals in the 100-meter dash, long jump, 200-meter dash and 4×100-meter dash. This feat made him arguably one of the greatest and most impactful athletes of all time.

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Jesse Owens Biography

Birthday: September 12 , 1913 ( Virgo )

Born In: Oakville, Alabama, United States

James Cleveland Owens, or simply Jesse Owens as the world knows him, was one of the greatest sporting legends who has to his name several world records and achievements. His achievements in 1936 Berlin Olympics track and field competitions remained unmatched for a large period of time, making him as the most glorious track and field athlete of his days. However, sadly, much of the recognition and acknowledgement came late in life or mostly posthumously for Owens, due to the racism meted out to African American community in those days. Nevertheless, one can never overlook or forget his contribution in the 1935 and 1936 Big Ten Championships and most importantly the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. His record at the 1935 Big Ten Championship in the long jump event with a leap of 8.13 m stood for almost 25 years before Ralph Boston broke it in 1960. Also, his four gold medals haul at Berlin Summer Olympics was equalled by Carl Lewis only in 1984. To commemorate his contribution and glorious feat in track and field, a Jesse Owen Awards was created to honor best track and field athlete by the US every year. It is the USA Track and Field's highest accolade that one can achieve. To know more about Jesse Owens life and sporting actions, read on.

Jesse Owens

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Also Known As: James Cleveland Owens

Died At Age: 66

Spouse/Ex-: Minnie Ruth Solomon (m. 1935–1980)

father: Henry Cleveland Owens

mother: Mary Emma Fitzgerald

siblings: Ernest, Henry, Ida, Johnson, Josephine, Lillie, Prentice, Quincy, Sylvester

children: Marlene

Born Country: United States

Quotes By Jesse Owens African American Men

Height: 5'10" (178 cm ), 5'10" Males

Died on: March 31 , 1980

place of death: Tucson, Arizona, United States

Ancestry: Indian American

Grouping of People: Smoker

Cause of Death: Lung Cancer

Notable Alumni: East Technical High School, Fairmont Junior High School

U.S. State: Alabama

education: Ohio State University, East Technical High School, Fairmont Junior High School

awards: 1976 - Presidential Medal of Freedom 1990 - Congressional Gold Medal

You wanted to know

What was jesse owens' impact on the 1936 berlin olympics.

Jesse Owens made history by winning four gold medals in track and field events, defying Adolf Hitler's belief in Aryan supremacy and showcasing African American athletic excellence.

How did Jesse Owens' achievements impact the civil rights movement?

Jesse Owens' success on the world stage challenged racial stereotypes and inspired African Americans to pursue their dreams despite facing discrimination, becoming a symbol of resilience and excellence.

What challenges did Jesse Owens face during his athletic career?

Jesse Owens encountered racism and segregation in both sports and society, overcoming obstacles to become one of the greatest athletes in history through hard work and determination.

What was the significance of Jesse Owens' Olympic performance in terms of sports history?

Jesse Owens' achievements at the 1936 Olympics shattered records and barriers, demonstrating the power of sport to transcend political ideologies and inspire generations of athletes to strive for greatness.

How did Jesse Owens' legacy influence future generations of athletes?

Jesse Owens' legacy as a trailblazer for African American athletes and a symbol of sportsmanship and perseverance continues to inspire individuals worldwide to overcome adversity and pursue their dreams with passion and dedication.

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Jesse Owens was known for his exceptional speed and agility, but he also had a unique superstition of carrying around a lucky rabbit's foot before his races.

Owens was not only a talented athlete, but he also had a passion for music and played the piano in his spare time.

Despite facing discrimination and segregation during his athletic career, Owens maintained a positive attitude and used his platform to advocate for equality and social justice.

Owens had a soft spot for animals and was known to rescue stray dogs and cats, showing his compassionate nature off the track.

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The Inspiring Story Of Jesse Owens And His Historic Triumphs At The 1936 Olympics

After winning four gold medals at the 1936 olympic games in berlin and upending hitler's ideas about aryan supremacy, jesse owens became one of the most legendary athletes in history..

Jesse Owens Olympics

N.N./Wikimedia Commons Jesse Owens won four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Germany.

In 1936, Nazi Germany invited the world to Berlin for the Olympic Games. The Nazis hoped to legitimize their regime and showcase the athletic prowess of the Aryan “master race.” But at the 1936 Olympics, Jesse Owens — a Black American track star — blew the Nazis’ plans out of the water.

Not only did Owens out-perform German athletes during the 1936 Olympics, but he also became the first American track and field athlete to win four gold medals at a single Olympic Games. Owens triumphed in the 100-meter run, the 200-meter run, the long jump, and the 4×100-meter relay.

On just the second day of the competition, Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels angrily wrote in his diary, “We Germans won a gold medal, the Americans three, of which two were Negroes. That is a disgrace. White people should be ashamed of themselves.”

This is the story of Jesse Owens and the 1936 Olympics.

Jesse Owens’ Path To The Olympics

Born to a sharecropping family on September 12, 1913, in Oakville, Alabama, James Cleveland Owens demonstrated his ability as a track star at a young age. After he and his family moved to Cleveland in 1922 — where his nickname “J.C.” became “Jesse” — Owens started setting records at Fairmount Junior High School. According to Case Western Reserve University , Owens ran the 100-yard dash in just 11 seconds. And before long, he had set school records in the high jump and the long jump as well.

Young Jesse Owens

The Ohio State University Archives Jesse Owens, in the third row with an asterisk on his jersey, started setting track records in junior high school.

From there, Owens enjoyed a meteoric rise. In 1933, he won three events at the National Interscholastic Championships. In 1935, he competed for Ohio State University (Columbus) in a Western Conference track and field meet, where he matched the world record for the 100-yard dash and broke world records for the 220-yard dash, the 220-yard low hurdles, and the long jump.

Then, in 1936, Jesse Owens and 311 other American athletes prepared to travel to Berlin, Germany for the Olympics. That year, the games would take place under the shadow of the horrific Nazi regime.

The Controversy Over The 1936 Olympic Games

Uncertainty about the 1936 Olympics raged on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. The International Olympic Committee had awarded the 1936 Summer Olympics to Berlin back in 1931 as an acknowledgement of Germany’s return to the international community after World War I, but Adolf Hitler — who’d come to power in 1933 — was unsure about hosting the games.

Hitler saw little value in the Olympics and their embrace of internationalism, but the Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, convinced him of their value. Goebbels argued that the games could advance the Nazi cause and showcase Aryans as the true “master race.” Indeed, the international spectacle of the Olympics would, in many ways, legitimize the Nazis.

1936 Olympics

National Archives and Records Administration The lighting of the Olympic flame at the 1936 Olympics.

Meanwhile, a number of countries weighed boycotting the 1936 Olympic Games. The international community was aware of the Nazi regime’s growing discrimination against Jews, which extended to the world of sports. But even though the American Olympic Committee’s president, Avery Brundage, initially expressed support for a boycott, he changed his mind after the Nazis invited him to tour Berlin’s newly constructed sports complex.

According to a Washington Post report from 1996, the Nazis also promised Brundage that 23 Jewish athletes would be invited to the Olympic training center. In fact, only one Jewish athlete, Helene Mayer, was allowed to compete for Nazi Germany during the Olympic Games, and that was only because the Nazis said that she had two “Aryan” grandparents.

It was under this dark cloud of antisemitism and racism that the story of Jesse Owens and the 1936 Olympics truly began.

Jesse Owens And The 1936 Olympics

Nazi Flags In Downtown Berlin

FOTO:FORTEPAN/Lőrincze Judit/Wikimedia Commons Nazi flags in Berlin during the 1936 Olympics.

As tourists and athletes from around the world poured into Berlin in the summer of 1936, they saw a city full of Olympic flags and swastikas. They didn’t see anti-Jewish signs, which the Nazis had removed ahead of the Olympics, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum .

On August 1st, the 1936 Olympic Games began to great fanfare in Berlin. And just a few days later, Jesse Owens would prove the hollowness of the Nazis’ racist mythology about Aryan supremacy.

On August 3rd, Jesse Owens raced to gold in the 100-meter dash. On August 4th, he defeated German champion Luz Long in the long jump (and later ended up forming an unlikely friendship with Long, who proudly walked arm-in-arm with Owens around the stadium and posed for several pictures with him). On August 5th, Owens won the 200-meter run, and then on August 9th, he nabbed his fourth gold medal in the 4×100-meter relay.

His fourth win was bittersweet, however, as he knew that he and another Black athlete were replacing two Jewish athletes who were supposed to run in that race. Owens initially tried to protest this last-minute switch, but he was berated by his coach, who ordered him to run: “You’ll do as you’re told.”

Jesse Owens At The 1936 Olympics

German Federal Archives At the 1936 Olympics, Jesse Owens defeated his German competitor during the long jump — and later befriended him.

Despite his conflicted feelings about his last win, Jesse Owens became the first American track and field athlete to win four gold medals in a single Olympics, a record that would stand until 1984. And his victories stood in the face of the smug Nazi sentiment about Aryan racial superiority.

In fact, rumors quickly spread that Hitler had deliberately snubbed Jesse Owens by refusing to shake his hand after his victories. The truth was that Hitler had not publicly congratulated any athletes after the first day of the competition, when he was requested to treat competitors equally.

Adolf Hitler

Alpha Historica/Alamy Stock Photo Adolf Hitler at the 1936 Olympics. Rumors spread that he’d snubbed Jesse Owens, though this appeared to be untrue.

Goebbels, however, was outraged. In his newspaper, Der Angriff (“The Attack”), he bitingly suggested that the Americans would not have even made it to the games without their “black auxiliaries” and that “the world would have described the Yankees as a great disappointment.”

At the 1936 Olympic Games, Jesse Owens made his mark on history. But he could not change the trajectory of Nazi Germany . And ultimately, the Olympics could not change his personal trajectory, either.

“I Couldn’t Ride In The Front Of The Bus”

Though Jesse Owens was the most successful individual athlete of the 1936 Olympics, Germany ultimately won the most total medals. And the Olympics had succeeded in legitimizing the Nazi regime. In the aftermath, The New York Times reported that the games had humanized Germans and that, after World War I, Germany was “back in the fold of nations.”

Crowd Saluting Hitler

National Archives and Records Administration The crowd saluting Adolf Hitler at the opening of the 1936 Olympics.

But the Nazis’ persecution of Jews picked up as soon as the international tourists and athletes had gone home. In fact, just two days after the Olympics ended, the head of the Olympic Village died by suicide after being dismissed from the military on account of his Jewish heritage.

Almost exactly three years later, World War II would officially begin in 1939 with the Nazi invasion of Poland.

Meanwhile, Jesse Owens found that his place in American society hadn’t changed much, despite his incredible performance at the Olympics. Though he had made the nation proud, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt failed to meet with Owens and congratulate him for winning four gold medals.

“When I came back to my native country, after all the stories about Hitler, I couldn’t ride in the front of the bus,” Jesse Owens remarked about his treatment after the Olympics. “I had to go to the back door. I couldn’t live where I wanted. I wasn’t invited to shake hands with Hitler, but I wasn’t invited to the White House to shake hands with the president, either.”

And when Owens heard about rumors that Hitler had snubbed him at the Olympics, he said, “Hitler didn’t snub me — it was our president who snubbed me… The president didn’t even send me a telegram.”

In the aftermath of the 1936 Olympics, Jesse Owens struggled to find his place. He withdrew from university and worked odd jobs as his fame diminished. He raced against horses and opened up a dry cleaning business, but later wrote books, traveled the world as a goodwill ambassador, and served as secretary of the Illinois State Athletic Commission.

Jesse Owens In The 1936 Olympics

German Federal Archives Jesse Owens salutes the American flag at the 1936 Olympics after winning the long jump.

In 1976 — long after the Nazi regime had fallen — Jesse Owens received his long-awaited congratulations from a president. Then, President Gerald R. Ford awarded Owens the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

“In 1936, when Adolf Hitler was trying to turn the games into a spectacle that would glorify racist dogma of the Nazi state, there was a strong movement in the United States against our participation in the games,” Ford said.

“As it turned out, U.S. participation in those Olympics provided a sharp rebuke of Hitler’s racist rubbish. Five Black American athletes won eight gold medals in track and field. One American athlete in particular proved that excellence knows no racial or political limits. That man is Jesse Owens.”

Owens died on March 31, 1980 at age 66 due to lung cancer. But his legacy as an athlete lives on. Under the shadow of the Nazi regime, he proved that their policies were exactly what Ford said — rubbish. Beneath the swastika flags of Nazi Germany, Jesse Owens proved the falseness of Nazi ideology. In one competition after another, the son of sharecroppers raced to gold.

After reading about Jesse Owens and the 1936 Olympics, discover the story of Bessie Coleman , the first Black female pilot in U.S. history. Or, learn about Bass Reeves , the Black Deputy U.S. Marshal who patrolled the Wild West.

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Jesse owens, jesse owens - the unstoppable athlete who triumphed over adversity and defied the odds.

Jesse Owens was a record-setting track and field athlete who transcended sports and triumphed over discrimination. As depicted in the movie Race , Owens captivated the world’s attention through his exceptional performances at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. And that only touches on Jesse Owens’ accomplishments and contributions to his sport and to the world.

The 1936 Berlin Olympics took place during Hitler’s Nazi regime.  Owens provided a demonstrative rebuke of Hitler’s ideology by winning no less than four gold medals at the Olympic games. In the process, Owens shattered racial stereotypes in a hostile environment and showcased the capabilities of black athletes on a global stage.

Owens also set world records in various track and field events during his career. Owens established three world records and tied another in the span of 45 minutes at the Big Ten Championships in 1935.

Jesse Owens’ achievements far-exceeded mere athletic accomplishments, world-records or Olympic gold medals:  he symbolized what was possible, he broke down barriers, and he contributed to civil rights issues and the right for equality throughout the world.

While he died on March 31, 1980, Jesse Owens’ courage, accomplishments, and legacy live on forever.

jesse owens biography in english

Jesse Owens - The Buckeye Bullet

Oakville, alabama, ohio state university, physical attributes, henry & emma, 6 brothers & 3 sisters, gloria, beverly & marlene, in his own words, jesse owens describes the stages of the 100-yard dash.

“To a sprinter, the hundred-yard dash is over in three seconds, not nine or ten.

The first ‘second’ is when you come out of the blocks. The next is when you look up and take your first few strides to attain gain position. By that time the race is actually about half over.

The final ‘second’ – the longest slice of time in the world for an athlete – is that last half of the race, when you really bear down and see what you’re made of. It seems to take an eternity, yet is all over before you can think what’s happening.”

© 2024 Jesse Owens Trust c/o Luminary Group LLC

Jesse Owens: 5 Facts About the Groundbreaking Olympic Athlete

Jesse Owens

1. As a child, Owens nearly died from what likely was a fibrous tumor

Owens struggled with poor health as a child, regularly reeling from such illnesses as chronic bronchial congestion and pneumonia. But it was a lump on the frail 5-year-old’s chest that swelled over the course of several days that concerned his family the most. With no money to see a doctor, Owens' mother, Emma, eventually cut the lump off herself with a kitchen knife. The golfball-sized incision spurted blood for days, but Owens survived.

2. In 1935, a rival had supplanted Owens as America's best hope for track and field gold

Ohio State's Owens burst into the national spotlight in May 1935 when he set three world records and tied another at the Big Ten Championships, but that summer he often found himself on the heels of Temple University’s Eulace Peacock. Peacock bested Owens in the long jump and the 100 meters on July 4th, and at one point he beat Owens in five consecutive races. Former Olympic gold medalist Charles Paddock noted that Peacock was the only clear-cut choice for an Olympic berth, and Owens himself wondered how he could beat his new rival. But Peacock suffered a pulled hamstring later that summer and tore the hamstring the following April and never got the chance to compete in the Olympics.

Jesse Owens racing

3. Owens was the first prominent Adidas pitchman

The shoe line that would eventually be known as "Adidas" was founded in 1924 by German brothers Rudolf and Adolf “Adi” Dassler. Adi Dassler sought to promote his athletic footwear among the world's top athletes at the 1936 Olympics, with Owens reportedly one of his top targets. It is unclear exactly how Owens came into possession of the shoes; some stories indicate that Dassler approached him in the Olympic Village; others note that he asked German coach Jo Waitzer to pass on a few pairs to the American star. Whatever the means, Owens raced into the record books with his new shoes, which quickly became a popular brand, thanks to its association with the gold medalist.

4. One of the most famous moments of his record-breaking Olympics was a myth

Owens fouled the first two attempts of the broad jump, leaving him with just one opportunity to nail a clean jump to advance to the next round. According to the legend, German champion Luz Long helped Owens pinpoint a spot well behind the takeoff board, helping the American safely make his final attempt and setting the stage for their spectacular duel. It's a great anecdote about the triumph of sportsmanship and humanity, but unfortunately it wasn't true. Famed sportswriter Grantland Rice watched Owens through his binoculars during the qualifying round and never saw Owens and Long interact. Years later, when asked point blank about the moment by Tom Ecker, author of Olympic Facts and Fables , Owens admitted to fudging the truth. But the heart-lifting camaraderie between the two competitors wasn't entirely a myth, as cameras captured them walking arm-in-arm after Owens outlasted Luz to win the gold medal.

5. Owens made a triumphant return to Berlin in 1951

The post-Olympic years were difficult for the decorated champion, who competed in such sideshow events as racing horses and accepted several demeaning jobs to earn a living. Now touring with the Harlem Globetrotters, Owens received a rousing ovation before speaking to 75,000 fans at the Olympic Stadium. Acting mayor of West Berlin Walter Schreiber then took the microphone to proclaim, "Hitler wouldn't shake your hand—I give you both hands!" and reached for Owens' arms. Although the stories about Hitler refusing to acknowledge the African American Olympian may also have been exaggerated, the dramatic moment fit right into Owens’ wheelhouse, and he filed it away for use in what eventually became a successful public-speaking career.

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Jesse Owens Biography

jesse owens biography in english

  • Occupation: Track and Field Athlete
  • Born: September 12, 1913 in Oakville, Alabama
  • Died: March 31, 1980 in Tucson, Arizona
  • Nickname: The Buckeye Bullet, Jesse
  • Best known for: Winning four Gold Medals in the 1936 Olympic Games

jesse owens biography in english

  • He was a member of the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity in college.
  • At Ohio State, he was known as the "Buckeye Bullet".
  • He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1976 by President Ford.
  • The Jesse Owens Award is given out annually to the top track and field athlete in the United States.
  • There have been two US Postage stamps (1990, 1998) in honor of Jesse Owens.
  • The track and field stadium at Ohio State is called the Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium.
  • He was married to Minnie Ruth Solomon in 1935. They had three daughters together.
  • ESPN ranked Jesse as the sixth greatest North American athlete of the twentieth century.
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Jesse Owens and the greatest 45 minutes in sport

On 25th of May 1935 the 21-year-old Owens averaged a world record every nine minutes at the Big Ten Championships. Five world leading marks and one world equalling effort, all completed with an injury severe enough for his coach to seriously consider pulling him out of the meet at the last minute.

Jesse Owens and the greatest 45 minutes in sport

Jesse Owens set five world records and equalled a sixth in 45 minutes. Yes, five world record-breaking performances and a world record-equalling one in three-quarters of an hour. It bears repeating.

While Owens won four gold medals in seven days at the Berlin 1936 Olympic Games – a truly momentous feat achieved in the face of genuine adversity – it has, in pure sporting terms, been matched. Compatriot Carl Lewis followed in Owens’ footsteps 48 years later by doing the 100m, 200m, long jump and 4x100m quadruple at the Los Angeles Games. In contrast, Owens’ efforts in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on 25 May 1935 at the Big Ten Championships (a leading annual USA intercollegiate athletics meet) stand alone in all sport.

Here, we take an in-depth look at what Michael Johnson, the four-time Olympic champion and the only man ever to win a 200m/400m double at an Olympic Games, described as “one of the most amazing feats in any sport”.

Five days before the Big Ten Championships, Owens fell down the stairs of his dormitory at Ohio State University. A badly bruised lower back made him an immediate doubt for the upcoming meet.

The Alabama man’s physical condition had not improved much by the morning of 25 May. According to reports at the time, the sprint star had to be helped in and out of the car in which some of the team had travelled to Ann Arbor. Once onsite, Owens could barely bend enough to touch his knees. He even took a 30-minute hot bath as a final attempt to loosen his limbs.

Ultimately, Larry Snyder, the Ohio State coach, agreed to let his charge compete only on the agreement that they assess his condition on an event-by-event basis. It proved an astute call.

15:15 100 yard dash – 9.4 seconds – equalled the world record

Having been unable to warm up or stretch, Owens said later that as he settled on his haunches for the 100, the pain he had been feeling “disappeared, as if by a miracle”. There was certainly something divine about what came next.

Slow at the start, Owens got into his smooth flowing stride quickly and was ahead by the 30-yard mark. He crossed the line in 9.4 seconds, equalling the world record.

An interesting aside reported by Sports Illustrated , is that more than half the official timers actually clocked Owens at 9.3 seconds. But the rules of the day stipulated that each runner got attributed the slowest time recorded. No one would run 9.3 seconds for another 13 years.

15:25 long jump – 8.13m – world record No.1

Owens’ schedule posed considerable logistical challenges, so considerable in fact that the 21-year-old knew from the beginning that he would only have time for one attempt at the long jump.

One proved enough. Owens flew down the runway and soared out to a breath-taking 8.13m. The first man to breach the 8m barrier, Owens had broken the world record by a massive 15cm – only Bob Beamon with his legendary leap at the Mexico City 1968 Olympic Games has ever extended the world-leading mark by more.

Owens’ record stood for 25 years and would have placed him sixth in the Rio 2016 Olympic Games finals, some 81 years later.

15:34 220 yards dash (200m dash) – 20.3 seconds – world records No. 2 & 3

Less than 10 minutes after setting a world record that would stand for a quarter of a century, Owens lined up for the 220-yard dash. In the USA this distance, until the 1960s, was often run in a straight line, with times also taken for the straight 200m.

The graceful, free-flowing Owens reportedly finished so far clear of his opponents that it looked like he was running on his own. He smashed the world record by three-tenths of a second, finishing in 20.3 seconds. With the 200m mark in his pocket too, it was two world records in one race.

16:00 220 yard low hurdles (200m low hurdles) – 22.6 seconds – world records No.4 & 5

Owens arguably saved the very best until last. Some special athletes have combined sprinting with long jump. The 22-year-old Jarrion Lawson, fourth in the long jump at the Rio 2016 Games and 2016 NCAA 100m and 200m champion, is the latest in a line that also includes Carl Lewis. But almost no athlete has been a sprinter, jumper and a hurdler.

In front of 5,000 or 10,000 (depending on who you ask) by now very excited fans packed in to the Ferry Field stadium, Owens, bad back and all, pulled off his tracksuit for a fourth time.

Exactly 22.6 seconds later he was holder of two hurdling world records. The first man to break 23 seconds, Owens was almost 5m ahead of his nearest rival.

Finally finished, the young superstar had to climb out of the changing room to escape his besotted fans. Of all his achievements, none can compete with those magical 45 minutes.

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Jesse Owens, 1913- 1980: He Was Once the World's Fastest Runner

This is Gwen Outen. And this is Steve Ember with PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English. Every week we tell about a person who was important in the history of the United States. Today we tell the story of athlete Jesse Owens. He once was the fastest runner in the world.

In the summer of nineteen thirty-six, people all over the world heard the name of Jesse Owens. That summer, Owens joined the best athletes from fifty nations to compete in the Olympic games. They met in Berlin, Germany. There was special interest in the Olympic games that year.

Adolf Hitler was the leader of Germany. Hitler and his Nazi party believed that white people -- especially German people – were the best race of people on Earth. They believed that other races of people -- especially those with dark skin -- were almost less than human.

In the summer of nineteen thirty-six, Hitler wanted to prove his beliefs to the world. He wanted to show that German athletes could win every important competition. After all, only a few weeks before the Olympics, German boxer Max Schmeling had defeated the great American heavyweight Joe Louis, a black man.

Jesse Owens was black, too. Until nineteen thirty-six, very few black athletes had competed in the Olympics for the United States. Owens was proud to be on the team. He was very sure of his ability.

Owens spent one week competing in four different Olympic track and field events in Berlin. During that time, he did not think much about the color of his skin, or about Adolf Hitler.

Owens said later: "I was looking only at the finish line. I thought of all the years of practice and competition, and of all who believed in me."

We do not know what Hitler thought of Jesse Owens. No one recorded what he said about this black man who ran faster and jumped farther than any man of any color at the Olympic games. But we can still see Jesse Owens as Hitler saw him. For at Hitler's request, motion pictures were made of the Berlin Olympic games.

The films show Jesse Owens as a thin, but powerfully-built young man with smooth brown skin and short hair. When he ran, he seemed to move without effort. When he jumped, as one observer said, he seemed to jump clear out of Germany.

Jesse Owens won the highest award -- the Gold Medal -- in all four of the Olympic competitions he entered. In the one-hundred meter run, he equaled the fastest time ever run in that Olympic event. In the long jump and the two-hundred meter run, he set new Olympic records. And as part of a four-man team, he helped set a new world record for the four-hundred meter relay race. He was the first American in the history of Olympic track and field events to win four Gold Medals in a single Olympics.

Owens's Olympic victories made him a hero. He returned home to parades in New York City and Columbus, Ohio, where he attended the state university. Businessmen paid him for the right to use his name on their stores. No one, however, offered him a permanent job.

For many years after the nineteen thirty-six Olympic games, Jesse Owens survived as best he could. He worked at small jobs. He even used his athletic abilities, but in a sad way. He earned money by running races against people, motorcycles and horses. He and his wife and three daughters saw both good times and bad times.

Poverty was not new to James Cleveland Owens. He was born in nineteen thirteen on a farm in the southern state of Alabama. He was the youngest of thirteen children. His parents did not own the farm, and earned little money. Jesse remembered that there was rarely enough food to eat. And there was not enough fuel to heat the house in winter.

Some of Jesse's brothers and sisters died while still young. Jesse was a sickly child. Partly because of this, and partly because of the racial hatred they saw around them, Jesse's parents decided to leave the South. They moved north, to Cleveland, Ohio, when Jesse was eight years old. The large family lived in a few small rooms in a part of the city that was neither friendly nor pleasant to look at.

Jesse's father was no longer young or strong. He was unable to find a good job. Most of the time, no one would give him any work at all. But Jesse's older brothers were able to get jobs in factories. So life was a little better than it had been in the South.

Jesse, especially, was lucky. He entered a school where one white teacher, Charles Riley, took a special interest in him. Jesse looked thin and unhealthy, and Riley wanted to make him stronger. Through the years that Jesse was in school, Riley brought him food in the morning. Riley often invited the boy to eat with his family in the evening. And every day before school, he taught Owens how to run like an athlete.

At first, the idea was only to make the boy stronger. But soon Riley saw that Jesse was a champion. By the time Jesse had completed high school, his name was known across the nation. Ohio State University wanted him to attend college there. While at Ohio State, he set new world records in several track and field events. And he was accepted as a member of the United States Olympic team.

Owens always remembered the white man who helped change his life. Charles Riley did not seem to care what color a person's skin was. Owens learned to think the same way.

Later in life, Owens put all his energy into working with young people. He wanted to tell them some of the things he had

learned about life, work and success: That it is important to choose a goal and always work toward it. That there are good people in the world who will help you to reach your goal. That if you try again and again, you will succeed.

People who heard Owens's speeches said he spoke almost as well as he ran. Owens received awards for his work with boys and girls. The United States government sent him around the world as a kind of sports ambassador. The International Olympic Committee asked for his advice.

In about nineteen seventy, Jesse Owens wrote a book in which he told about his life. It was called "Blackthink." In the book, Owens denounced young black militants who blamed society for their troubles. He said young black people had the same chance to succeed in the United States as white people. Many black civil rights activists reacted angrily to these statements. They said what Owens had written was not true for everyone.

Owens later admitted that he had been wrong. He saw that not all blacks were given the same chances and help that he had been given. In a second book, Owens tried to explain what he had meant in his first book. He called it "I Have Changed." Owens said that, in his earlier book, he did not write about life as it was for everyone, but about life as it was for him.

He said he truly wanted to believe that if you think you can succeed--- and you really try -- then you have a chance. If you do not think you have a chance, then you probably will fail. He said these beliefs had worked for him. And he wanted all young people to believe them, too.

These were the same beliefs he tried to express when he spoke around the world about being an Olympic athlete. "The road to the Olympics," he said, "leads to no city, no country. It goes far beyond New York or Moscow, ancient Greece or Nazi Germany. The road to the Olympics leads -- in the end -- to the best within us."

In nineteen seventy-six, President Gerald Ford awarded Jesse Owens the Medal of Freedom. This is the highest honor an American civilian can receive. Jesse Owens died of cancer in nineteen eighty. His family members operate the Jesse Owens Foundation. It provides financial aid and support for young people to help them reach their goals in life.

This program was written by Barbara Dash. It was produced by Lawan Davis. This is Steve Ember.

And this is Gwen Outen. Listen again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

This page is part of Stories About People which is part of Interesting Things for ESL Students .






Jesse Owens, whose four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin made him perhaps the greatest and most famous athlete in track and field history, died of lung cancer yesterday in Tucson, Ariz. He was 66 years old.

In Berlin, Mr. Owens, who was black, scored a triumph that would come to be regarded as not only athletic but also political. Adolf Hitler had intended the Berlin Games to be a showcase for the Nazi doctrine of Aryan supremacy.

A member of what the Nazis mockingly called America's "black auxiliaries," Mr. Owens achieved a feat unmatched in modern times in Olympic track competition. The year before, with a wrenched back so painful that he could not dress or undress without help, he broke five world records and equaled a sixth, all within 45 minutes.

But the Jesse Owens best remembered by many Americans was a public speaker with the ringing, inspirational delivery of an evangelist. Later in his life, he traveled 200,000 miles a year making two or three speeches a week, mostly to sales meetings and conventions, and primarily to white audiences. With his own public relations and marketing concern, he earned more than $100,000 a year.

Mr. Owens, a pack-a-day cigarette smoker for 35 years, had been hospitalized on and off since last Dec. 12. Doctors said the cancer was inoperable, and since January he had received radiation and chemotherapy treatment at hospitals in Phoenix and Tucson.

He re-entered the University of Arizona Health Sciences Center in Tucson a week ago. He lapsed into a coma Saturday night and died at 3:40 A.M., Tucson time, yesterday without having regained consciousness. His wife, Ruth, and other family members were at his bedside.

Dr. Stephen E. Jones of the university hospital, who headed the medical team treating Mr. Owens, said his patient had remained "remarkably optimistic and hopeful that he was going to survive." However, Dr. Jones said, there was no positive response to experimental drugs tried on Mr. Owens.

The White House issued a statement yesterday in which President Carter said, "Perhaps no athlete better symbolized the human struggle against tyranny, poverty and racial bigotry."

In Vienna, Simon Wiesenthal, who has spent years tracking former Nazis, proposed that an avenue leading to the Olympic Stadium, now in West Berlin, be renamed for Mr. Owens. Mr. Wiesenthal said that when he made similar suggestions in the past, he was told that streets could not be named for living persons.

In Phoenix, which had become his hometown, Mr. Owens's body will lie in state tomorrow in the Capitol Rotunda. His burial will be in Chicago, but details were still pending late yesterday.

James Cleveland Owens was born Sept. 12, 1913, in Danville, Ala., the son of a sharecropper and the grandson of slaves. The youngster picked cotton until he and his family moved to Cleveland when he was 9. There a schoolteacher asked the youth his name.

"J.C." he replied.

She thought he had said "Jesse," and he had a new name.

He ran his first race at age 13. He became a nationally known sprinter at East Technical High School in Cleveland, slim and lithe at 163 pounds. He ran with fluid grace. There were no starting blocks then; sprinters merely dug holes at the starting line in tracks of cinder or dirt.

After high school, he went to Ohio State University, paying his way as a $100-a-month night elevator operator because he had no athletic scholarship. As a sophomore, in his first Big Ten championships, he achieved a harvest of records even greater than the Olympic glory he would attain a year later.

A week before the Big Ten meet, which was held in Ann Arbor, Mich., Mr. Owens and a fraternity brother were wrestling playfully when they tumbled down a flight of stairs. Mr. Owens's back hurt so much that he could not work out all week. Coach Larry Snyder and teammates had to help him in and out of the car that drove him to the track for the meet.

There, in a vain attempt to lessen the back pain, he sat for half an hour in a hot tub. He did not warm up or even stretch. At the last minute, he rejected suggestions that he withdraw from the meet and said he would try, event by event.

He tried, and the results are in the record book. On May 25, 1935, from 3:15 to 4 P.M., Jesse Owens successively equaled the world record for the 100-yard dash (9.4 seconds), broke the world record for the broad jump, now called the long jump, with his only attempt (26 feet 8 1/4 inches, which remained the record for 25 years), broke the world record for the 220-yard dash (20.3 seconds, which also bettered the record for 200 meters) and broke the world record for the 220-yard low hurdles (22.6 seconds, which also bettered the record for the 200-meter low hurdles).

Kenneth L. (Tug) Wilson, the Big Ten commissioner, watched in awe and said: "He is a floating wonder, just like he had wings."

The next year, with the Italians occupying Ethiopia, the Japanese in Manchuria, the Germans moving into the Rhineland and a civil war starting in Spain, the Olympic Games were held in Berlin. Despite pleas that the United States boycott the Olympics to protest Nazi racial policies, American officials voted to participate.

The United States Olympic track team, of 66 athletes, included 10 blacks. The Nazis derided the Americans for relying on what the Nazis called an inferior race, but of the 11 individual gold medals in track won by the American men, six were won by blacks.

The hero was Mr. Owens. He won the 100-meter dash in 10.3 seconds, the 200-meter dash in 20.7 seconds and the broad jump at 26 feet 5 1/2 inches, and he led off for the United States team that won the 400-meter relay in 39.8 seconds.

His individual performances broke two Olympic records and, except for an excessive following wind, would have broken the third. The relay team broke the world record. His 100-meter and 200-meter times would have won Olympic medals through 1964, his broad- jump performance through 1968.

Actually, Mr. Owens had not been scheduled to run in the relay. Marty Glickman and Sam Stoller were, but American Olympic officials, led by Avery Brundage, wanted to avoid offending the Nazis. They replaced Mr. Glickman and Mr. Stoller, both Jews, with Mr. Owens and Ralph Metcalfe, both blacks.

Hitler did not congratulate any of the American black winners, a subject to which Mr,. Owens addressed himself for the rest of his life.

"It was all right with me," he said years later, "I didn't go to Berlin to shake hands with him, anyway. All I know is that I'm here now, and Hitler isn't.

"When I came back, after all those stories about Hitler and his snub, I came back to my native country, and I couldn't ride in the front of the bus. I had to go to the back door. I couldn't live where I wanted. Now what's the difference?"

Having returned from Berlin, he received no telephone call from President Franklin D. Roosevelt, was not asked to visit the White House. Official recognition from his own country did not come until 1976, when President Gerald R. Ford presented him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Three years later, President Carter gave him the Living Legends Award.

Nor were there any lucrative contracts for an Olympic hero after the 1936 Games. Mr. Owens became a playground janitor because he could not find a better job. He ended his career as an amateur runner and accepted money to race against cars, trucks, motorcycles, horses and dogs. He toured with the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team.

"Sure, it bothered me," he said later. "But at least it was an honest living. I had to eat."

In time, the four gold medals changed his life.

"They have kept me alive over the years," he once said. "Time has stood still for me. That golden moment dies hard."

He became a disk jockey, then ran his public relations and marketing concern, first in Chicago and then in Phoenix.

He also became celebrated as a speaker, using about five basic speeches with interchangeable parts. Each speech praised the virtues of patriotism, clean living and fair play. His delivery was old-fashioned spellbinding, a far cry from the days when he stuttered. Even in casual conversations, he spoke in sweeping tones.

"When he enters a room," wrote Jon Hendershott in Track and Field News, "he doesn't so much take it over as envelop it."

William Oscar Johnson, writing in Sports Illustrated, described him as "a kind of all-round super combination of 19th-century spellbinder and 20th-century plastic p.r. man, full-time banquet guest, eternal glad-hander, evangelistic small-talker. . .what you might call a professional good example."

Not everyone agreed. During the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, when Mr. Owens attempted to mediate with militant American black athletes on behalf of the United States Olympic Committee, critics called him "Uncle Tom." He wrote a 1970 book, "Blackthink," decrying racial militancy, and a 1972 book, "I Have Changed," saying the ideas in his first book were wrong.

In his later years, Mr. Owens walked two miles every morning and swam and lifted weights at the Phoenix Y.M.C.A. He weighed 180 pounds.

"I don't jog," he said, "because I can't run flat-footed. And at 60 years old you're crazy to be out there running."

Any black who strives to achieve in this country should think in terms of not only himself but also how he can reach down and grab another black child and pull him to the top of the mountain where he is. This is what a gold medal does to you.

Regardless of his color, a man who becomes a recognized athlete has to learn to walk 10 feet tall. But he must have his dignity off the athletic field.

Material reward is not all there is. How many meals can a man eat? How many cars can he drive? In how many beds can he sleep? All of life's wonders are not reflected in material wealth.

We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline and effort. These things apply to everyday life. You learn not only the sport but things like respect of others, ethics in life, how you are going to live, how you treat your fellow man, how you live with your fellow man.

You think about the number of years you have worked to the point where you are able to stand on that day to represent your nation. It's a nervous, a terrible feeling. You feel, as you stand there, as if your legs can't carry the weight of your body. Your stomach isn't there, and your mouth is dry, and your hands are wet with perspiration. And you begin to think in terms of all those years that you have worked. In my particular case, the 100 meters, as you look down the field 109 yards 2 feet away, and recognizing that after eight years of hard work that this is the point that I had reached and that all was going to be over in 10 seconds. Those are great moments in the lives of individuals.




jesse owens biography in english

Jesse Owens

  • Born September 12 , 1913 · Oakville, Alabama, USA
  • Died March 31 , 1980 · Phoenix, Arizona, USA (lung cancer)
  • Birth name James Cleveland Owens
  • Black Magic.
  • Height 5′ 10″ (1.78 m)
  • Jesse Owens, arguably the most popular American track and field star in history, was -- along with his contemporary, world's heavyweight champion Joe Louis -- one of the first African Americans to change white society's perception of both black athletes and, more importantly, people of color. The future Olympic champion was born James Cleveland Owens on September 12, 1913 in Oakville, Alabama, the youngest of 10 children born to sharecroppers Henry and Emma Owens. When young "J.C." as he was called was eight years old, his parents decided to abandon their small hometown and flee the sharecropper's life of peonage (legal in the U.S. until a 1938 Supreme Court decision outlawed it) by moving north to Cleveland, Ohio to find a better way of life, far away from the Jim Crow segregated south. J.C. was enrolled in a public school, and on his first day of school, the teacher heard his name as "Jesse", which was what he would be known as instead of J.C. for the rest of his life. Prosperity did not come with the move to Cleveland as southern blacks were to find that racism was prevalent up north too, and Owens had to work while attending school to help support his family. Because he had to work after school, his high school track coach would meet him in the mornings to train him, due to his great talent. He was recruited by many colleges, but decided to go to the University of Ohio, but without a scholarship, he had to again work his way through school. In addition, he had to face discrimination daily on campus and during the travels to track meets, as America was still in the throes of legal segregation. Owens married his high school sweetheart, Ruth Solomon, in 1935, and they eventually had three daughters together. At the Big Ten meet in Ann Arbor on May 25, 1935, Owens set three world records and tied a fourth in less than an hour. Owens tied the record in the 100-yard dash at 9.4 seconds, and set records in the broad jump (26 feet 8 1/4 inches), the 220-yard dash (20.3 seconds) and the 220-yard low hurdles (22.6 seconds). The stage was set for Berlin. The Berlin Olympics of 1936 were held in Adolf Hitler 's Nazi Germany, and Hitler's Nazi Party used the event as a soapbox to promulgate the theory of "Aryan" racial superiority. Hitler was spectacularly shown up by Jesse Owens and other African American athletes, members of a so-called "inferior" race. Despite the hostile atmosphere, Owens triumphed in the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash and the broad jump. He replaced a Jewish-American member of the 400-meter relay team that went on to win the Gold Medal. In three of his events, Owens -- who became the first American in the history of track and field to win four gold medals in a single Olympics, a feat not duplicated until 1984, when Carl Lewis won gold medals in the same events at the Warsaw Pact nations-free 1984 Summer Olympics) -- established Olympic records. It is disputed whether Owens shook hands with Hitler. By the end of the games, the German fans cheered for him. In fact, in his 1970 autobiography "The Jesse Owens Story", Owens claimed that the Fuhrer himself waved to him. Owens' life after the Olympics was marred by the lack of opportunities provided to all African Americans, not just athletes. Although he came back to a ticker-tape parade held in in his honor by the City of New York, Owens had to ride the freight elevator to attend a reception for him at the posh Waldorf-Astoria hotel. In his autobiography, Owens remembered, "When I came back to my native country, after all the stories about Hitler, I couldn't ride in the front of the bus. I had to go to the back door. I couldn't live where I wanted. I wasn't invited to shake hands with Hitler, but I wasn't invited to the White House to shake hands with the President, either." Like many African Americans in the first half of the 20th Century, Owens was a Republican. The Democratic Party traditionally counted on the votes of the "Solid South", politicians who were anti-black and pro-segregation, while the Party of Lincoln traditionally was the party of civil rights legislation, which died in committee under long-serving Southern Democratic pols in Congress. It was not until the 1960 Presidential election that a majority of African Americans voted for the Democratic candidate rather than the Republican. Thus, it is not surprising that Owens endorsed Republican Presidential candidate 'Alf Landon' over incumbent President 'Franklin D. Roosevelt' in 1936, who would lose, crushed under the massive landslide racked up by FDR, who began to form a "New Deal coalition" that would embrace African Americans. After the Olympics, Owens had difficulty making a living and turned to sports promotion, essentially turning himself into an entertainer. Though boxing was integrated, the number of African American contenders was regulated as to not alienate white fans, and the pro sports of baseball, football and basketball were segregated. Black athletes, even those as popular as Owens, did not begin winning serious promotional contracts until the 1970s. To make an income, Owens engaged in many exhibitions, such as running against race horses before Negro League professional baseball games. He moved to Chicago, Illinois, where he became a radio disc-jockey. He was extremely well-liked, and became an in-demand public speaker. Owen's popularity grew with the time, as he was seen after the war as the man who showed up Hitler and his discredited policies of racial superiority, thus becoming an important public figure in a society that, beginning with the Supreme Court decision desegregating schools (Brown v. Board of Education, 1954), was facing the painful process of overcoming its own racial hatreds and sordid past. Owens started his own public relations firm, and traveled around the country speaking on behalf of corporations and for US Olympic Committee. His speeches stressed the importance of religion, hard work and loyalty. He also sponsored and participated in youth sports programs in inner-city neighborhoods. In 1976, President Gerald Ford bestowed the Medal of Freedom on Jesse Owens, the highest civilian honor the United States government can award. Jesse Owens, one of the more remarkable Americans to grace the world stage, died on March 31, 1980 in Phoenix, Arizona from complications of lung cancer, likely caused by his pack-a-day cigarette smoking habit. He was buried in Oak Woods Cemetery in Chicago, Illinois. Owens was 66 years old. His Owens's memory is kept alive by his widow Ruth and his daughter Marlene, who operate the Jesse Owens Foundation, which provides financial assistance and support to deserving young people s from disadvantaged backgrounds. Honors continued to accrue to Owens, even after death, testament to his greatness as a symbol of overcoming adversity. In 1984, a street in Berlin was named after him, and a school was renamed Jesse Owens Realschule/Oberschule (Secondary School). On March 28, 1990, Owens was posthumously awarded a Congressional Gold Medal, which was presented to his family by President 'George H. W. Bush'. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Jon C. Hopwood
  • Jesse Owens is an American track and field athlete and four-time gold medalist in the 1936 Olympic Games. Owens specialized in the sprints and the long jump, and was recognized in his lifetime as the greatest and most famous athlete in track and field history. He set three world records and tied another, all in less than an hour at the 1935 Big Ten track meet in Ann Arbor, Michigan, a feat that has never been equaled and has been called "the greatest 45 minutes ever in sport". He achieved international fame at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany, by winning four gold medals: 100 meters, 200 meters, long jump, and 4 × 100-meter relay. He was the most successful athlete at the Games. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Tango Papa
  • Spouse Ruth Solomon (August 10, 1935 - March 31, 1980) (his death, 3 children)
  • Was invited back to Berlin in the 1960s, to the same stadium where he'd won his Olympic medals, and was given a hero's welcome. The mayor addressed him: "The last time you were here, Adolf Hitler refused to shake your hand. Today, I'm proud to give you both of mine." Owens and the mayor embraced, then Owens ran one last ceremonial lap around the track, with the crowd cheering.
  • Even though he defeated the top German athletes in the 1936 Olympics, the German people liked him. Crowds of 110,000 cheered him in Berlin's glittering Olympic Stadium - fans sought his autograph and picture when he walked the streets. In 1982, Berlin renamed the avenue leading to the Olympic stadium "Jesse Owens Allee" (Parkway) in his honor. His widow and family attended the dedication ceremony as guests of the German government.
  • The runner he beat in the 200-meter dash at the 1936 Summer Olympics was Jackie Robinson 's brother, Matthew "Mack" Robinson, who also beat the world record at the time while taking the silver medal.
  • While Adolf Hitler was not fond of Jesse Owens as a black man per se, he never snubbed him by refusing to shake his hand. Hitler shook hands with only the German winners on the first day of the Olympics. When the Olympic officials demanded that going forward Hitler either shaken the hand of every medalist or none at all, he chose not to publicly greet any medalist regardless of nationality.
  • Won 4 gold medals in Track & Field (100 meters, 200 meters, long jump, and 4 × 100 meter relay) at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin.
  • [When asked about how he felt years after Adolf Hitler refused to shake his hand at the Olympics] I'm here. He's not.
  • We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort.
  • Friendships born on the field of athletic strife are the real gold of competition. Awards become corroded, friends gather no dust.
  • A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.
  • The battles that count aren't the ones for gold medals. The struggles within yourself - the invisible, inevitable battles inside all of us - that's where it's at.

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Jesse Owens born in Alabama

The great Olympian was born on September 12th, 1913

Race winner: Jesse Owens competing in the 100 metre sprint at the 1936 Olympics

Young Jesse’s grades were always low, but PE teachers in high school spotted his athletics potential and trained him to startling effect. His prowess took him to Ohio State University in 1933 as one of its few black students and Owens started breaking world records in sprints, hurdles and the long jump. In 1936 he was picked for the US team in the Olympic Games in Berlin.

It was there that Owens rose beyond national to international fame. He won the 100 metre sprint, the 200 metre sprint in world record time, the long jump, in which he set another world record, and was part of the winning American team in the 4 x 100 metre relay. His haul of four gold medals was the largest of any competitor and his modesty and charm won hearts as well as heats.

The story that Adolf Hitler refused to present Owens with his medals and shake his hand because he was black started in the New York Times, was taken up by other papers and lasted for years, but is completely untrue. Hitler had wanted to present medals only to German athletes, which the Olympic Committee would not allow, so he did no presenting at all. Owens denied that Hitler had snubbed him, describing how he passed the Führer’s box one day and Hitler waved to him and he waved back. Hitler later sent him a signed photograph. Owens said he was far worse snubbed by whites in the United States than ever in Germany, including by President Roosevelt, who did not even send him a congratulatory telegram.

Back in the States Owens earned money from activities including endorsing products for major corporations, which cost him his amateur standing, but kept him in the public eye. He was an impressive speaker commending athleticism and American patriotism to the young and his sheer likeability as well as his achievements helped in changing white attitudes. In 1976 President Ford awarded him the Medal of Freedom as ‘a source of inspiration’ to all Americans. When he died at 76 four years later in Tucson, Arizona the flags flew at half-mast across the whole state.

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Jesse, a spiritual autobiography

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  1. Jesse Owens

    Jesse Owens (born September 12, 1913, Oakville, Alabama, U.S.—died March 31, 1980, Tucson, Arizona) was an American track-and-field athlete who became one of the sport's most legendary competitors after winning four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. His victories were a blow to Adolf Hitler 's intention to use the Games to ...

  2. Jesse Owens

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