Jesse Owens, Hitler’s Olympic Nemesis (Part Two)

Adolf Hitler wanted the 1936 Berlin Olympics to be a coming out party for his Aryan Master Race. Jesse Owens crashed the venue by winning four gold medals.

Jesse Owens in the 1936 Olympic Long Jump

Owens then had to hustle to the long jump competition which also began at 10:30 AM. Here he faced an athlete from Germany who was his first formidable foreign competition, a 22 year old German; Carl Ludwig “Luz” Long. Long was the current German and European record holder, not quite Owens equal but certainly dangerous if Jesse should falter. And, proving that he was human, Jesse did initially stumble during what should have been an easy qualification. He was charged with his first of three jumps when he typically jogged on the runway and through the landing area just to get a feel for the surface. This American warmup practice was unknown in Europe and despite even the head coach of the American track and field contingent getting into the face of the officials, the practice jump counted. The incident seemed to rattle Owens, his second jump was only 23 feet, 3 inches, short of what he needed to qualify for the next round and more than three feet shorter than his own world record.

Conversely, and fortunately from Nazi Germany’s perspective, the head of the American Olympic Committee, Avery Brundage, was adamantly opposed to any interference in American Olympic participation due to politics. Brundage, a wealthy and dictatorial administrator, once famously stated that the Olympic Games belong to the athletes and not to the politicians. He officially travelled to Germany to assess the situation and after a series of carefully choreographed interactions with German officials, he was able to convince the IOC to agree to US participation.

Podcast Episode Details

Jesse Owens, Hitler’s Olympic Nemesis (Part Two)