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Black History Month: Jesse Owens
You will be changed, seeing this story. The great Jesse Owens was a champion in the Olympics and championed friendship with a competitor for a lifetime. And do not miss the afterword with little-seen pictures. (Two-minute read and video.)
The 1936 Olympics was held in Germany. Adolf Hitler was in power. To Hitler, the Olympics were to be a statement about the supremacy of the so-called Aryan race. Every other ethnicity was inferior. But Jesse Owens, of African ancestry, won four gold medals at the 1936 games. Owens beat some of Hitler’s greatest athletes.
Much could be said about Jesse Owens’s great skill as an athlete. But there is a deeper story, a human story, the friendship between Jesse Owens and Luz Long, a German long jumper. Long and Owens cemented a lifelong friendship in a matter of days. Wonderful pictures exist of Owens and Luz talking or walking together arm in arm. As Owens said of Long,
“It took a lot of courage for him to befriend me in front of Hitler. You can take all the medals and cups I have won in sport and they would not come close to the 24-karat friendship I felt for Luz Long at that moment. Hitler must have gone crazy watching us embrace. The sad part of the story is I never saw Long again.”
Luz Long died in 1943 while fighting for Germany in World War II. A final letter he wrote to Jesse Owens reads, in part,
My heart tells me, if I be honest with you, that this is the last letter I shall ever write. If it is so, I ask you something. It is a something so very important to me. Please go to Germany when this war done, find my son Karl, and tell him about his father. Tell him, Jesse, what times were like when we not separated by war. I am saying—tell him how things can be between men on this earth. Your brother, Luz’”
Another picture, this one with Jesse and Karl years after the war, tells the tale of true friendship, a friendship that traversed ethnicity, nationality, and generations; a friendship that should be a lesson to us all.
For Truth in Two, this is Dr. Mark Eckel, president of The Comenius Institute, celebrating Jesse Owens during Black History Month.
AFTERWORD & PICTURES
The information and quotes for this Truth in Two were predominately taken from Jeremy Schaap, Triumph: The Untold Story of Jesse Owens and Hitler’s Olympics. New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin, 2007 and Lawrence Reed Real Heroes: Inspiring True Stories of Courage, Character, and Conviction.
Further notations, including how Owens was treated by Hitler versus Franklin Delano Roosevelt:
Jesse was introduced to Adolf Hitler who shook his hand in congratulations for his accomplishments.
“Back home, ticker tape parades feted Owens in New York City and Cleveland. Hundreds of thousands of Americans came out to cheer him. Letters, phone calls, and telegrams streamed in from around the world to congratulate him. From one important man, however, no word of recognition ever came. As Owens later put it, ‘Hitler didn’t snub me; it was our president who snubbed me. The president didn’t even send a telegram.’
Franklin Delano Roosevelt . . . couldn’t bring himself to utter a word of support . . . FDR invited all the white US Olympians to the White House, but not Jesse.
‘It all goes so fast, and character makes the difference when it’s close,’ Owens once said about athletic competition. He could have taught FDR a few lessons in character, but the president never gave him the chance. Owens wouldn’t be invited to the White House for almost 20 years — not until Dwight Eisenhower named him ‘Ambassador of Sports’ in 1955.” [Lawrence Reed]
PICTURES: Owens and Long walking arm in arm during the 1936 Olympics. Owens saluting the American flag, winner of the long jump competition, Long winning the silver medal, saluting Hitler. Owens and Long smiling, next to each other on the infield. Jesse Owens and Karl (Kai) Long after the war. [Getty Images, noted above]
Zentralbild/Hoffmann
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Authentic courage and love on display.
Thanks for sharing Mark.
Great story
Interesting . . .
Roosevelt must have been a typical bigoted Republican…………..
Somebody must have been on the same side of history as Jefferson Davis and Woodrow Wilson
Oh my God. That’s astounding.
Well, I guess it’s not. But oh my God.
Better late than never.
Just another example of Republicans trying to clean up the mess after Democrats. It gets repetitive after a while…
Biden has already asked the Rhetorical question “Do you want to be on the side of Abraham Lincoln (Republican) or Jefferson Davis ? (Democrat) Maybe at the next press conference we will hear “Do you want to be on the side of Dwight Eisenhower or Franklin Roosevelt?”
Indeed. And Martin Luther King Jr. was a registered Republican. George Wallace was a Democrat.
Gee, it’s like there’s a pattern or something.
Biden was probably completely unaware that he was extolling the virtues of Republicans and denigrating Democrats, with the single exception of John Lewis. His handlers have probably informed him not to make this mistake again, that is, if his handlers have even detected the bone-headed error yet.
Almost didn’t read it because of the “Black History Month”. Glad I did, though.
From the beginning. Some folks conveniently forget.
I’ve read the story and even watched the video before (Carl Ludwig Long is kind of a big deal where I live) and find it moving every single time. Thanks for posting it here.