VOICE ONE:
This is Gwen Outen.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Steve Ember with People in America in VOA SpecialEnglish. Every week we tell about a person who was important in thehistory of the United States.
Today we tell the story of athlete Jesse Owens. He once was thefastest runner in the world.
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VOICE ONE:
In the summer ofnineteen-thirty-six, people all over the world heard the name ofJesse Owens. That summer, Owens joined the best athletes from fiftynations 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 partybelieved that white people — especially German people – were thebest race of people on Earth. They believed that other races ofpeople — especially those with dark skin — were almost less thanhuman.
In the summer of nineteen-thirty-six, Hitler wanted to prove hisbeliefs to the world. He wanted to show that German athletes couldwin every important competition. After all, only a few weeks beforethe Olympics, German boxer Max Schmeling had defeated the greatAmerican heavyweight Joe Louis, a black man.
VOICE TWO:
Jesse Owens was black, too. Until nineteen-thirty-six, very fewblack 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 infour different Olympic track and field events in Berlin. During thattime, he did not think much about the color of his skin, or aboutAdolf Hitler.
Owens said later: “I was looking only at the finish line. Ithought of all the years of practice and competition, and of all whobelieved in me.”
VOICE ONE:
We do not know what Hitler thought of Jesse Owens. No onerecorded what he said about this black man who ran faster and jumpedfarther than any man of any color at the Olympic games. But we canstill 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 youngman with smooth brown skin and short hair. When he ran, he seemed tomove without effort. When he jumped, as one observer said, he seemedto jump clear out of Germany.
Jesse Owens won the highest award — the Gold Medal — in allfour of the Olympic competitions he entered. In the one-hundredmeter run, he equaled the fastest time ever run in that Olympicevent. In the long jump and the two-hundred meter run, he set newOlympic records. And as part of a four-man team, he helped set a newworld record for the four-hundred meter relay race. He was the firstAmerican in the history of Olympic track and field events to winfour Gold Medals in a single Olympics.
VOICE TWO:
Owens’s Olympic victories made him a hero. He returned home toparades in New York City and Columbus, Ohio, where he attended thestate university. Businessmen paid him for the right to use his nameon their stores. No one, however, offered him a permanent job.
For many years after the nineteen-thirty-six Olympic games, JesseOwens survived as best he could. He worked at small jobs. He evenused his athletic abilities, but in a sad way. He earned money byrunning races against people, motorcycles and horses. He and hiswife and three daughters saw both good times and bad times.
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VOICE ONE:
Poverty was not new to James Cleveland Owens. He was born innineteen-thirteen on a farm in the southern state of Alabama. He wasthe youngest of thirteen children. His parents did not own the farm,and earned little money. Jesse remembered that there was rarelyenough food to eat. And there was not enough fuel to heat the housein winter.
Some of Jesse’s brothers and sisters died while still young.Jesse was a sickly child. Partly because of this, and partly becauseof the racial hatred they saw around them, Jesse’s parents decidedto leave the South. They moved north, to Cleveland, Ohio, when Jessewas eight years old. The large family lived in a few small rooms ina part of the city that was neither friendly nor pleasant to lookat.
Jesse’s father was no longer young or strong. He was unable tofind a good job. Most of the time, no one would give him any work atall. 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.
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Jesse, especially, was lucky. He entered a school where one whiteteacher, Charles Riley, took a special interest in him. Jesse lookedthin and unhealthy, and Riley wanted to make him stronger. Throughthe years that Jesse was in school, Riley brought him food in themorning. Riley often invited the boy to eat with his family in theevening. And every day before school, he taught Owens how to runlike an athlete.
At first, the idea was only tomake the boy stronger. But soon Riley saw that Jesse was a champion.By the time Jesse had completed high school, his name was knownacross the nation. Ohio State University wanted him to attendcollege there. While at Ohio State, he set new world records inseveral track and field events. And he was accepted as a member ofthe United States Olympic team.
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VOICE ONE:
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 youngpeople. He wanted to tell them some of the things he had
learned about life, work and success: That it is important tochoose a goal and always work toward it. That there are good peoplein the world who will help you to reach your goal. That if you tryagain and again, you will succeed.
People who heard Owens’s speeches said he spoke almost as well ashe ran. Owens received awards for his work with boys and girls. TheUnited States government sent him around the world as a kind ofsports ambassador. The International Olympic Committee asked for hisadvice.
VOICE TWO:
In about nineteen-seventy, Jesse Owens wrote a book in which hetold about his life. It was called “Blackthink.” In the book, Owensdenounced young black militants who blamed society for theirtroubles. He said young black people had the same chance to succeedin the United States as white people. Many black civil rightsactivists reacted angrily to these statements. They said what Owenshad written was not true for everyone.
Owens later admitted that he had been wrong. He saw that not allblacks 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 hisfirst book. He called it “I Have Changed.” Owens said that, in hisearlier 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 cansucceed— and you really try — then you have a chance. If you donot think you have a chance, then you probably will fail. He saidthese beliefs had worked for him. And he wanted all young people tobelieve them, too.
VOICE ONE:
These were the same beliefs he tried to express when he spokearound the world about being an Olympic athlete. “The road to theOlympics,” he said, “leads to no city, no country. It goes farbeyond New York or Moscow, ancient Greece or Nazi Germany. The roadto the Olympics leads — in the end — to the best within us.”
In nineteen-seventy-six, President Gerald Ford awarded JesseOwens the Medal of Freedom. This is the highest honor an Americancivilian can receive. Jesse Owens died of cancer in nineteen-eighty.His family members operate the Jesse Owens Foundation. It providesfinancial aid and support for young people to help them reach theirgoals in life.
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VOICE TWO:
This program was written by Barbara Dash. It was produced byLawan Davis. This is Steve Ember.
VOICE ONE:
And this is Gwen Outen. Listen again next week for People inAmerica in VOA Special English.