Jesse Owens was a black athlete born on 12 September 1913 in Oakville. He's know for his participation in the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games, where he won four gold medals and was the star of the Games

In his fourth gold medal, Jesse was involved in one of the many discussion he has always been part of. On the afternoon of 4 August 1936, Jesse was on the top step of the podium after beating German athlete Luz Long. It's said that Adolf Hitler got up and gone out of the stadium so as not to shake hands with American Black. In reality, things went differently. As he wrote in his autobiography, The Jesse Owens Story, Owens himself racounted how Hitler stood up and waved to him:

"After getting off the winner's podium, I passed the grandstand to return to the locker room. The German Chancellor stared at me, got up and waved at me. I did the same, responding to the greeting. I think that journalist and writers showed bad taste and then invented a hostility that didn't happen at all"

AFTER SPORTING LIFE:

In 1976 he was awarded the Silver Collar of the Olympics order for his affront to racism in the 1936 Olympic Games and in the same year he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest title for an American civilian, by the Republican President of the United States Gerald Ford , who paid homage with these words: "Owens has overcome the barriers of racism, segregation and bigotry by showing the world that an African American belongs to the world of athletics"

Owens died of lung cancer at the age of 66 in Tucson, Arizona

Thank you all for your attention. Goodbye!

Galassi Gianluca

15/02/20