22-year-old Jesse Owens rose above prejudice. He smashed the assumed racial superiority by winning FOUR gold medals during the 1936 Olympic Games.

The son of a sharecropper and whose grandparents had been slaves, Owens won the 100m, 200m, 4x100m relay, and long jump breaking the Olympic records that would stand for 20 years. Even Hitler couldn’t stand the humiliation and left the stadium in a huff.

He became the first American to win four gold medals at a single Olympics. However, Owens returned to America to be made to feel unworthy.

“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. I wasn’t invited up to shake hands with Hitler, but I wasn’t invited to the White House to shake hands with the President either.”

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