🧵1/ 🇺🇸 #BlackHistoryMonth: Black #history is American history.
👟Jesse Owens & the 1936 Berlin #Olympics
🗣️Jesse Owens is often remembered as the athlete who rose above discrimination in #Berlin and was snubbed by Hitler. But that’s only half the story. To counter the whitewashing of history, I want to share a bit about the legend who showed the world what true American excellence looks like.
Did you know?
▪️Roots: The son of sharecroppers and the grandson of enslaved people, Owens was picking
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100 pounds of cotton a day by age seven to help his family survive in Alabama.
▪️1935: He set four world records in 45 minutes at the Big Ten Championships—a feat still unmatched in sports history.
▪️1936: He won four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics, shattering #Nazi racial #propaganda on the world stage.
👉🏽The Harsh Reality of Jim Crow:
Despite his global triumph, Owens returned to a segregated America. Even as a world champion:
▪️He was forced to use the freight elevator to reach his own
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celebratory reception at the Waldorf-Astoria.
▪️President Franklin D. Roosevelt, eyeing reelection and dependent on Southern white voters, ignored the entire team of 18 Black Olympians.
👉🏽 No telegram. No #WhiteHouse invitation.
Official recognition took decades:
✅ 1955: #President Dwight D. Eisenhower named Owens an “Ambassador of Sports.”
✅ 1976: President Gerald Ford awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
✅ 2016: President Barack #Obama finally honored the 18 Black Olympians of
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1936, noting they represented American excellence while being denied American equality.
🇺🇸Owens’s legacy—defying systemic inequities and racism with dignity—remains an inspiration. He showed generations that barriers can be broken and, more importantly, that we are strongest when we uplift one another.
🎯Join me in embracing diversity, honoring our histories, and celebrating our differences. That is patriotism. That is how we strengthen the very fabric of this nation.🗽
