Jesse Owens, one of the most electrifying stars in the history of track and field — and whose record-setting speed and athleticism humiliated Adolf Hitler on the global stage — won his fourth gold medal at the Berlin Olympics on this day in history, August 9, 1936.
"The African-American son of a sharecropper and the grandson of slaves had single-handedly crushed Hitler's myth of Aryan supremacy," ESPN wrote in 2000, while placing Owens at no. 6 on its list of the greatest North American athletes of the 20th century.
Jesse Owens ran the first leg of the 4x100 relay as he and American teammates Foy Draper, Ralph Metcalfe and Frank Wykoff sprinted to victory with a world-record time of 39.8 seconds.
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It was an astonishing 1.3 seconds better than silver medalist Italy.
Germany placed third.
The U.S. relay team's mark stood for 20 years.
Members of the American relay team that won the 400-meter relay race at the Olympics in Berlin. They bettered the world and the Olympic records at 0:39.8 seconds. Left to right: Jesse Owens, Ralph Metcalfe, Foy Draper and Frank Wykoff on Aug. 18, 1936. (Getty Images)
It was the final gold medal of the Berlin Games for Owens.
Over the previous week, he bested the global competition in 100 meters (10.3 seconds, Olympic record), 200 meters (20.7 seconds, world record) and long jump (8.06 meters, short of his own world record 8.13 meters).
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"In one week in the summer of 1936, on the sacred soil of the Fatherland, the master athlete humiliated the master race," proclaimed ESPN.
Owens was just 22 years old at the time.
Adolf Hitler (left, foreground) congratulates shot put athletes at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, shaking hands with bronze medal winner Gerhard Stoeck of Germany. Also, from left: Nazi leader Hermann Goering, Kurt Daluege (General of Police), gold medalist Hans Woellke of Germany (center), followed by Hitler's personal adjutant Wilhelm Brueckner (half-covered) and (far right) silver medalist Sulo Baerlund of Finland, on August 2, 1936. (Heinrich Hoffmann/ullstein bild via Getty Images)
He was fresh off a brilliant collegiate career at Ohio State University.
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Owens set or matched six world records at the Big 10 Championships on May 25, 1935 — considered one of the great achievements in the history of intercollegiate athletics.
"The 21-year-old Owens averaged a world record every nine minutes," said the International Olympic Committee in its profile of Owens and his seemingly superhuman achievement.
American Jesse Owens running in the 200-meter sprint — a new Olympic record — in Berlin, August 4, 1936. (Austrian Archives/Imagno/Getty Images)
Owens is acclaimed not only in the U.S. but among global sports fans.
He was one of BBC's six finalists for Sports Personality of the Century in 1999, alongside the likes of global soccer star Pele of Brazil and American boxer Muhammad Ali, who captured top honors as voted by the British public.
Owens, who died in 1980, was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1990.
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He represented the "highest expression of national appreciation for distinguished achievements and contributions," according to the U.S. House of Representatives.
"The Berlin Games were to be the showcase of Hitler’s theories on the superiority of the master race," said President George H.W. Bush as he presented the award to the runner's widow, Ruth Owens.
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"It was an unrivaled athletic triumph. But more than that, it really was a triumph for all humanity."
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