J.C. "Jesse" Owens is best remembered for his participation in the Berlin Olympics of 1936, where as part of the United States athletics team he won four gold medals in the track and field events. As a black athlete, Owens' success was in direct contradiction with the Nazi doctrine of Aryan supremacy espoused by the Third Reich. Nine of the ten black Americans competing for the United States at the Berlin Olympics won gold medals. Adolf Hitler refused to congratulate Owens on his achievement, and left the stadium before the awards ceremony. Owens' place in history has thus been assured as much for the politics of his sporting achievement as for the achievement itself.

Jesse Owens

If the implications of what Owens had done at Hitler's Olympics sent a powerful message across pre-World War II Europe, his success had more ambiguous implications for domestic...