In yesterday’s posting, I offered some details about the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. Central to that was Jesse Owens’ feat of achieving four gold medals, three of which were world records.
Here is a bit of trivia that I included in the Historical Background section of Lebensborn, the second novel in the series, The Addlestone Chronicles:
“Jesse Owens’ long jump distance of 26’ 8” at the 1936 Berlin Olympics remained the world record for the next twenty-four years. Ralph Boston surpassed that mark in August 1960 and, a month later, won the long jump gold medal at the Rome Olympics.
Jesse’s birth name was James Cleveland Owens. His family had moved from Alabama to Cleveland, Ohio, when he was nine years old to seek a better life. They were part of what is known as the Great Black Migration, when more than 1.5 million African Americans fled the racially segregated South.
He had a thick southern accent, and when his third-grade teacher asked his name, he replied ‘JC,’ his initials, as that was what his parents called him. The teacher didn’t understand and thought he was saying ‘Jesse.’ That name stuck for the rest of his life.
He died in 1980 in Tucson, Arizona, at the age of 66 due to stage IV lung cancer.”