1936 Berlin Olympics Boycott

"The Black Eagles"
The Pittsburgh Courier, July 11, 1936
by Holloway

Jesse Owens: “If there is discrimination against minorities in Germany, then we must withdraw from the Olympics.”

Jeremiah T. Mahony, President of the Amateur Athletic Union: "There is no room for discrimination on grounds of race, color, or creed in the Olympics."

Journalist Heywood Broun: "I think that one of the most useful kinds of protest that can be made against the fascist regime of Hitler lies in our staying away from the Olympic Games in Berlin."

Ernest L. Jahncke, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of the Navy and IOC Member: "Neither Americans nor the representatives of other countries can take part in the Games in Nazi Germany without at least acquiescing in the contempt of the Nazis for fair play and their sordid exploitation of the Games."

Judge Jeremiah T. Mahony: “The Nazi government wants more than American participation in a sporting contest. It wants to bring the American dollar into the very weakened Nazi treasury. And it wants to picture Htler with Uncle Sam standing behind him and saying ‘We are with you, Adolf!’”

The Philadelphia Tribune: “The AAU shouts against the cruelties of the other nations and the brutalities in foreign climates, but conveniently forgets the things that sit on its own doorstep.”

OSU Track Coach Larry Snyder: “Why should we oppose Germany for doing something we do right here at home?”

United States Olympic Committee President Avery Brundage: “The very foundation of the modern Olympic revival will be undermined if individual countries are allowed to restrict participation by reason of class, creed, or race. Certain Jews must understand that they cannot use these games as a weapon in their boycott against the Nazis."

Frederick Rubien, Secretary of the U.S. Olympic Committee: "The Germans are not discriminating against Jews. The Jews were eliminated because they are not good enough athletes."

Coach Larry Snyder: “Jesse Owens is sitting on top of the world today. If he continues to participate in this activity (the boycott) he will be a forgotten man.”

Jesse Owens: “I see no reason to get into a controversy about the Olympics. The games have been awarded to Germany, all preparations have been made, and now some people want to have American withdraw just because some of the German polocies are not approved by them.”

Ernest Jahncke was expelled from the IOC for his comments. He remains the only person ever expelled from the IOC.

Sources:
Triumph (Jeremy Schaap)
Nazi Games (David Clay Large)
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Washington Post

Triumph (book)

History is more interesting than you think it is. It is more awful than you think it is. It is more nuanced and subtle than you think it is. The way most people learn it, history is a plot so dull and obvious you'd fall asleep halfway through.

The 1936 Olympics (winter and summer games) were awarded to Germany during the Weimar Republic. After 1933, they became the Nazis' Olympics. Once the games commenced, they were Hitler's Olympics, and by the time they were through, they were Jesse Owens' Olympics. This may be the basic message of Jeremy Schaap's informative and not very long history Triumph: The Untold Story of Jesse Owens and Hitler's Olympics, but Schaap does an important service debunking a lot of well-entrenched myths about this moment in time.

There was a serious movement afoot to relocate the German Olympics, or to simply boycott them. Many American men who stood against such a movement pointed to the Jim Crow South as evidence of a certain American hypocrisy. However, the real hypocrisy is the implication that Hitler's Jew-hatred was like our own bigotry - i.e. acceptable and part of doing business.

Owens himself wanted to compete, and why wouldn't he. The story everyone now tells about Jesse Owens astonishing drubbing of the so-called Master Race is how Hitler left his box during the race, or during the medal ceremony, or in some other fashion made a big deal of snubbing Owens. As if any world leader would stoop so low in perception as to show their spite for one particular athlete - or performer, or anyone, really.

Hitler was openly dismissive of the "non-Aryan" athletes, inviting not only German medal winners, but also fair-skinned Finnish athletes to be photographed with him after their wins on the first day - but not the first African-Americans to medal in the these games later the same day. The Olympic committee insisted he greet all medal winners or none at all, and Hitler chose to greet none after this first day, a rule he failed to keep.

Owens himself told later in his life that the German audience in the stands was hostile towards him, though records show the exact opposite was true. The German crowds were excited to have this young, American runner at their Olympics, they cheered wildly. They even whistled, which apparently is a strictly American thing to do.

Hitler did watch as Jesse Owens won four gold medals, in the 100, the 200, the long-jump and the relay. And at the time, Owens claimed Hitler waved at him from his box.

"When I passed the Chancellor he arose, waved his hand at me, and I waved back at him. I think the writers showed bad taste in criticizing the man of the hour in Germany."

He did not feel then that he had been snubbed by the German Chancellor.

"Hitler didn't snub me—it was FDR who snubbed me. The president didn't even send me a telegram."

FDR did not congratulate Owens, though he did receive a cable from Ohio Governor Martin L. Davey reading:

"It is my pleasure to convey to you the congratulations of the people of your state for your brilliant achievement in the Olympic games."

Now, while it is common knowledge that Americans have long distinguished between the accomplishments of white men and all others (e.g.: first woman astronaut, first black president) I was amazed to learn all of the remarkably colorful adjectives used to describe Mr. Owens. I was not previously aware, for example, the appetite in the media for the word "sepia" when describing lighter-skinned blacks.

Yes, he was the Cleveland Cataclysm (LA Times) Buckeye Bullet (an OSU reference, not one to the color of the nut.) He was also the Negro Wonder (NY Times), the Dark Streak (NY Times), and the Brown Blizzard (several papers.)

Avery Brundage

In 1936 the President of the United States Olympic Committee was Avery Brundage, former Olympic athlete, successful building magnate, and complete dick.

The best thing that can be said of him is that without his tireless effort to lick Hitler's butt-crack, Jesse Owens would not have had the opportunity to be an Olympic legend. This is ironic, because Brundage was also a tireless racist.

"The fact that no Jews have been named so far as to compete for Germany doesn't necessarily mean That they have been descriminated against on that score. In forty years of Olympic history, I doubt if the number of Jewish athletes competing from all nations totaled one percent of those in the games. In fact, I believe one-half of one percent would be a high percentage." - Avery Brundage, July 26, 1935

Among other accomplishments, Brundage struggled to keep Jim Thorpe from having his Olympic medals posthumously returned. While this may have had nothing at all to do with the fact that Thorpe kicked Brundage's ass in the decathalon and the pentathalon in the 1912 games, though it is a documented fact that Brundage was the one who reported Thorpe's paid exhibition baseball games to the Olympic committee.

Brundage had a soft spot for totalitarian regimes - Fascist and Communist - arguing against boycotting the 1936 Winter and Summer Games in Germany, or later as IOC President opposing the Eastern Bloc tradition of paying their athletes (because as he said, it was their way of life) while stringently opposing professional athletes in the West.

And women. He believed women should not be Olympic athletes. Avery Brundage was all kinds of asshole.