Olympic Games Archives | The Saturday Evening Post

California Gold Prospects: Olympic Hopefuls on 1983

Some group is always calling for a boycott of the Olympic Games, but it rarely actually happens. Backing out of the 1980 Olympics in response to the Soviet war in Afghanistan was a rare instance of follow-through by more than 60 nations, including the U.S. Of course, that left many a yearning athlete high and dry on glory, followed by a difficult four-year wait for the next opportunity — if that opportunity still existed.

Three years later, the Post highlighted a number of athletes — some of whom had been favorites to win in 1980 — with their eyes set on the 1984 U.S. Olympic Team. Four of them went on to strike Olympic gold at the Los Angeles Games the following year.

The California Gold Rush of ’84

By S. Lamar Wade

Excerpted from an article originally published on July 1, 1983

The gold rush of ’49 was but a Sunday afternoon stroll in the park compared to the upcoming gold, silver, and bronze rush of ’84 for medals at the Los Angeles Olympics. The hurdles on the road to the Olympics are many. For most athletes, blood, sweat, and tears are just a starter, but for those who are burning with Olympic fever, no hurdle is too great to overcome. Some will be back again in ’88, but for others, it is their final opportunity to satisfy the dream of standing in the winners’ circle.

Rowdy Gaines: 1980’s Loss

In line for enough medals at the 1980 Moscow Olympics to make him the most renowned swimmer since Mark Spitz, Ambrose (Rowdy) Gaines saw his hopes go down the drain with the American boycott. Along with them went his concentration and boyish enthusiasm.

“I couldn’t believe the United States would actually stick to it,” says this Auburn University graduate from Winter Haven, Florida. “I felt cheated, oppressed, and unwanted. I still think the boycott was a stupid decision; it proved nothing.” Rowdy Gaines, at 24, continues to dream his Olympic dream. “Sometimes I wonder if I’m getting too old, burned out. I think about all my colleagues who didn’t have a chance to swim and turned to earning a living, and I ask myself if I’m not wasting my time. But swimming is what I want to do the most.”

Having used up his college eligibility, Rowdy still trains with coach Richard Quick at the University of Texas. Here, in the pool at Austin, is where he established his world records in both the 100- and 200-meter freestyle events. And if this training results in victories over the American competition of Chris Cavanaugh and Rich Saeger in the U.S. Trials, June 25–30, 1984, at Indianapolis, he will face Jorg Woithe of East Germany and Michael Gross of West Germany, top contenders in the Olympics.

“It’s been tough the last three years,” says Rowdy. We ‘older’ swimmers were supposed to have reached our peaks in 1980. Hopefully, that won’t turn out to be true.”

[Gaines won three gold medals at the 1984 Games, in the men’s 100–meter freestyle and as part of the men’s 4 x 100 freestyle team and 4 x 100 medley team.]

Mary T. Meagher’s Postponed Dream

When Soviet military troops rumbled into Afghanistan in 1979, the reverberations jarred the life’s dream of 15-year-old Mary Terstegge Meagher of Louisville, Kentucky. Mary T., as she is known by her colleagues, became one of the athletic-career casualties of President Jimmy Carter’s retaliatory American boycott of the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow.

Bitterly disappointed, she had no more than nicely rearranged her goal and rekindled her spirits when an Associated Press reporter phoned with the results of the Olympic swimming competition and told her she could have beaten their times — and wanted to know how she felt about that.

“I felt like hanging up the phone and crying,” she confesses.

In fact, Mary T. nearly quit swimming altogether. But she decided to plunge ahead for the 1984 Olympics. And her “comeback” has already made quite a splash. She has won an NCAA championship, set world records in both the 100- and 200-meter butterfly events, and has emerged as one of America’s brightest hopes for ending the domination of East Germany in her sport.

[Meagher won three golds at the 1984 Los Angeles Games, in the women’s 100-meter and 200-meter butterfly and swimming the butterfly leg of the women’s 4 x 100 medley. She competed again in 1988 and brought home a silver and a bronze medal.]

Mary Lou Retton — All 93 Pounds

It’s a long way from the coal-mining community of Fairmont, West Virginia, to Texas. But Mary Lou Retton, a ninth-grader at Houston’s Northland Christian School (having left at home her parents, three brothers, and sister Shari — an All-American gymnast at West Virginia University), has come much further in her training since the days she tried to emulate the Soviet crowd pleaser Nelli Kim at the local gym.

Mary Lou’s Texas training, in fact, has unearthed a load of gymnastic talent that, at age 12, has earned her the No. 1 senior-class ranking in the nation. And hopes are high that she will be one of the United States’ most productive natural resources in the 1984 Olympic Games. Standing a scant 4’10” and weighing but 93 pounds, her performances combine speed and amazing acceleration with a force that has caused gymnastic experts themselves to flip. Though she believes vaulting and floor exercises to be her best events, an innovative maneuver on the uneven bars has already been named for her.

Mary Lou credits her refinement to coach Bela Karolyi, the Romanian tutor responsible for the stardom of Nadia Comenici in the 1976 Games, before he defected to America in 1981 and opened a gymnasium in Houston. Here, under the eye of this technician, Mary Lou has improved her fundamentals, and here she has benefited from working out with fellow-student Dianne Durham, ranked No. 2.

With Mary Lou Retton, chances are good that coach Bela Karolyi will again strike Olympic gold — only this time for the United States.

[At the 1984 Games, Retton brought home the gold medal for the women’s individual all-around — plus two silvers and two bronzes to boot.]

Bolden’s Bold Dash

Born premature, asthmatic, and clubfooted, Jeanette Bolden’s leap from life’s starting block was anything but spectacular. For the first 4 of her 23 years, this world-class sprinter was forced to wear corrective braces.

Today, some track experts give her an excellent chance of capturing the 100-meter gold medal in 1984. To do so, she first must qualify in the Olympic 100-meter-dash trials next June in Los Angeles. Jeanette, undaunted, has overcome even bigger obstacles.

She not only had to wear corrective braces as a youngster, but several times during grade school, she was rushed to the hospital with asthma attacks so severe her life was close to the finish line.

At age 12 she was sent to Sunair Home For Asthmatic Children at Tujunga, California, for nine months. It was there that she had an introduction to sports — first swimming, then branching out to running.

“The more I ran, the more people began taking an interest in me,” she says. “And in 1977, after I beat some pretty good people, I no longer had to hide anything. I just wanted to keep on running.”

Not surprisingly, her favorite passage from the Bible, which she studies avidly, is found in the Book of Isaiah: “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.”

[Bolden brought home gold in 1984 as a member of the women’s 400-meter relay team.]

You can read the original article, “The California Gold Rush of ’84”, here.

The Summer Olympic Games: Heroes, Hope, and Hostility

Stir your memories of Olympics past with these Post articles that highlight the hope, hard work, and often controversy that surround an athlete’s participation in the Olympic Games.

Scandal and the Olympics

By Roger Kahn

Originally published October 10, 1964

Much like today, the Tokyo Olympics of 1964 were mired in controversy, with questions of national unity and political allegiances overshadowing the athletics.

Jesse Owens Remembers the 1936 Berlin Games

By Jesse Owens

Originally published January 1, 1976

Forty years after his historic showing in Germany, the track star reflects on the 1936 Olympic Games, his gold-medal effort, and an unlikely friendship that formed along the way.

California Gold Prospects: Olympic Hopefuls in 1983

By S. Lamar Wade

Originally published July 1, 1983

A year before the 1984 Los Angeles Games, the Post highlighted a group of American Olympic hopefuls, some of whom went on to earn worldwide fame.

Jesse Owens Remembers the 1936 Berlin Games

Jesse Owens’ triumph at the 1936 Berlin Games was marked not only by his gold medals but by his grace and dignity in the face of racial hostility. In the second of a seven-part Post series he wrote in 1976 on the “spirit, courage, and enduring qualities of the Olympic Games,” the track star remarks on his unlikely friendship with an athlete from Nazi Germany.

1936: Golden Moment of Triumph

By Jesse Owens

Excerpted from an article originally published on January 1, 1976

We have to remember that more than victory itself, the Olympic Games teach us a sportsmanship that transcends all prejudices and national and racial lines. That year was a very difficult year because Hitler had declared the dominance of the German Aryan race, and we had the impudence to come over and prove him wrong in so many cases.

But there happened to be a young German broad jumper, Lutz Long, the greatest of them all in his own country, who was watching as I took my qualifying jumps. I had already fouled twice, and it looked as though I might not even be able to survive in the competition. But he came over and remeasured my steps, remeasured my takeoff mark, and he laid out my sweatshirt right next to the takeoff board as a marker to help my jump. Thanks to his suggestions and confidence in me, I was able to produce a leap which qualified and opened up the pathway to ultimate victory.

Lutz Long jumped 25 feet 9 27/32 inches for a new Olympic record. I managed 26 feet 5 5/16 inches and so won. Lutz was second; but in my book of sportsmanship he ranks first.

You can imagine how touched I was at such sportsmanship. My friendship with Lutz Long, which commenced so brightly on the field of competition, continued after the Games. We became great friends and we corresponded regularly. But during World War II, sometime during the invasion of Poland, the last living traces of Lutz Long were obliterated in the Holocaust.

In 1951, I returned to Germany, and among a delegation which came to visit me at the hotel where I was staying, there were a woman and a boy who came up and introduced themselves to me. This boy was the son of my lost friend, Lutz Long, and his name was Kai. Lutz Long had been only 22 at the time of the Olympics, and as the preparation for World War II rushed across Germany, it transpired that this little boy had seen his father only three times in his life. And so I began to correspond with Kai, and then we developed our own friendship that arose from the father’s noble and self-sacrificing sportsmanship and generosity. Kai Long and I continue to correspond and whenever I hear from Lutz’s son, my mind goes back to that afternoon in the Olympic Stadium when an athlete sacrificed his fame and victory for the sake of pure sportsmanship. And then I know that the Olympic ideal is something that should be cherished and never forgotten.

You can read Jesse Owens’ article in its entirety here. For more of our historical coverage of the Olympic Games, check out “The Summer Olympic Games: Heroes, Hope, and Hostility.”

Scandal and the Olympics

The 2016 Rio Olympics is off to a bumpy beginning, and not a single starting line has been crossed yet: Zika virus, doping scandals, political corruption, and construction delays. In short, it’s just another year at the Olympics.

Today, we’re taking a peek at the history of controversy in the Games. In October 1964, sports writer Roger Kahn argued in the Post that America should not only resist the political controversies of the Olympics with protest, but quit them altogether in defiance of “dictators, propagandists, and manipulators.”

Let’s Pull Out of the Olympics

Excerpt from article originally published October 10, 1964

By Roger Kahn

It is the theory of certain somber sportsmen that World War III will begin at an Olympiad. This is not so much hysterical as extreme. The brutal quality of Olympic events brings out the worst in most nations and the combative in all, but the games have been with us, on and off, since 776 BC, and all that happens in the end is that everybody goes home sullen. We should quit this corruptive mess, this sweaty hypocrisy, before the damage to our spirit becomes irremediable.

History teaches that civilization and Tokyo will both survive the forthcoming Olympics. It also indicates that these games, like so many in the past, will be ludicrous, wasteful, filled with petty feuding, small cruelties, and overlaid with a patina of pomposity.

“The Olympic ideal.” We shall have to hear that phrase, played and replayed as if it were a chord from heaven, even though the original Olympic ideal involved pagan worship, commercialism, and the casual murder of women. (Only men were allowed to observe the ancient games. Intruding women were hurled over a nearby cliff.) …

If the Olympics were merely ludicrous, merely anachronistic, there would be no point in urging American withdrawal. It is the right of every American to be as ludicrous and anachronistic as he wants, provided that he violates no laws. But the Olympics ultimately are something more. Inevitably they become a political tool.

In antiquity, Nero crashed the Olympics of 66 AD, accompanied by 5,000 personal bodyguards. Oddly enough, whatever event the emperor entered, he won. As the bodyguards cheered, Nero was acclaimed best singer, best musician, best herald and winner of the chariot race. This was simply crude. Refined manipulation of the Olympic Games was splendidly demonstrated in 1936.

Then, as you may remember, the barbarity called Nazism was generally recognized. So to whom were the 1936 games awarded by the International Olympic Committee? Why, to that dandy little sportsman from Austria, wearing brown shirt and black moustache, the crowd-pleasing Adolf Hitler. …

Did freedom-loving Olympians protest? The president of the American Olympic Committee stated: “Certain Jews must now realize that they cannot use these games as a weapon in their boycott against the Nazis.” Placards advocating murder of Jews were banned in Berlin while the Olympic Games were going on. But at the very least, the games sanctioned Hitler as a member of the civilized community, which he was not.

The years since World War II have been filled with competition for so-called uncommitted nations and struggles for international prestige. Who has found Olympic fields a perfect stage for propaganda? The North and South Koreans, the East and West Germans, the Formosan and mainland Chinese, and that gentleman from Georgia, Josef Stalin and, later, the ubiquitous butterball from the Ukraine, Nikita Khrushchev. …

To what purpose, then, do we continue to compete? Unlike Communist society, we have a free and vibrant literature, complex art, unsubsidized music. These things are functions of the human spirit brave and free. Muscle? Any anemic elephant can lift more than a half dozen men. Marathons? My money would be on stampeding buffalo.

In 393 AD the Roman emperor Theodosius considered the ancient Olympic mess briefly. “Unchristian,” remarked the emperor, a newcomer to the faith, and ordered the games abolished. Presently earthquakes and floods all but abolished the Olympic site in Greece. Zeus was on the wane but he still got across a message from which we can profit.

For Kahn’s predictions of the 1964 Olympics and more on political corruption throughout Olympic history, read the entire article “Let’s Pull Out of the Olympics.”

Speaking Out: Let’s Pull Out of the Olympics

Originally published October 10, 1964

Realistically, rather than idealistically, here are some of the things that lie ahead in Tokyo:

A Hungarian water-polo player will attempt to drown a Russian.

A Russian wrestler will thumb a Hungarian’s eye.

A Romanian 800-meter runner will slam his elbow into a Yugoslav’s ribs, hiss “deviationist,” lose his breath and drop out of the race.

A Russian woman shot-putter will say she owes her strength to wheat from the Ukraine, milk from collective cows and faith in the Theory of Surplus Value.

An Indian neutralist will make a speech about sports transcending politics.

A Polish girl gymnast will defect, announcing that she has always wanted to work for the CIA.

A Soviet “assistant coach,” attempting to kidnap the Polish gymnast, will suffer a ruptured disc in the scuffle.

An American distance runner, new to saki [sic], will stand in the middle of the Ginza, Tokyo’s main street, and sing, “Let’s Remember Pearl Harbor (as we go to meet the foe).”

Tokyo officials will issue a statement denying police brutality.

The Japanese cabinet will sputter, totter, and finally right itself as Americans get back to the business of following football (not an Olympic sport).

In Tokyo there will also be footraces, fencing, fistfights, pistol shoots, weight throws, and the marathon. Why a marathon?

It seems that in 490 BC a Greek runner sprinted about 26 miles from the plain of Marathon to the Athenian marketplace with word of victory over invading Persians. “Rejoice, we conquer,” cried the runner. He then died, apparently of a coronary occlusion.

I would say that once is enough. That Greek runner demonstrated beyond argument that a 26-mile run can kill a seemingly well-conditioned man. But Olympic officials disagree. Thus at Tokyo a large field of marathon runners will set forth, followed in automobiles by cardiologists taking notes and officials reminiscing about the courage of the ill-fated runner of the first “marathon.”

Soviet invasion of the Olympics began in 1952 at Helsinki. By 1956 in Melbourne, Red athletes were suddenly as good as Americans. By 1960 in Rome, they were better. In all, the Russians, with no Olympic tradition whatsoever, have won more than 100 gold medals in the last three Olympiads.

Two reactions are possible. One can call the Russians a dirty bunch of Communists, who don’t understand amateurism, sportsmanship, and the Olympic ideal. Or one can grow up.

By definition, the Olympic Games are for amateur athletes only. That is incomplete. It next requires a definition of amateurism. … Generally, I would say that an amateur athlete is one who does not accept checks.

A southwestern football player who signs a contract with a university, receives thousands of dollars in academic aid and a fraudulent job from a prosperous alumnus is an amateur in America. A hockey player who earns less than a specified sum is an amateur in Canada. And everybody is an amateur in the Soviet Union because, Soviet spokesmen explain patiently, “No such thing as professional in a People’s State.”

It is difficult to find two Americans who agree precisely on what constitutes an amateur. Is it likely, or even possible, that Americans will agree with Australians, Koreans, and Russians?

In the Soviet state there is no confusion at all. Anyone who might possibly win an Olympic medal at anything is an amateur. Nikolai Sologubov, the Russian hockey captain in 1960, was an army officer who had one military duty: “Play hockey.” He followed orders so well he was made a captain. Igor Ter-Ovanesyan, their best broad-jumper, has been attending a Moscow physical-fitness institute on what sounds like one of the best athletic scholarships in history, as good as anything a Big Ten quarterback enjoys. It includes an apartment and a car; he is a hero of his country and he is getting an advanced university degree for his ability to broad-jump. Understandably, many Americans are outraged at such things. But their fury takes a marathon route to absurdity. Let’s make the Russians toe the mark, they say. If we could, it might make sense to begin with something other than sports — say, nuclear disarmament. But we cannot. Obviously we can’t get the Russians to adopt our economy at large. But further, we cannot get them to accept what we mean by amateurism when we ourselves don’t know what we mean.

I am an amateur softball player. I love to play and I have never accepted a cent for my services, primarily because I have never had an offer. You may be a perfect amateur at golf or tennis. But when someone unlike us reaches an exalted level of competence in America, others become willing to pay “expenses” to watch him play. Did you ever try to explain an expense account to a Marxist?

The Russians are not merely non-understanding. Someone high up in the Soviet state decided 15 years ago that it was time for Russians to show the world their muscles. Result: Muscles became the property of The State. Additional result: Valery Brumel, the greatest high-jumper in the world.

Now, say, Americans, between bickerings about the meaning of amateurism, why can’t we do that? The answer is simple. We have a free society. American muscles, like American minds, are the property of the individual. Any candidate advocating a change would make Alf Landon look like a big winner.

We have, as European borrowers bemoan, a materialistic society. We also have, as no other vast, free nation, a natural inclination to participate in sports. We did not need a president with a bad back to remind us to keep fit. For all the visible flabbiness, Americans from coast to coast are deeply involved in squash and bowling and golf and tennis, and softball games where grown men, wearing shorts, slide home. The brutal sport, boxing, is dying. Without benefit of Olympic nonsense, we are doing fine.

Consider our best athletes. There’s Mickey Mantle, who can hit a baseball higher, harder, farther than an ordinary man will with two swings. Mick is not eligible for the Olympics. Baseball, where many of our great athletes go, is not an Olympic sport. Besides, Mantle commits the sin of earning $100,000. He is thus un-Olympic and corrupt.

Jimmy Brown can certainly run with more determination than anyone else. He plays for the Cleveland Browns, who pay him well. Thus he is not allowed to participate in the Olympics.

Have you ever seen Bill Russell leap to clear a backboard? Russell, the best basketball player in the world, is kept out of the Olympic basketball tournament because Olympic tradition argues that any athlete using his gifts to feed his children is impure. Have you ever seen Willie Mays overtake a twisting line drive, 410 feet from home plate? It is a truly thrilling moment in sport. Have you ever watched Arnold Palmer crash a fairway wood on a rising line dead toward the hole? Or seen Pancho Gonzalez slam an ace into a corner of the service box?

Mays, Palmer, and Gonzalez are three of our finest athletes. At their sports, they are clearly the best in the world. But do they get to compete? Not on your life; instead we have kayak rowing, Greco-Roman wrestling, you name it. We may defeat the Russians at Tokyo, as we defeated the Nazis at Berlin 28 years ago. But if so, what do we achieve? Hitler charged that the Berlin victory, footwork of such stars as Jesse Owens, showed only that the United States employed Black Auxiliaries. To this a Nazi pamphlet added: “Among inferior races, Jews have done nothing in the athletic sphere. They are surpassed even by the lowest Negro tribes.” Thus victory was polluted and turned worthless. If we put the Reds to rout in Tokyo — which is not likely — we can expect similar libels, and we’ll cry “professionalism” if they win.

1936: Golden Moment of Triumph

Jesse Owens wrote a series of Post articles about great U.S. Olympians in 1976. In this article from the January/February issue, Owens recalls his own moment of triumph in 1936 Berlin and the people who inspired him to become a champion.

1936: Golden Moment of Triumph

By Jesse Owens

Originally published January/February 1976

Illustration of Jesse Owens — Jesse Owens (Illustration by Robert Charles Howe)

Editor’s note: In the Olympic Games of 1936, held in Berlin, a superb American athlete by the name of James Cleveland “Jesse” Owens won four gold medals. He won his first two medals with astonishing performances in the 100- and 200-meter sprints, setting new records in both. His leap in the broad jump won him a third medal, once again for a record, 26 feet 5 5/16 inches. And finally, Jesse ran in the 400-meter relay to help set another world record and to win a fourth gold medal for the United States. As a mere boy in junior high school in Cleveland, Jesse had run the hundred yards in 10 seconds flat, a phenomenal feat. That was the beginning of fame for a youngster born in 1913 on a tenant farm in northern Alabama, one of seven children who worked with their parents in the cotton fields. This splendid man who was a great-grandson of slaves, who was called by Dr. Paul Goebbels, the Nazi propagandist leader, “a black American auxiliary,” has made everyone in America proud of his lifetime contributions as a citizen. Goebbels had to eat those words that day in ’36 as Jesse swept the field time after time, and in due time was selected by sportswriters’ polls as the world’s “top track performer since 1900.”

Jesse’s fame has not dimmed through the years, as he has continued to represent the character of American athletic competition as an inspiration to youngsters, and an image of integrity that has never wavered since the days of his track triumphs. Arthur Daley once commented, “Owens was so matchless in his sheer grace and speed that his like may never be seen again.”

Today, Jesse Owens is scarcely a pound heavier than in his running years. Trim, erect, square-shouldered, he walks on those marvelous legs, still, like some relaxed panther ready to burst into galvanizing energy at a moment’s notice. His own story of his Olympic victories tells you much about the kind of man he is.

Since I was 13 years old, it was my dream that I might someday participate in the Olympics. It all came about simply because our junior high school coach, Charles Riley, who happened to develop quite a lot of good runners for this country, brought to our school, Fairmount Junior High School in Cleveland, Ohio, a man who at that time was known as the “World’s Fastest Human Being,” Charles Paddock, the great United States sprinter famous for his leaping lunge at the finish of every race.

Charlie Paddock had just returned from the 1920 Olympics in Amsterdam, Holland, and he was a very nice man who settled down and just told us kids all about it.

When Charlie Paddock was through talking to us, the coach came down to where I had been sitting in the front row in an end seat in the auditorium and he whispered in my ear that since there were a lot of youngsters who might want to get Charlie Paddock’s autograph, perhaps I could take the problem in charge and help them line up. I did this, and as a reward after the last of my schoolmates got the great man’s autograph, I was invited into the coach’s office to meet the famous runner.

I can remember facing this great athlete as he sat on the coach’s desk with one leg hanging down, and he and the coach seemed to be in such deep conversation that I was afraid I was interrupting them. But they didn’t seem to mind my standing around and the great Paddock shook my hand as he left.

Afterward the coach asked me, “Well, what do you think about him?” And I said, “Well, gee, coach, I sure would like to be known as the ‘World’s Fastest Human Being’ some day.” So, then, Charles Riley told me something I have never forgotten.

“Everybody should have a dream,” he said. “Every man must remember that dreams are high and that you must climb a ladder to reach them. Each rung of that ladder has a meaning of its own as you climb. The first rung of that ladder, of course, goes back to one important point — just how dedicated are you? How much of what you have are you willing to give to the dream? And the next rung of the ladder is your determination to train yourself to reach the dream at the top. And the third rung of that ladder is the self-discipline that you must display in order to accomplish all this. The fourth rung, which is one of the most important rungs in that ladder to your dream, is the kind of attitude you have in going about all this. By this I mean, are you capable of giving every moment that you possibly can to making this dream come true and of throwing your whole heart and soul into the effort?”

I remembered that moment nine years later when I stood at the starting line of the 100-meter race in the Olympic Stadium in Berlin, waiting to run against the finest competitors that the world had to offer. I looked down that field to the finish 109 yards and 2 feet away and then I began to think in terms of what it had taken for me to get there, the number of people who had counseled and coached me; and the people who believed in me — the community from which I had come and the school which I attended.

And as I looked down at the uniform of the country that I represented and realized that after all I was just a man like any other man, I felt suddenly as if my legs could not carry even the weight of my body. My stomach said that it wasn’t there. My mouth was dry as cotton; the palms of my hands wet with perspiration. And as we stood there, unnoticed — unnoticed because a German boy had won an Olympic victory in another part of the stadium, and the crowd was giving him an ovation that was due an Olympic champion — this was the sight that I saw within that wonderful arena. As my eyes wandered across the field, I noticed the green grass — the red track with the white line. A hundred-and-odd-thousand people crowded into the stands. And as my eyes looked upward, I noticed the flags of every nation represented there at the Olympic Games underneath that German blue sky.

Now, my attention was diverted from that beautiful picture, because the whistle had been blown and we were to assemble around the starter to receive our final instructions for this historic event. After our instructions had been given, every man went to his mark and adjusted hands and feet. Every muscle in his body was strained. And suddenly the gun went off. The athletes ran neck and neck for some yards, but our Ralph Metcalfe of Marquette University led the field at the 50-yard mark. From then, the 70 to the 90, Ralph and I ran neck and neck. And then for some unknown reason I cannot yet fathom, I beat Ralph, who was such a magnificent runner.

The greatest moment of all, of course, was when we knelt and received the Wreath of Victory, and standing there facing the stands, we could hear the strains of the Star Spangled Banner rise into the air and the Stars and Stripes was hoisted to the skies. It was then that I realized the immensity of my ambition of nine years to become a member of Uncle Sam’s Olympic Team and to emerge as a victor in the Olympic Games. Yes, this was the moment I had worked for all those years. And let me say that as you stand there and watch your flag rise above all others because of your own efforts and you can say to yourself today, “I am an Olympic champion,” there cannot be a greater thrill. But we have to remember that more than victory itself, the Olympic Games teach us a sportsmanship that transcends all prejudices and national and racial lines. That year was a very difficult year because Hitler had declared the dominance of the German Aryan race and we had the impudence to come over and prove him wrong in so many cases.

But there was one incident that happened in those Olympic Games which I shall never forget and which represents to me an example of how friendship and sportsmanship can transcend all obstacles when given the opportunity. The broad jump was an event that I was supposed to win with some ease because in the past I had failed only once to win first place in every track meet in which I had participated in my entire athletic career. But on this day, something was going wrong. I couldn’t imagine what was happening to spoil my jumping technique, but I had jumped only 23 feet 6 inches as a qualification effort and apparently was about to be eliminated. But there happened to be a young German broad jumper, Lutz Long, the greatest of them all in his own country, who was watching as I took my qualifying jumps. I had already fouled twice, and it looked as though I might not even be able to survive in the competition. But he came over and remeasured my steps, remeasured my takeoff mark, and he laid out my sweatshirt right next to the takeoff board as a marker to help my jump. Thanks to his suggestions and confidence in me, I was able to produce a leap which qualified and opened up the pathway to ultimate victory. Lutz Long jumped 25 feet 9 27/32 inches for a new Olympic record. I managed 26 feet 5 5/16 inches and so won. Lutz was second; but in my book of sportsmanship he ranks first.

In 1951 I returned to Germany and among a delegation, which came to visit me at the hotel where I was staying, there were a woman and a boy who came up and introduced themselves to me. This boy was the son of my lost friend, Lutz Long, and his name was Kai. Lutz Long had been only 22 at the time of the Olympics, and as the preparation for World War II rushed across Germany, it transpired that this little boy had seen his father only three times in his life. And so I began to correspond with Kai, and then we developed our own friendship that arose from the father’s noble and self-sacrificing sportsmanship and generosity. Kai Long and I continue to correspond and whenever I hear from Lutz’s son, my mind goes back to that afternoon in the Olympic Stadium when an athlete sacrificed his fame and victory for the sake of pure sportsmanship. And then I know that the Olympic ideal is something that should be cherished and never forgotten.

For more of our historical coverage of the Olympic Games, check out “The Summer Olympic Games: Heroes, Hope, and Hostility.”

An Olympic Family Act

Siblings Diana and Steven Lopez will represent the USA in the London 2012 Summer Olympics. They are shown here wearing sponsor Ralph Lauren’s signature U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Closing Ceremony Parade Uniforms.

In celebration of the upcoming 2012 Olympic games, the Post caught up with members of a very impressive family who will represent the red, white, and blue in London this July. It will be nothing new to the Lopez siblings—Jean, Mark, Diana, and Steven—as at least one member of the family has been taking home medals in taekwondo for the better part of two decades.

In 1995, the oldest sibling Jean won silver at the World Championships. He retired in 1998—after winning medals at more than 30 competitions—to focus on coaching his brothers and sister.

When the sport officially became part of the Olympics in 2000, younger brother Steven qualified and took home the gold. He repeated that accomplishment in 2004 and won bronze in 2008.

Joining Steven in 2008, Diana and Mark jumped into the family act by taking home a bronze and silver medal, respectively.

All four will be present this year–Jean as coach, Mark as both a training partner and alternate, and Diana and Steven as competitors. The Post was able to catch up with Diana and Steven for this Web exclusive interview:

On what it’s like to be in the Lopez family:

Diana: Growing up with 3 older brothers, I always had to be competitive just to be on the same mat. I always pushed myself really hard to be competitive. And my family is very competitive—whether it’s soccer, volleyball, video games, we all want to win. But it’s all friendly. We want what’s best for one another at the end of the day.

Something that we always remember is where our parents came from–Nicaragua–which is a third world country. We were born in Houston. My parents always told us never to take anything for granted and taught us how to be humble and grounded. And the future looks bright: my niece Alyxandra just turned 13 and is a junior champion in her own right. If the younger members of our family want to continue, they’ll have Olympic champion aunts and uncles to help. We’re the perfect family to help guide and push them to reach their goal.

Steven: We push each other. There’s a healthy competitiveness. When my brother made the national team at 17, I said ‘I’m going to be younger and better,’ and I made it at 15. I did it for him, because he always had aspirations, but he didn’t have an opportunity (the first year taekwondo was an Olympic sport it did not have a competition in Jean Lopez’s weight class). It’s a difficult, lonely, and hard road to be the best, and when you have teammates who are your siblings, it makes it easier. You all make the same sacrifices, and it’s a huge advantage because we’re traveling together so we always have home court.

On what motivates them:

Diana: It’s my own personal drive and will to keep going. We only have a short amount of years. I’m 28, and this is the time where I should be driving to be the best. I learned from my parents. They have a great work ethic, and they were always working hard for what was best for me.

Steven: I think largely it’s love of the sport; the joy in training. That hasn’t changed. I’ve been doing this for 28 years, and at times you don’t feel like waking up and training, but I still love the sport and want to compete at the Olympic level and to be the best. Being on that first place podium is one of the greatest feelings I’ve ever felt.