Coppin State Athletics Celebrates Black History Month: Jesse Owens & Alice Coachman

For the rest of the month of February, Coppinstatesports.com will be highlighting several African-American athletes that have impacted U.S. history. In this piece we will take a look at a pair of athletes that made a difference in the world of track and field.
 
Jesse Owens
Track & Field
Jesse Owens became the hero of the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin Germany, after winning four gold medals. He was born on September 12, 1913 in Oakville, Alabama and attended Ohio State University. In addition to his studies and participation in track, Owens worked three jobs to pay his tuition. He experienced racism as a student-athlete at Ohio State, but used it as motivation into becoming the best.
 
Owens went on to break three world records and tie another in 1935. His 26 foot 8 1/4-inch broad jump set a record that was not broken for twenty-five years. As a member of the 1936 US Olympic team, the African American members of the squad faced the challenges not only of competition but also of Adolph Hitler's boasts for the domination of white European athletes. Owens won a total of four gold medals at the Olympic games. As a stunned Hitler angrily left the stadium, German athletes embraced Owens and the spectators chanted his name. He returned to a hero's welcome in America, and was honored with a ticker tape parade in New York City.
 
Alice Coachman
Track & Field
Alice Coachman was the first black woman to win an Olympic medal at the 1948 Olympics in London with a record-breaking height of 5 feet, 6 and 1/8 inches in the high jump finals. Alice was born on November 9, 1923 in Albany, Georgia and was often denied the opportunity to train or compete in organized sports events. Coachman did not get discouraged and improvised her training by running barefoot in fields and on dirt roads and also using old equipment to improve her high jump.
 
As a teenager Coachman broke the high school and college high jump records, barefoot, in the AAU national championships. At 16 years old she caught the attention of the athletic department at the Tuskegee Institute and was offered a scholarship in 1939.  During her peak years World War II canceled the Olympic Games in both 1940 and 1944. Finally in 1948, she was able to show her talent setting a record in the high jump event, making her the first black woman to win an Olympic gold medal.