James Cleveland Owens was born on September 12, 1913, in Oakville, Alabama, the son of a sharecropper and the grandson of an enslaved man. When his family moved north to Cleveland, a teacher misheard his initials, "J.C.", as "Jesse". The name stuck for the rest of his life.
At Ohio State, he became the most astonishing athlete in America. On May 25, 1935, at the Big Ten championships in Ann Arbor, Michigan, he set three world records and tied a fourth in about 45 minutes. It is still called one of the greatest afternoons in sports history.
In the summer of 1936, at the Olympic Games in Hitler's Berlin, Jesse Owens won four gold medals: the 100 meters, the 200 meters, the long jump and the 4×100-meter relay.
But when he came home, fame did not pay the bills. The world's most famous athlete still had to find a way to earn a living. On December 26, 1936, in Havana, Cuba, he ran a race against a horse, for money. For years afterward he took part in paid exhibition races to support his family.
Recognition came slowly. In 1976, forty years after Berlin, President Gerald Ford awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor. Jesse Owens died on March 31, 1980.
The fastest man on Earth, racing a horse to make a living.
