A photograph from a postcard of Jesse Owens at the start of his 200 meter gold medal run on August 5 at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin.
Owens’s historic performance on August 5th secured his second of four legendary gold medals during the 1936 Berlin Olympics, breaking the Olympic record with a blistering time of 20.7 seconds. Just two days after shattering the Nazi regime’s Aryan supremacy narrative in the 100-meter dash, Owens returned to the Olympic stadium track to completely dominate the 200-meter field, leaving his competitors yards behind in the dust. The image of Owens exploding out of the starting blocks captured on this postcard became a powerful, viral visual symbol of American athletic excellence that traveled around the globe, proving that human genius and physical perfection could completely conquer state-sponsored hate on the world’s biggest stage.
