What did Jesse Owens and the 1936 Berlin Games really show?

In 1936 Adolf Hitler's government hosted the Olympics in Berlin to show off the Nazi regime, and Jesse Owens, a black American sprinter, won four gold medals there. The famous version of the story says Owens humiliated the Nazis and that Hitler snubbed him. The record is more complicated than that.

The Games had been awarded to Germany before the Nazis came to power, but by 1936 the Nazi regime treated them as an opportunity for propaganda. To look peaceful and tolerant, the authorities temporarily took down antisemitic signs. At the same time, German Olympic officials barred nearly all Jewish and Romani athletes from the national team. The high jumper Gretel Bergmann was dropped shortly after equalling the German record. Only the fencer Helene Mayer, who had one Jewish parent, represented Germany.

A movement to boycott or relocate the Games developed in six countries, and failed. Forty-nine nations competed, the most at any Olympics until then.

In Berlin, Owens won the 100 metres, the long jump, the 200 metres and the relay, making him the most successful athlete there. Germany still topped the medal table with 101 medals, 38 of them gold, against 57 for the United States.

What about Hitler? On the first day he congratulated some German and Finnish winners and then left the stadium before the black American high jumper Cornelius Johnson received his gold medal. After that, the president of the IOC told him to greet all medalists or none, and Hitler greeted none. Owens, who won his first title the following day, was never in line to be greeted. The story that Hitler publicly snubbed him is not supported by the evidence. That does not mean Hitler was pleased: his minister Albert Speer later wrote that Hitler was highly annoyed by Owens's run of victories and, with a shrug, dismissed black athletes in openly racist terms.

Owens himself said he had been treated cordially in Germany and reserved his bitterness for the segregation he faced at home.