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It dawned on me with blinding brightness. I realized: I had jumped into another rare kind of stratosphere – one that only a handful of people in every generation are lucky enough to know.

Jesse Owens

It was bad enough to have toppled from the Olympic heights to make my living competing with animals. But the competition wasn’t even fair. No man could beat a race horse, not even for 100 yards.
JESSE OWENS

Animal Bad Enough Live Man Myself Race
When I came back, after all those stories about Hitler and his snub, I came back to my native country, and I could not ride in the front of the bus. I had to go to the back door. I couldn’t live where I wanted. Now what’s the difference?
JESSE OWENS

Country Difference Live Myself Story
It’s like having a pet dog for a long time. You get attached to it, and when it dies you miss it.
JESSE OWENS

Animal Attachment Death Dog Time
Friendships born on the field of athletic strife are the real gold of competition. Awards become corroded, friends gather no dust.
JESSE OWENS

Athletics Born Friendship Gold Reality
He was constantly on me about the job that I was to do and the responsibility that I had upon the campus. And how I must be able to carry myself because people were looking.
JESSE OWENS

Appearance Himself Job Myself People Responsibility See
We used to have a lot of fun. We never had any problems. We always ate. The fact that we didn’t have steak? Who had steak?
JESSE OWENS

Food Fun Problem
To a sprinter, the hundred-yard dash is over in three seconds, not nine or ten.
JESSE OWENS

Run Sports Time
The black fist is a meaningless symbol. When you open it, you have nothing but fingers – weak, empty fingers. The only time the black fist has significance is when there’s money inside. There’s where the power lies.
JESSE OWENS

Black Fingers Money Power Time Yourself
I let my feet spend as little time on the ground as possible. From the air, fast down, and from the ground, fast up.
JESSE OWENS

Myself Possible Sports Time
I wanted no part of politics. And I wasn’t in Berlin to compete against any one athlete. The purpose of the Olympics, anyway, was to do your best. As I’d learned long ago from Charles Riley, the only victory that counts is the one over yourself.
JESSE OWENS

Athlete Learning Myself Politics Purpose Victory
One chance is all you need.
JESSE OWENS

Chance Need One Liner Oneself Yourself
If you don’t try to win you might as well hold the Olympics in somebody’s back yard. The thrill of competing carries with it the thrill of a gold medal. One wants to win to prove himself the best.
JESSE OWENS

Best Himself Oneself Reward Thrill Win Yourself
I’d noticed him watching me for a year or so, especially when we’d play games where there was running or jumping.
JESSE OWENS

Game Himself Myself Play Run
The road to the Olympics, leads to no city, no country. It goes far beyond New York or Moscow, ancient Greece or Nazi Germany. The road to the Olympics leads — in the end — to the best within us.
JESSE OWENS

Best Beyond Destination End Leadership Road
I always loved running. It was something you could do by yourself and under your own power.
JESSE OWENS

Love Myself Power Run Sports Yourself
It dawned on me with blinding brightness. I realized: I had jumped into another rare kind of stratosphere – one that only a handful of people in every generation are lucky enough to know.
JESSE OWENS

Bright Enough Hands Kind Morning Myself People

It dawned on me with blinding brightness. I realized: I had jumped into another rare kind of stratosphere – one that only a handful of people in every generation are lucky enough to know.

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It dawned on me with blinding brightness. I realized: I had jumped into another rare kind of stratosphere – one that only a handful of people in every generation are lucky enough to know.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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