Q 01/05

In which city did Jesse Owens win his Olympic gold medals in 1936?

A) Los Angeles

B) Munich

C) Amsterdam

D) Berlin

Answer · why

D) Berlin

Berlin. Hitler meant the Games to prove Aryan supremacy, and the grandson of an enslaved man went home as their most successful athlete.

Q 02/05

How many gold medals did Jesse Owens win at the 1936 Games?

A) One

B) Two

C) Four

D) Eight

Answer · why

C) Four

Four. He won both sprints and the long jump inside three days, then added a relay gold he had not been due to run for.

Q 03/05

In which US state was Jesse Owens born?

A) Alabama

B) Mississippi

C) Tennessee

D) Georgia

Answer · why

A) Alabama

Alabama. He was born in the farming hamlet of Oakville, which his family left for the North when he was nine; a memorial park and museum to him now st...

Q 04/05

When Owens was nine, his family joined the Great Migration north and settled in which city?

A) Gary

B) Pittsburgh

C) Detroit

D) Cleveland

Answer · why

D) Cleveland

Cleveland. His father and older brothers found work in the steel mills there, while the boy delivered groceries and worked in a shoe repair shop.

Q 05/05

How is Owens, known at home as J. C., said to have become Jesse?

A) A preacher baptised him Jesse

B) A census clerk misspelled it

C) A teacher misheard his initials

D) A coach shortened his name

Answer · why

C) A teacher misheard his initials

A teacher misheard his initials. The story goes that he answered 'J. C.' in a Southern drawl on his first day at school in the North, and she wrote do...