Tribute to Olympic and human rights champion, Jesse Owens 1980 Apr 22

Filed under 2 or more | Music and Songs | Sport & Athletics | Tributes and Expressions of appreciation

JESSE OWENS HONOURED AT THE UNITED NATIONS

On 22 April 1980 Ambassadors from four countries, civil rights leader Bayard Rustin and Olympic medalist Herb Douglas met at the United Nations Headquarters in New York to honour the spirit and accomplishments of the late Olympic and human rights champion Jesse Owens.

The commemorative tribute was convened by Sri Chinmoy: The Peace Meditation at the United Nations, with Mr. Jeff Kamen, WPIX-TV U.N. Correspondent, serving as Master of Ceremonies.

Following are excerpts from the programme,


“THE JESSE OWENS SPIRIT: A CALL TO GREATNESS”

A tribute to the late Olympic and human rights champion

TUESDAY l P.M. 22 APRIL 1980

United Nations Dag Hammarskjold Library Auditorium

Guest speakers include:

H.E. Mr. William J. Vanden Heuvel Deputy Perm anent Representative of the United States to the United Nations H.E. Mr. Yehuda Blum Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations H.E. Mr. Zenon Ross ides Permanent Mission of Cyprus to the United Nations

H.E. Baron Rudiger von Wechmar Permanent Representative of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United Nations

 Rabbi Marc H.Tanenbaum National Interreligious Director American Jewish Committee

 Mr. Bayard Rustin President, A. Philip Randolph Educational Fund Representing the Owens Family:

 Mr. Herb Douglas 1948 Olympian and personal friend of the Owens Family

Host: Mr. Jeff Kamen WPIX-TV United Nations Correspondent

Sponsored by: Sri Chinmoy: the Peace Meditation at the United Nations


Mr. Jeff Kamen, WPIX-TV United Nations Correspondent:

Welcome to this United Nations tribute to Jesse Owens. All of us are here to celebrate his magnificent spirit of courage, dedication, dignity and humility which continue to be a genuine call to greatness. I am Jeff Kamen, United Nations correspondent for WPIX-TV, New York. It is a real honour to serve as master of ceremonies for this event. With us today, as you will see and hear, are distinguished diplomats, religious leaders, a great pioneer in the American Civil Rights Movement and a representative of Jesse Owens’ family, himself a great Olympian.

To begin our programme, I would like to ask all of our honoured guests to come on the stage for a brief moment of silence, to lead us all in a universal moment of silence to honour the spirit of Jesse Owens.

Would you all join us for a moment, please.


 (A brief meditation follows.)



Thank you all.

Shraddha

At three points in the programme

we will have songs written especially for this event –

written about Jesse Owens, his life, his spirit

by the man who asked me to invite you all here today, Sri Chinmoy.

Sri Chinmoy has been offering to the United Nations inspirational programmes, such as this one, for almost a decade now.

Before our first speaker,

I would like to invite the Peace Meditation Group Singers

to come to the stage and offer us the first song, entitled

‘ ‘Jesse Owens.” (Song)


 The concentration and dedication that it took Jesse Owens to accomplish what he accomplished is just incredible. When I first met Jesse, it was 1965. The place was Chicago, and the American Civil Rights Movement was making its move into the North for the first time. Jesse was deeply worried about the possibility of bloodshed, but at the same time he told me he felt there was a real opportunity for change, the best kind of change for a better life.

The amazing thing was that even at that critical juncture for American people, American black people especially, Jesse had a wider view, a global view. He said,

“I feel somehow, Jeff, that the years to come hold enormous promise if we have the courage to persist.”

Our first speaker is a man who has devoted his life to the persistent struggle for human dignity in his own nation and in the world.

 Please welcome Mr. Bayard Rustin, President of the A. Philip Randolph Educational Fund.


Mr. Bayard Rustin, President, A. Philip Randolph Educational Fund:

Shraddha

In 1936 the world was challenged by a racist doctrine, the doctrine of the Nazis, the pseudoscientific doctrine that gained acceptance in many parts of the world. As the growth of the German economic and military strength increased, many people became confused. I am not only talking about people in Germany who became confused. We in the United States became confused, and our confusion led to an increasing indifference. Now God or Providence, if you will, inevitably manifests itself in an individual who brings truth from the mountaintop to the valley where we live.

 Jesse Owens, a black man, was thus one chosen by God to shake all of us into seeing a clear picture of what Nazism was. This was one of our own whom we all loved, who received such unfortunate treatment in Germany. Jesse Owens disproved all racism and religious prejudice with his talent, genius and his warm personality.

His performance in the Olympic Games was without a doubt a spiritual setback for bigotry and an inspiration to all people who believed that all men and women are equal. He, as a solitary man, had the strength and dignity of a giant chosen for such a task. Although perhaps not even conscious of that task, he did it well, for God only commands that whatever duty he puts before us, we carry out. Jesse won after many years of practice and turmoil and poverty.

Shraddha

He knew that he was winning races; I doubt that he knew what in fact he was doing for all mankind. One can be chosen by God to carry out a specific task and it can end there. Not so with Jesse. His vast contribution at the Olympics may have been for him unconscious. But there were also the everlasting conscious acts for God which he performed. I must have telephoned Jesse Owens many times to join committees for this, committees for that: committees for Indian independence, persecution of Jews in Russia, the Cambodians who were starving, and so forth. To the glory of that great man, never did he argue with me except once. He was not quite sure about joining the committee for the Cambodians.

After all, there was fantastic unemployment amongst people here. For example, in our ghettos it was sometimes 60 percent. At first he said he didn’t think he wanted to sign, and I said, “Well, come along, let us have lunch.” He was too busy for lunch; we had coffee, and he didn’t even drink the coffee. At the end of our talk he said,

You know, Bayard, I’m confused with all these figures before me.”

I said, “Jesse, what do black mothers say to their children when they are confused?”

He smiled and said,

“Well, Mama said that if you’re confused, do the right thing and you are not responsible for the consequences.”

He did join the committee for the Cambodians. In challenging our indifference to the Jews, Jesse was challenging our indifference to all humanity. He was challenging the assumptions of the colonialists. He was challenging the bigotry in our own country. For Jesse knew that to be indifferent is thrice a sin. First, it creates a greater tragedy in the lives of those to whom we are indifferent. Second, it is a judgment upon ourselves for soon our own indifference will lead us to be insensitive to other people. Third, it is a judgment upon us because as surely as we give no heed to the least of those who are in trouble, sooner or later that very trouble will envelop us. Most of all, Jesse knew that indifference is a punishment to our very selves. As surely as we do not conceive of ourselves, we draw a line. We automatically say if they are not humans like us, ultimately there is nothing we cannot do unto them. As Jesse knew, our own indifference is a punishment because it destroys the values we ourselves hold most dearly.


Mr. Jeff Kamen:

The Germany which rose from the ashes of World War II is a new nation, filled with a new consciousness of international cooperation and dedication to peace for all mankind. It is a great joy to introduce the Ambassador to the United Nations from the Federal Republic of Germany, Rudiger von Wechmar.


Shraddha

His Excellency Baron Rudiger von Wechmar, Permanent Representative of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United Nations:

Jesse Owens is very well known to my country not only as the winner of four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin but also for his many efforts towards promoting friendly relations between the Federal Republic of Germany and the United Nations.

We all remember his outstanding contribution to international understanding. For many years he has contributed by public statements in the United States and in Germany to a more objective judgement of my country and its people.

It was not only his personality as a sportsman but also his convincing fellowship as a human being for which he was known to all of us.

I am pleased to say that the many honours conferred on him within the past twenty years included also the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.

Shraddha

He will remain for us “a floating wonder, just like somebody who had wings,” a man who was always aware of his dignity both in the athletic field and in everyday life.

He has come to be a “symbol of human struggle against tyranny, poverty and racial bigotry,” as President Carter put it recently. His own perception of life may be best described by quoting the following words from him:

 “We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline and effort…. You learn not only the sport but things like respect of others, ethics in life, how you are going to live, how you treat your fellow man, how you live with your fellow man.”

Jesse Owens set an example of how to live up to these ideals.


Mr. Jeff Kamen:

When I looked at the photograph of Jesse Owens on the podium, I was reminded again about the incredible one-pointedness, that tight focusing capacity, that Jesse Owens had to have to do what he did, not only at that spectacular Olympic meet, but for the rest of his life. His entire life was an uninterrupted song of determination, energy and dedication.

 I’d like to introduce the Ambassador from Israel, my friend, Yehuda Blum. His Excellency


Shraddha

Dr. Yehuda Z. Blum, Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations:

We are gathered here today not merely to pay tribute to an outstanding athlete. For Jesse Owens, extraordinary athlete and sportsman as he was, embodied in his being a very special symbol of human dignity. When he competed in Berlin in 1936 he was not competing on behalf of the United States alone; he was running in the name of all decent, upright and free men. He was not bearing just the Olympic torch; he carried aloft a torch for all mankind.

 It was my lot to have been born in Czechoslovakia in the earl y 1930’s. I was not even of school age when Jesse Owens competed at Berlin, and so I have no personal memories of his outstanding accomplishments there. But later, when the whole of Eastern Europe fell under Nazi domination and when some of us went through the horrors of concentration camps, I remember vividly being told how Jesse Owens ‘ victories so incensed Hitler that he refused to attend the continuation of the games.

It is easy to understand Hitler’s wrath, because Jesse Owens’ extraordinary athletic accomplishments before the eyes of the whole world made nonsense of the Nazis’ racist theories and shattered the very foundations on which they were based. The mere knowledge of what Jesse Owens had done helped give encouragement and hope to us all in those dreadful times.

Because of what he did in Berlin in 1936, we the Jewish people, the prime target of Nazi racism, have always held Jesse Owens in special esteem. In his very being he was the quintessence of the unity and brotherhood of man, ideals that were proclaimed to the world by the Jewish people, through the Hebrew Prophets in Jerusalem.

Shraddha

Throughout our long history we have fought and suffered for them, not only on our own behalf but on behalf of other minority groups everywhere.

Today we uphold these ideals and principles and abide by them in our State, the State of Israel, where it is not just Jews and Arabs who live side by side in equality and dignity.

Anyone who has visited Israel has noticed that even among Jewish Israelis there is a vast cross-section of ethnic back- grounds, ranging from tall blond Jews of Scandinavian origin to shorter , darker Jews from places like India, Yemen and Iraq, and finally black Jews from Ethiopia.

It is the tradition which both we and Jesse Owens share that these Jews from the four corners of the earth have been moulded together to form one people once again, after centuries of dispersion and it is the message of Jesse Owens which we hold aloft. Let us never lose sight of it.

And let us be thankful for a life that has become the symbol of human decency and human dignity.


Mr. Jeff Kamen: In my twenty-one years as a reporter in this country, I have been amazed at the shift in the posture of my own nation. In the past I would have had a hard time arguing with some of my foreign colleagues that America was taking too arrogant a position worldwide. But I feel so much better about being a member of the population of the United States these days because there has been an evolution of humility and no loss of dignity, and that’s a wonderful combination. I feel that the gentleman I am about to present to you is a manifestation of those qualities, Ambassador William vanden Heuvel of the United States.


Shraddha

H.E. Mr. William J. vanden Heuvel J Deputy Permanent Representative of the United States to the United Nations:

As we gather here today, there  are some who knew Jesse Owens and many of us who did not. And yet all of us now know him very well.

 We look at the extraordinary picture on the stage here, and we see all of the qualities of greatness the speakers before me have described. There is very little that I could add to what Bayard Rustin said or what Ambassador von Wechmar and Ambassador Blum have said, because I do believe that in their own beautiful and eloquent words they have captured the essence of a very significant person.

Shraddha

In times of difficulty for the world or for a country or for a person, there does seem to be an illuminating spirit that comes to us and in that illumination we find a new direction. Jesse Owens was that illuminating spirit. He was that spirit for the world in 1936; he was that spirit for his country for all the remaining years of his life. He ran an extraordinary race, not only in Berlin, but in all the years of his life. I often wonder what he himself thought when he challenged Hitler. He was a young boy from the Midwest of the United States, totally new to horizons and dimensions of important international challenge. Did he truly understand what he was going to represent to the peoples of the world on that day? And in the disgust, anger and brutal whim of Hitler as he walked away without awarding the medals to Jesse Owens, did this young boy understand what a hero he had become for all of us?

Shraddha

 His name is a legend and an inspiration for all of us. His words, echoing through the years, have done such wonders for us. There is nothing we can add to the four medals that he won on that day, except to say that now, as we look back, we realize that he continued running and really won a much 13 greater race. He lived a no bl e and t rue life, not only for those to whom he spoke in 1936, but also for those in his own country. As a black man, he came back to us not only speaking about the prejudice against the Jews, but also reminding us that the qualities that he had as a human being deserved the honour and respect of all of us.

He reminded us how correct the Declaration of Independence truly is, and in that he was the greatest of Americans.

I am privileged and honoured to come today to share these moments of silence, meditation and music, to listen to these beautiful words, and to speak for Americans in saying we are very, very proud of Jesse Owens and the memory he leaves us. Thank you.


 Mr. Jeff Kamen:

 I now have the honour to present a dear friend and constant teacher about the reality of international life, His Excellency Ambassador Zenon Rossides of Cyprus.


His Excellency Mr. Zenon Rossides, Permanent Representative of Cyprus to the United Nations:

We are here today to pay homage to the memory  of Jesse Owens. He was a great man \who excelled in his athletic record as a rare Olympic star, and at the same time, he excelled in his philanthropic spirit. He had a harmonious blend of the two. This happy blend characterized the ancient Greeks with whom the Olympics started. For them, there was no divorce between the achievements of the mind and the achievements of the muscle. Each was a necessary part of the qualities or virtues which are characteristic of the perfect man. Jesse Owens had both these great qualities. He was an excellent example of a man so self-denying, so loving his fellow man, and at the same time excelling in sports as no one else could have done.

This is the spirit of ancient Greece, which was imbued in Jesse Owens. The Olympic Games, as you probably know, were of paramount religious and political significance to the ancient Greeks. The entire poetic work of Pindar was dedicated alone to songs in celebration of the Olympic contests, as the most important of the achievements in life.

The whole Olympics were closely associated with the spirit of peace and the brotherhood of man. So it was an event shaking the whole political world. There would be a genuine truce in all wars between the Greeks. As you know, there were terrible wars between the Greeks, but everything was calm and full of peace and love during the whole of that period. They went to these games in a spirit of brotherhood, although a little while before they had been quarreling and fighting.

Shraddha

Jesse Owens is a flash of light in the darkness of our material world.

Jesse Owens is a thought of love that is eternal.

Jesse Owens is the world that should be, and is not.

Jesse Owens stands as an example for all of us, for the whole world, because he was at the same time the victor and the victim : the victor of dignity, love and achievement in the Olympics and the victim, the very great victim, of discrimination.

By his example and his life, he defeated in the best way discrimination and he encouraged man to better himself. In trying to pay tribute, we feel his greatness. We feel his greatness as impressing upon the whole world the necessity of change in this age where change is needed more than ever, not merely for a better world, not merely for a better life, but for the very survival of mankind. We have reached the time when the nuclear weapon is holding the big stick, telling us that either we change or we perish. The choice should be to change, but we see so little desire for change in the world. We see that bigotry has increased. We see dedication to the worst kinds of antagonism, war and hatred at a time when the punishment is near: a nuclear catastrophe is approaching.

Shraddha

I spoke about the true spirit of the Olympics. The survival of that spirit should animate the Olympic Games of our time to make them as important as they were in the old days of Greece. This Olympic spirit was there in the case of Jesse Owens, in the fulness of his heart, expressed in his many, many manifestations of love for his fellow man.

Jesse’s legacy is that the concept of peace should prevail, not only during the Olympic Games, but at all times in our advanced technological world. The spirit now lying dormant in man should be awakened, above all in the United Nations, where it is direly needed. The spiritual side of man is direly needed to guide him towards what he should do for his own salvation. It is direly needed because of the approaching threat of nuclear war.

In this sense I wish to express appreciation for what this Meditation Group is trying to do in the United Nations. It is related to the deeper significance of the principles and purposes of the United Nations, which can be attained only if the spirit of man is awakened, at this time when the intellect of man, through the development of technology, has become bankrupt. So, in the spirit of Jesse Owens, may we take this occasion to pray and meditate that there should be a lasting change for the better in this world.  


Mr. Jeff Kamen: Where else but at the United Nations, where else but in the City of New York, could we be treated to this incredible array of poetry from around the world.

Our next speaker is a clergyman with a universal touch, because his devotion almost transcends what would be the definition of his own faith. It goes to all humanity, and that’s why he has often been invited to join us. It gives me special pleasure to present Rabbi Marc Tannenbaum, President of the American Jewish Committee.


Rabbi Marc H. Tanenbaum, National Interreligious Director, American Jewish Committee:

Jesse Owens was an athlete and, in an age of professionalism, one would conventionally think that that exhausted his meaning. But perhaps in ways that he himself had not been altogether aware of, he became a metaphor for a meaning in finitely greater than athletic prowess itself. If I were to fall back on the definition written by my late blessed teacher Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Jesse Owens was in fact a prophet who lived his life conforming to the great moral and ethical principles of the prophets of Israel. My teacher defined a prophet as one who by his very life stood against indifference to evil and the evil of indifference.

Quite appropriately, we are here to honour Jesse Owens’ remarkable human achievement as one of the great imperishable stars of track and field who won four gold medals in the 1936 Olympics in Nazi Germany. He achieved, as others have said, almost in ways which were un conscious, the extraordinary moral achievement of stripping naked the Nazi myth of Aryan racial superiority. Standing in the presence of Adolf Hitler and the entire power and weight of the Nazi military machine, standing above all in the face of the Nazi demonology that sought to divide the world between Aryans and the inferior races, this one man alone humiliated Adolf Hitler and that ideological and pathological Nazi racial doctrine.

Shraddha

It should not go unremarked that Hitler’s contempt for Jesse Owens and the black people and the inferior races of the world was preceded by three years of systematic, mounting contempt for Jews, and for Jews as athletes. For between 1933 and 1936, Adolf Hitler and his entire system that gave him ultimate veneration, that made him in fact a saviour, forcibly removed 40,000 Jews from the 250 athletic clubs of Germany, saying that they, like Jesse Owens, had no moral, human right to compete with their superiors in the Olympics.

We will not pay genuine homage to Jesse Owens if we think of his achievement as a past event. In fact, for me, there is great meaning in coming here today and wanting to take part in what he represented. We must understand that the race that he ran against Hitler and the Nazi doctrine of racial superiority is not simply a past event. It is in fact a moral obligation, a moral claim on every single one of us in this room and on every human being in the world today, as we continue to face that dark legacy of racial, religious an d ethnic bigotry and hatred which is the engine that fuels the epidemic of dehumanization in the world today.

Shraddha

Jesse Owens is a metaphor for our time. He calls us to our senses. He calls us to mobilize our conscience, our moral will; to join our hands and our hearts and to stand against the evil of trying to assert superiority by proclaiming the inferiority of another. That is the ultimate idolatry of our life. It stands against everything that is essential in the Biblical tradition, in Judaism and Christianity, in Islam, in Buddhism and Hinduism, in the very ethos of democracy itself. And so let us hon our Jesse Owens not only for what happen ed in 1936, but for the summons that he lays on our conscience today in this place. in every pl ace.

Let us know that our survival depends on affirming the sacred tradition that every human being is created in the sacred image of God; that every human life is of infinite worth and infinite preciousness. It is in our hands and in the way in which we uphold one 19 another and are responsible for the fate of the destiny of one another, that the very key to human survival itself lies.  


Mr. Jeff Kamen : Now I have the honour of introducing a 1940 Olympian and a personal friend of the Owens family, Mr. Herb Douglas. Herb, will you join us please? It is a privilege to b e here with you.


Mr. Herb Douglas: Thank you.


Mr. Jeff Kamen: Now Sri Chinmoy, Leader of the Peace Meditation Group, would like to make a presentation to Mr. Douglas.


Shraddha

Shraddha

Sri Chinmoy: On behalf of the Peace Meditation Group, I would like to offer you this plaque. About eight years ago I was extremely fortunate to meet the immortal of immortals, Jesse Owens. And at that time I presented him with another plaque, with the message that is inscribed in this book.


(Sri Chinmoy reads the following inscription from his book, Sri Chinmoy with His Athlete-Idol: Jesse Owens.

 “To the Immortal Jesse Owens: The desiring world loved you for your outer speed. The aspiring world loves you for your inner speed. I love you because in you I see the teeming sufferings of Mother-Earth and the illumining Blessings of Father-Heaven.”

I would now like to read out the eulogy to Jesse Owens that I gave

Shraddha

on 9 April 1980 after a public meditation at Columbia University.

“Spirituality means speed: speed in the inner world, speed in the outer world. In the inner world, speed is founded mostly upon aspiration. In the outer world, speed is founded mostly upon inspiration.

 “There are some individuals who have speed in the inner world, while there are others who have speed in the outer world. There are few, very few, who have speed both in the inner world and in the outer world. Jesse Owens, the champion of champions, the immortal of immortals, has this rare speed both in the inner world and in the outer world. He is the colossal pride not only of his race, the black people, but also of the entire America.

Finally, he is, indeed, a universal treasure. As the outer world treasures his fastest speed, even so the inner world cherishes his bravest dedication that fought against poverty, darkness and ignorance in human life. ” Here we are all seekers. As seekers, we are offering our soulful homage to a seeker who has contributed abundant speed and light to the entire world.”


Shraddha

Mr. Herb Douglas: Thank you, Sri Chinmoy. I am very happy to be representing Mrs. Ruth Owens. She sent a letter to you, which I will read.

Dear Sri Chinmoy,

Although I am not there in person, my heart and soul are with you. I’m standing by all the time, It matters not the hour or clime. I cannot falter, cannot fail, His love forever will prevail. I’ll not complain, my lot bemoan, I’ll never again think I am alone. Jesse stands at hand to cheer, And has me know he is near.

Ruth Owens

Shraddha

Distinguished members of the clergy, members of the diplomatic corps, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to digress a little to perhaps why I am here: because Jesse Owens played an important part in my life. If I could take just a few brief moments, I would like to go back to the time when I was a spindly kid of thirteen years old. Jesse became my guiding light. He had broken four world records : 100, 220, 220 low hurdles, 220 high hurdles, and the next year he won four gold medals in the 1936 Olympic Games. I revered him so much that I had his picture up on my bed along with Joe Louis and Abraham Lincoln. For a young black youth during that time those three were very significant. And it so happened that I chose to follow the path of Mr. Owens. I had even incorporated into my prayers that I would one day become an Olympian like Jesse Owens. Needless to say, there was not an Olympic Games until 1948 when I was 26 years old. But at 13 years old I had the great opportunity of meeting Jesse Owens. I recall my mother standing near as I met him.

Within a matter of a few seconds I said, “Mr. Owens, I run 100 in 10.4, I long jump 20 feet and I high jump 6 feet, and I am 13.”

He said, “You keep running. You do better than I did at your age.” Then he said, “But by all means get an education.”

As I said, he was my guiding light. I became an Olympic medalist and received a doctorate degree. I was only one of the millions of black youth, one of the millions of people throughout the world whom he inspired.

Perhaps in winning an Olympic medal during the late Forties, in 1948, we were just carrying on what Jesse had only started. I was never able to actually repay him but our friendship over the past twenty years became closer and closer.

A few weeks before he was informed by the doctor that he had three months to live he did a commercial for American Express. That was his first real national commercial. Needless to say the commercial reads,

“Do you know me?”

Well, all of us, I think, know Jesse Owens and what he stood for. Jesse Owens carried the Olympic torch his entire life. He was and is a shining light for millions of youth throughout the world. He was a winner. He made it and so can they. He was a true Olympian-he won without malice, without hate. He was a man who loved his fellow man.

His spirit, as does the Olympic spirit, transcended political, racial, religious and national boundaries. He is a hero for those who love freedom, for those who strive to overcome all that impinges on the human spirit. The spirit of Jesse Owens will continue to live, and it will burn bright. He carried the Olympic torch his entire life and now he has passed it on to us. It is our responsibility to ensure that the Olympic spirit remains free and healthy. I thank you on behalf of Jesse Owens.   


Mr. Jeff Kamen: I want to thank you all. And to close our programme I would like to invite the Peace Meditation Group singers to give us their last offering.

As they come up let me just acknowledge with gratitude the presence of Deputy Permanent Representative of Jamaica to the United Nations, Mr. Peter Bartlett.  


See also:  

 On 4 November 1972, Sri Chinmoy met with former Olympic champion Jesse Owens, whom he has admired since his youth. Their interview took place in the Park Lane Hotel in New York City. Excerpts from their conversation follow. The full text of their meeting appears in the booklet Sri Chinmoy with His Athlete Idol: Jesse Owens.  Excerpts-from-conversation-jesse-owens-and-sri-chinmoy-1972-nov-04/


Performed by the Peace Meditation Group Choir on 22 April 1980 in the United Nations Dag Hammarskjold Auditorium : Tribute to Olympic and human rights champion, Jesse Owens

songs-dedicated-to-jesse-owens-performed-1980-apr-22/


Sample of some words to songs at programme:

JESSE OWENS

Jesse Owens, Jesse Owens, Jesse Owens!

O deathless jump, O breathless speed,

Eternally athlete’s world you will feed.

Dictator Hitler’s Aryan supremacy

Surrendered to your Himalayan ecstasy.

Champion of champions,

Hero of heroes!

In your service-heart America glows.

In Berlin four gold medals-winner,

Eternity’s diamond-heart owner.

 

THE GREA T REFEREE

Two unmatchable teammates:

My wife of almost fifty years, Ruth,

And the Nazi

Who fought Hitler with me,

Luz Long;

Three unique leaders:

My father,

My mother,

And Charles Riley.

But, most, and most humbly,

To The Great Referee.


PDF of report from May 1980 periodic Bulletin “Meditation at the UN”

bu-scpmaun-1980-05-27-vol-08-n-05-may-ocr-opt.pdf

 scanned page-images 07 to 32 in Gallery 2


Gallery  1 Photos from event


Gallery 2

scanned page-images 07 to 32

from May 1980 periodic Bulletin “Meditation at the UN”