Jesse Owens was an African American born on September 12, 1914 in Oakville, Alabama. Jesse was the grandson of slaves and the son of sharecroppers. As a child, Jesse loved to run; even when he had no chores to do at home, he would run just for fun until his lungs could no longer carry him. Jesse and his family were farmers in Alabama and were very poor. They regularly attended a Baptist church on Sundays. Eventually, Jesse's family moved to Cleveland. While Jesse was in elementary school, Charles Riley, a track and field coach, noticed how fast he ran and how high he jumped and offered to coach him. He wanted to meet young Jesse so he could make him a good high school track and field athlete and even an Olympic athlete. This trainer recommended that Jesse do more running than he did in gym class. He also suggested running 90 minutes a day after school, but Jesse couldn't run after school because he was busy working in the fields. So instead of running every day after school, he decided to run before school. During training, Coach Riley would critique Jesse's running to help him improve his form, keeping his knees and head high and his back straight. Jesse was not used to having a white-American coach working with him to achieve a goal. Coach Riley would push him and that would allow Jesse to do his best. When Jesse was 15, during a friendly 100m running competition, Coach Riley timed his race at 11 seconds. Coach Riley was very impressed as he had never seen a 15 year old run 100m at that time. One day, Riley picked up Jesse and took him to a thoroughbred race. Riley believed horses were the purest racers, not like humans who were burdened by human flaws such as selfishness and vanity. Ri...... middle of paper ...... you have to put a mark behind the board to aim so that when he jumps, he doesn't make a mistake. He tried what Long suggested and he made no mistake and got 26 feet. 0 by breaking the record. On the final jump, Long made a mistake and that's how Jesse won the long jump. On his final jump, Jesse broke the record again, reaching 26 feet, 5.5 inches. Even though Jesse Owens came from a poor family, he still had within him the perseverance, zeal and courage to be the best Olympic athlete he could be. His legacy has continued to inspire a whole new generation of track and field athletes. In fact, Gerald Ford awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1976. Discrimination in his own country and in Germany did not stop or discourage him from doing his best..