Jesse Owens
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Jesse Owens (1913 - 1980) was an African American athlete who famously won four gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympics in the 100m, 200m, long jump and 4-man 100m relays. Owens' victory in the 1936 Olympics has been taken as a dramatic refutation of Hitler's racial claims about the superiority of white Aryans over others (the defeat of German boxer Max Schmeling by Joe Louis in 1938 has been seen similarly). Owens was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1976 by Gerald Ford, and posthumously given the Congressional Gold Medal by George H. W. Bush in 1990.