Oct 1, 2009 5:21 pm US/Central
Olympian Jesse Owens' Daughters Back 2016 Bid
Daughters Believe Olympics Would Enhance Their Father's Legacy, As Well As Chicago's
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
He was perhaps America's greatest Olympian, and he considered himself a Chicagoan. Jesse Owens spent most of his adult life here. As CBS 2's Derrick Blakley reports Owens' three daughters believe bringing the Olympics to Chicago will enhance our city's legacy, as well as their father's.
From Marlene Owens Rankin's Hyde Park condo, Jesse Owens' three daughters have a clear view of Chicago's potential Olympic playground.
Asked whether her father could have imagined the Olympics right on the lakefront, Rankin said, "On some level, yeah, he could envision it."
Jesse Owens won four gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympics in Track and Field, and struck a blow against Adolf Hitler's theories of white supremacy. But after the Games, like other African-Americans, he returned home to face hardship and discrimination.
"It wasn't easy for him. He didn't come home to million dollar contracts and stuff like that," said Gloria Owens Hemphill, Owens' oldest daughter.
However, things got better in 1949 when Owens and his family moved from Michigan to Chicago.
"It was a place that wrapped their arms around him and he made it home," Rankin said.
"He truly, truly loved Chicago," said Beverly Owens Prather, Owens' youngest daughter.
Jesse Owens' three daughters all grew up in Chicago and still live here. Hemphill is a retired educator. Rankin is a longtime social worker and administrator. And Prather worked in banking and finance before becoming a housewife.
All three believe the
2016 Olympics would enhance their father's legacy, as well as Chicago's.
"His life after the Olympics, especially as an older person after the Olympics, was devoted to such wonderful things. It was devoted to kids," Hemphill said.
It's fitting then that earlier this month, the city unveiled a new, nearly $10 million field house at Jesse Owens Park on the Southeast Side, along with a new, half-million dollar playground.
Jesse Owens died in 1980. He's buried in Chicago's Oak Woods Cemetery. But his daughters believe their dad would give his enthusiastic blessing to Chicago's Olympic bid.
If Chicago lands the Games, Prather said, "I can see him now, and I can hear him say, 'you done a good job, champ.' Everybody was 'champ' to him."
Jesse Owens was quite successful in his later life. He traveled extensively as a corporate consultant and a sought-after speaker, often lecturing youth groups.
Owens' grandson, Stuart Rankin, is in Copenhagen right now. He's part of the
Chicago 2016 committee, hoping to bring home the Olympic Games.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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