Heroes Without a Country: America's Betrayal of Joe Louis and Jesse Owens

by Donald McRae

"Black men look like they rule sport in America today. It was nothing like that in the 1930s. America was white and that was that. It didn't do you no good to dream of making it to the big time. It was impossible. And then, y'know, along came Jesse and along came Joe." -- Ruth Owens, Jesse's late wife n the summer of 1935, within weeks of each other, Joe Louis and Jesse Owens emerged as the first black superstars of world sport, and their subsequent political and social impact on America was nothing short of sensational. To fans (and even critics) the world over, they seemed larger than life, and yet in their endeavors they were unfailingly as vulnerable as they were courageous; as troubled as they were brilliant; as unsettled in themselves as they are now fixed in history. Scrupulously researched and written in spare, eloquent prose, Heroes Without a Country vividly re-creates some of the most dramatic sporting events of the past century. In August 1936, in front of Hitler and an imposing phalanx of Nazi commanders, Jesse Owens, "the fastest man on earth," won an unprecedented four medals at the Olympic Games in Berlin. Two years later, in "the fight of the century," his great friend Joe Louis crushed Germany's Max Schmeling to signal the end of white supremacy in boxing. Like Jesse, Joe had been born to black sharecropping parents in a country demeaned by racism; together their victories became a rallying point for the disenfranchised black population of America. Idolized across the world, they were two young men at the pinnacle of their careers who overcame prejudice and fear to achieve their goals. Yet for both of them, success brought its own perils. In 1938, two years after winning his gold medals in Berlin, Owens was hounded out of amateur sports by the infamously tyrannical Olympic boss "Slavery Avery" Brundage and, facing financial ruin, he was reduced to running for money against dogs, horses, and even his friend Joe Louis. Later the two would be subjected to FBI investigations, harassed by the IRS, and beleaguered by debt and despair. Jesse watched Joe slip into drug addiction and mental illness. In Heroes Without a Country, award-winning writer Donald McRae captures the uncanny coincidences and intertwined events that bound these men together -- through both triumph and tragedy -- and provides an intimate and thought-provoking dual portrait of two of the most important athletes of the twentieth century.

Genres: Sports, Nonfiction, History, Biography

400 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 2003

About the author

Donald McRae was born near Johannesburg in South Africa in 1961 and has been based in London since 1984.

He is the award-winning author of six non-fiction books which have featured legendary trial lawyers, heart surgeons and sporting icons. He is the only two-time winner of the UK’s prestigious William Hill Sports Book of the Year – an award won in the past by Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch and Laura Hillenbrand’s Sea Biscuit. As a journalist he has won the UK’s Sports Feature Writer of The Year – and was runner up in the 2008 UK Sports Writer of the Year – for his work in the Guardian.

Donald lived under apartheid for the first twenty-three years of his life. The impact of that experience has shaped much of his non-fiction writing. At the age of twenty-one he took up a full-time post as a teacher of English literature in Soweto. He worked in the black township for eighteen months until, in August 1984, he was forced to leave the country. He is currently writing a memoir based on these experiences.

Reviews

[Frank Duke · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book at the Jesse Owens Museum in Danville, Alabama. I knew nothing about Owens' life other than his feats at the 1936 Olympics. The museum did not offer a lot of information, so I hoped this book would fill in the gaps. It is a well-researched and documented dual biography of Owens and Joe Louis. But I failed to understand the title. The book did not offer information on what it called "America's betrayal" of the two black athletes. Indeed, it acknowledged that both men failed to pay any income tax for years. Louis, in particular, comes across as a man whose generosity lost him a fortune, forcing him to embarrass himself through such acts as professional wrestling. Owens is portrayed in a slightly different light, though his treatment by the US Olympic Committee and the Amateur Athletic Union is completely unforgiveable. Likewise, his treatment by younger black athletes in the 1960s (calling him an "Uncle Tom") is inexcusable. But did America betray these men? I did not see evidence of that in the book.

[Bax · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fine dual biography that directs a pitiless spotlight on the racism endemic to the country during the period of its protagonists ascendancy.

Any fan of boxing will be familiar with alpha and omega of Joe Louis's life, but all I knew of Owens came from grainy film clips of the Berlin games, and their friendship was a complete unknown.

An excellent telling of a fascinating and tragic story.