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teams. I was a catcher on the baseball team. I played on the basketball team. We won a city championship in, in basketball. Also won a city championship in baseball. Uh I ran on the track team and I was the field day champion. I was the fastest runner in the school. And of all things I swam on the swimming team.

And in those days athletes played all sports in season. In the spring and summer you played baseball. In the fall you played football. In the winter time you played basketball. And all year round you ran. I don't ever remember walking as if as a young person. I always ran. It was just my nature to run.

Q: So sports were very important to you it seems.

A: Sports were critical to me. Uh my life was built around sports. And I think it began when I started reading the Merrywell books. Now uh those of you who are my age may well remember the Merrywell books. They were written by Bert L.

Standish and Frank Merrywell was the premier hero. He had a younger brother named Dick Merrywell who also was a great athlete. And Frank Merrywell married and had a son named Frank Merrywell, Jr., who also was a great athlete.

And I wanted to be like Frank Merrywell junior or senior or Dick Merrywell.

And uh the exploits of the book, I started reading them I guess when I was 12 years of age, and I wanted to duplicate those exploits. He ultimately went to Yale. Became an all -- American football player, basketball player, a champion in all the sports he participated in and a, a well -- rounded All -- American type person. I wanted to be Frank Merrywell. I still remember his, his, his girlfriend's name whom he married. Her name was Inez. I married a person named Margery, but I met her in high school. So it was uh, uh it was my, my goal to be like Frank Merrywell, this fictional character.

Q: Then your goal was to be this quintessential All -- American guy?

A: Yes that's right. I wanted to be the uh as good as I possibly could be in sports and also be a good student, because Frank Merrywell was a good student. I, 1 wound up being, I would say, uh a B student. Uh I never had problems passing a, a courses in school. I was uh a fair student.

Q: So there is actually one story I'm curious about. When you talk about how active you were in sports and how they really were your life at that point. Did you think that you had a future in sports, that you might be thinking in terms of Olympics or an athletic career?

A: I never thought in terms of having a future in sports. I never aspired, for example, to be a, a sports announcer. That came through my uh the good day I had, the best day I ever had on a football field. But the only reference I recall as to having aspirations in sports was in my uh Junior High School graduating year when I was all of 14 years of age. My homeroom teacher, a man named Hugh Brown, who was an alumnus of Yale, wrote in my yearbook -- be seeing you in the 1936 Olympics. And I thought that was very nice. I was a fast runner in school. But

3 4 uh I was only 14. I didn't think in terms of the Olympic games, but he predicted it.

Q: After you read that did you think ah ha maybe that is where I'm going or is that something I should aspire to?

A: I didn't think in terms of the Olympic games until I was uh well into my uh freshman year at Syracuse University. Uh I was a, a school boy champion as a sprinter. I was the, the city champion, the state champion, the national sprint champion, but I didn't think in terms of the in terms of the Olympic games because I, I was still a kid. Iwas 17. And uh only in my freshman year when I began to win against important competition did I realize I had a chance to make the team. And when I won the metropolitan championships in New York City and then the Eastern Olympic trials up at Harvard against a great sprinter named Ben Johnson. When I beat Ben he was uh, uh, he was uh the world's record holder at 60 yards indoors, and when I beat him I realized then just a, a month before the Olympic games that I had a chance to make the Olympic team.

Q: I'm going to ask you to repeat one sentence. Not the whole thing. When you said something about not until I was in my freshman year. Can you say not until I was in my freshman year in college?

A: Not only my freshman year in college did I realize that I had a chance to make the Olympic team? I was uh a high school champion, New York City sprint champion for several years, and New York State champion. I was also the national interscholastic schoolboy champion. I and I knew I could run fast, but I didn't know how fast I ran until I ran against uh some of the better sprinters in America and was able to beat them, particularly a fellow from Columbia named Ben Johnson, an outstanding sprinter. He was the world's record holder at 60 yards indoors and when I beat Ben, beat him a couple of times, I realized I had a shot for the Olympic team and that was at the end of my freshman year at Syracuse.

Q: Having all of a sudden this thought or goal, was there anything different about being a Jewish American athlete than just being another great athlete?

A: In my high school years and my junior high school years, there was nothing different about being a Jewish high school athlete certainly not in New York City.

I'd competed against everyone. And uh I felt no different than other athletes in school. It was only in my uh freshman year at Syracuse University that I became aware of the fact that I might have been a little bit different when at my first training table meal as a freshman, I asked uh at lunch, the very first meal, please pass the lamb chops, and everyone laughed at the table, because they weren't lamb chops. They were pork chops. So I realized then I was a little bit different than most of the other guys on the football squad.

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Q: Did it motivate you differently? Did you think about it differently when you competed?

A: I was always aware of the fact that I'm a Jew. Uh never unaware of it under virtually all circumstances. And uh even in uh the high school competitions and certainly at college and uh for the Olympic team I wanted to show that uh a Jew could do just as well as any other individual no matter what his race, creed or color and perhaps even better. And uh it wasn't until uh the, the circumstances developed in the Olympic games when I was refused the opportunity to run in the games uh because of the fact I'm Jewish.

Q: At this time you're a little bit older, you're a little bit smarter about what's going on in the rest of the world, were you more aware of the restrictions applied to Jews. I mean in your, in your community growing up it was very mixed. It didn't seem to be an issue. But were you aware that there was anti -- Semitism in America, that you couldn't go everywhere you wanted to and that sort of thing?

A: I was certainly aware of the fact that there was anti-- Semitism. My grandfather and my father, my uncles, told me about the pogroms in Europe and Romania.

They'd heard about the pogroms in Poland as well and in other parts of Europe and Russia and I was aware of uh anti-- Semitism. In New York City I was also aware of the fact that there were certain places I was not welcome. I might go into a hotel for example and uh see a small sign where you registered uh which read restricted clientele, which meant in effect no Jews, no Blacks allowed. There were certain areas around New York City where you couldn't live. Like Darian, Connecticut, for example was a place where Jews were not permitted to own homes in Darian. And uh I was aware of that. Uh my folks would tell me and my in -- laws later on uh told me about reservations they made at a hotel and my father -- in -- law's name was Dorman and uh neither Jewish or Gentile, and he would try to check into a hotel having made a reservation at some resort and being turned away when they found out he was Jewish. He might check in as Jack Dorman, which he was, but his friends and associates might have names like Goldberg or Cohen or Goldstein and the group was turned away uh upon occasion. So I was aware. I was aware of anti-- Semitism. In New York and throughout the country as well.

Q: How much in the early 30's did you know about what was going on in Europe and Germany in particular?

A: I knew practically nothing about what was going on in uh Germany uh specifically and in Europe generally, except that I'd heard about the pogroms in eastern Europe basically as I mentioned in Romania and Poland and Russia. Uh but I was not specifically aware until my freshman year at Syracuse when as a political science major I began to learn of the uh anti -- Semitism that uh some of the Fascist countries were subjecting Jews to, particularly in Nazi Germany.

There was anti -- Semitism in Germany. I knew that. And there was anti --

5 6 Semitism in America. The uh Nuremberg laws as I understand it were passed in 1933. I was aware that there were.

Q: I think 35. There were restrictions from 33.

A: I'm sorry.

Q: ...Start over.

A: Yes. I, I, 1 was aware of the Nuremberg laws which were passed in 1935. Um Hitler had come to power in 1933. As a political science major at Syracuse University, I was aware of those anti -- Semitic laws, but these were merely on the books uh like the laws perhaps, not going to certain hotels, not going into certain areas, the unwritten laws, or the law about not crossing against a red light if you're crossing the street. Uh they were not seriously spoken nor seriously taken in the States. We were aware of it. But how, how they affected individuals I didn't know.

Q: And you didn't have any family in Europe?

A: At that time uh the family I had in Europe uh were my father's brothers who uh lived in Romania and were still there. But uh I didn't know how they were affected by it at all.

Q: Okay. It's just interesting to know, you know, what you knew before going over to Germany. Tell me about qualifying for the Olympics. How did that come about?

A: I qualified for the Olympic games by winning a series of races to qualify for the final trials which were held at Randall's Island in New York City uh the first use of that Randall's Island Stadium for track and field championships. I qualified by winning the metropolitan championships and then the eastern qualifying round up at Harvard Stadium in Boston. There were Eastern, Near -- Midwestern, Western, and Far western trials and I was the winner of the sprint in the East so I qualified for the final round. It was a series of qualifying rounds and I and about, I would guess, 14 other sprinters qualified for the final round. And in that final round I qualified and made the team.

Q: How did you place in those final rounds? What happened there?

A: Uh the placement in the final round, in the actual finals, I qualified by finishing second in my uh in that semi -- final heat uh at Randall's Island. And uh I'd like to tell the story of uh my first race against Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe. Uh these two were the two great black sprinters of the day. Uh we drew uh, uh marbles which we numbered for the lanes in which you ran. I drew lane number 5. Jesse Owns was in lane number 4. Ralph Metcalfe was in lane number 6. And

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7 I'm in number 5. So here is Owens, the world's champion, alongside of me.

Metcalfe, who'd run and won a silver in the 1932 Olympic games, on the other side. These two magnificent athletes on either side of me and I'm scared stiff. I mean I was shaking so that when the starter called us to our marks, to put our feet in the starting holes, we didn't use starting blocks in those days, you dug holes with a trowel. When I started to put my front foot, my left foot, in the hole, my foot was shaking so I could not put my foot in that starting hole. It was just vibrating so I couldn't put it down. And all six additional sprinters on either side of me were on, on their marks, getting ready to go, and I'm still standing there shaking. And the starter called everyone up and called me over to him. I knew the man. Uh he'd started me in some of the high school races I had run, and he said Marty walk up and down a bit, take a few deep breaths, relax, jog up and down, relax, and we'll try to start again. And after several minutes uh I was calmed down sufficiently to get my foot into that starting hole. Both feet in and we raced. UhI don't remember the gun going off. We were set terribly tense of course on our marks, and then set, and then I was running. And there was Owens on my left and Metcalfe on my right and for forty yards I'm running even with them. And then suddenly as though they were on an escalator and I was not they were pulling ahead and moving ahead. And I fought as best I could and I kept dropping back. And uh then I realized I wasn't going to catch either one of them and I thought I finished third in the race. Uh so much so that uh Ted Using who was broadcasting the race on the infield of the track, he was the leading track and field broadcaster of the time. Uh Ted called me over after the race and said here's Marty Glickman, the kid from Brooklyn who finished third. Oh wait a second he said. I see they've placed Frank Wycoff third. Marty finished fourth. And he interviews Frank and then he says now here's Mar, oh just a moment he says, uh they've placed Floyd Draper in the fourth place, Marty finished fifth. So he interviewed Floyd Draper and then he, he interviewed me finishing fifth. Which is where I was placed. I was a bit upset about that. Uh films from the race indicate that uh I beat Floyd Draper by a foot uh. Very little question about that.

As for Frank and myself, you could, you could choose the winner between the two of us, but uh, uh I didn't know whether I beat Frank or not. Nor did he. Uh later in Paris in a post --- Olympic meet I beat Frank but uh, uh we were virtually in a dead heat for third place. So I, I so remember Dean Cromwell finishing uh, uh it's too long already.

Q: Yeah. I guess I'm asking was there something that happened there, that was a precursor of anything else?

A: Well Dean Cromwell, Dean Cromwell leads to another story which has to do with the selection uh my ouster from the team. So uh if you can fit this in. As we finished the race, I noted that Dean Cromwell, the assistant head track coach of the American Olympic team and the head track coach of the University of Southern California, was in amongst the officials, arguing with them that Frank Wycoff had finished third and Floyd Draper had finished fourth. Because he was the coach of Southern Cal and Wycoff and Draper ran for Southern Cal or had

7 8 run. Wycoff was graduated. Had run for Southern Cal. These were his boys and he pushed them amongst the officials uh as finishing third and fourth. And I was placed fifth. I don't know whether I finished third, fourth, or fifth. I just don't know. But I do know that Dean Cromwell had a hand in the placement of the order of finish.

Q: And you think it was clearly favoritism, not the fact that you were a Jew?

A: I think it was clearly favoritism that uh he wanted his boys placed third and fourth. Uh the fact that I was Jewish I think did not matter at that time. He wanted his boys in there. And uh I had made the team anyhow because the first seven men were to make the team. The first three finishers running the 100 meter run, and the next four finishers making up the 400 meter relay. So I had made the team.

Q: Any other Jews on the team?

A: The other Jew on the track team, one other Jew was Sam Stoller. Stoller was placed sixth in the 100 meter final. He finished behind me. He ran a poor race.

Later Sam beat me in the Olympic Village in a trial race we had amongst the three of us. Sam Stoller finishing first. I was beaten by a shoulder by Sam, and we both beat Floyd Draper. Floyd Draper wound up running on the team.

Q: We'll get to that. Now after you qualified for the Olympic team, what sort of preparation was there between those qualifying rounds at Randall's Island and going to Berlin?

A: We qualified for the Olympic team uh on a uh Friday and we were on board the ship I believe on Tuesday, heading for uh Berlin. It was almost immediate. Uh we were measured for our uniforms. Uh there were several events we attended, uh several ceremonies we attended and we were aboard ship uh within three days after making the team. It was very quick. There was no training period or anything like that. We stayed in shape, of course. We kept working out every day to make sure we were in good condition. And we took the S.S. Manhattan for Berlin.

Q: Now this sounds pretty exciting. I don't know how much you had traveled before then, but winning these rounds and then a few days later being on a boat going to Europe sounds like a big deal.

A: This was quite an experience for me. I had been no farther than Boston. I'd been no further south than Philadelphia until that time. I was uh this 18 year old kid from Brooklyn. I was the second youngest kid on the team, on the track team.

And here I was aboard this magnificent liner heading for Europe and uh it was a most exciting time. Uh it was wonderful, it was thrilling, it was, it was great. It was fulfilling my Frank Merrywell dream partially.

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Q: What was it like on the boat?

A: The boat was uh informal. It was fun. Uh we, we trained aboard the ship. It was a, a five day crossing and a sixth day getting uh to Hamburg and then down to Berlin by train. Uh but we had no opportunity to really sprint aboard ship. So we did calisthenics, we jogged up and down, we did a great deal of walking aboard ship. We uh watched our diet fairly carefully. Uh there was no specific training regimen because we were all pretty good athletes, had our own different coaches and coaching techniques applied to us for months and years beforehand. So we were not concemed with uh being uh directed by the coaches who were on the team. It was a fun time. It was, it was a time that was loose and easy and pleasant and, and we looked forward with great anticipation to getting to Europe and getting in competition.

(end of Tape | of 4)

Tape 2 of 4

(five seconds)

Q: I want to backtrack for a moment. Prior to your going to Berlin, do you remember any conversation, any newspaper articles, any talk of America boycotting the Olympics because of what was going on already in Germany?

A: At the time we were competing in the uh regional finals and then the finals at Randall's Island uh the talk was so slight that I truly was not aware of the possibility of a boycott of the 1936 games. It had very little play in the press if any. I don't remember seeing it in the newspapers or hearing it on the radio. As a matter of actual fact, no Jewish organization like B'nai Brith or uh ADL or uh the American Jewish Congress if there was an AJC then. Uh no Jewish organization nor any individual ever said to me, Marty don't go. There was no talk, general talk, of boycott. I know now that there was a vote taken involving the AAU, the Amateur Athletic Union, and the American Olympic Committee and that uh they voted to go. Uh but there was no such publicity or promotion such as existed in 1980 when the President of our United States, Jimmy Carter, uh strongly recommended that we don't participate in the 1980 games. There was no such popular movement at the time of 1936.

Q: And you weren't aware that there were athletes who had decided not to go on their own?

A: I was not aware of any athletes who decided not to go. I know now that athletes uh say they decided not to go. There was a fine sprinter whom I never met, never ran against, fellow named Herman Newgas, of Tulane, who determined that he

9 10 was nor going to try out for the team. Uh he didn't go, he didn't try out for the team. But I knew that later, in later years.

Q: So this was just not an issue?

A: The fact of going or not going was not an issue. Not as far as I was concerned nor in terms of the public press or the populace generally. Uh we didn't think in terms of not going.

Q: Tell me about the trip over, the anticipation, what it was like being on the boat?

A: Being on the boat was fun. Being on the boat was a brand new experience particularly for a kid from Brooklyn or any of us who'd never been abroad. Uh I'd been no farther north than uh, uh than Boston. I'd been no farther south than Philadelphia, and here I was uh an eighteen year old kid from Brooklyn uh heading for Europe. Uh had been, a name, a place my parents came from, going to Germany, and uh visiting other countries as well. Our first stop for example was uh in Ireland with the ship. Just stopping there and seeing it in the distance and how beautifully green it was. We stopped in England momentarily at Plymouth and I could, uh I couldn't see the Plymouth Rock or anything like that and uh, uh but it was Plymouth England and then we went across to uh, uh Germany to uh, uh landed in Hamburg and from Hamburg took the train down into the uh heart of Berlin to the huge Bahnhof in Berlin.

Q: What was going on on that boat? What was the mood? People were I assume fairly excited.

A: All of us were pleased at having made the team. And uh the boat was wide open.

In those days a huge ship uh like the Manhattan uh had different classes, first class, second class, uh cabin class or whatever, steerage even. Uh but we had the run of the boat. And uh, uh those we ate in what amounted to uh the uh second class dining room, we were not in the top categories of dining room, we had huge menus to choose from. We were not given training table food. We selected our own foods. There was a fellow on the team named Tarzan Brown. Uh an Indian, Narragansett Indian from Maine who'd never seen a menu like this before. And Tarzan was a marathon runner. He weighed perhaps a hundred and thirty pounds.

Uh, uh a great marathon runner. He'd won the Boston marathon. On the team and we had uh this huge menu. And every meal, every day, he ate the menu from top to bottom. I mean six appetizers, and two or three soups, and four main courses. In those six days on the ship uh he might have put on between 10 and 11 pounds. He ran the first mile of the marathon and uh then he sat by the wayside and uh gave it all up.

Q: How were you spending your time on the boat?

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A: We spent our time on the boat talking, uh working out, uh calisthenics mostly.

Jogging up and down on some of the very short, straight aways on deck. Uh there was no facility to really work out the way we would have ordinarily on a, a cinder track or a clay track, certainly no quarter -- mile track aboard ship. Uh but we, we stretched, uh we jogged, we walked, we did exercises and uh we talked and we read and uh, uh generally it was a group of guys having a good time together.

There were women on the team as well, but uh, I guess I was not involved nor interested in any of the women. I had a girlfriend who later became my wife.

Q: Was there any special camaraderie amongst the few Jewish athletes on the boat?

A: There was no special camaraderie amongst the Jewish athletes except a, a warm friendship that I developed with a, a baseball player, Herman Goldberg, who was a catcher on the exhibition baseball team. There was no international baseball competition. America was practically the only place where baseball was played in those days. So it was a demonstration. An exhibition team and he was on the team and on the Olympic team. Herman was, a catcher on the team. We hit it off very nicely. But usually uh with the athletes from the different sports, the track athletes stayed together, uh the gymnasts were together, the swimmers were together. Not that we didn't fraternize with each other but we had much more in common with Olympic team.

Q: Now when you say you talked a lot, what did you talk about? What it was going to be like in Berlin competing or?

A: We didn't talk about uh about what Europe was going to be like. We talked uh about mostly about America. We talked about uh, uh baseball and football and particularly about track and field. Uh we told stories, we swapped yarns. We were, how can I say it best, we were a bunch of guys who enjoyed each other.

We had enormous respect for each other. And I as one of the younger fellows on the team, looked up to some of the older men who were not only older but bigger and stronger uh that one. And uh it was just a very pleasant time, a group of young men being with each other enjoying uh the sea voyage, enjoying each other's company.

Q: Did you think about the fact that you were representing the United States in the Olympics?

A: It's rather unusual uh for me or any athlete to say that uh we represented America.

I didn't feel as though I represented the USA. Uh I represented me. I was a, I was glad I was on the team. It was a goal I had sought. It was uh an achievement for me. It was an individual thing. After all the Olympic games in theory and I strongly believe this, the Olympic games are for the individual, for the excellence of the individual and theoretically though we wear national uniforms we don't represent the different countries who's uniforms we wear. We represent athletes.

We represent sports. We compete in sports for sports" sake. The competition is

11 12 all important. Winning is not important. Baron de Coubertin who founded the modern Olympic games insisted, has been quoted many times as saying, winning is not the goal of the Olympic games, taking part, participating is what the Olympic games are all about. So it wasn't as though we were going there to win for the United States. That was the thought that was perhaps in the back of our minds. It was not a conscious thought. We were going as athletes, not necessarily as Americans. I was going there as a Jewish American athlete, but as an athlete basically. A Jew, an American, and an athlete.

Q: What's the reality of what you're saying that there is that there are no, are you saying theoretically there are no national lines, there are no politics in the Olympics? I mean that certainly isn't my perception.

A: People say that there are politics in the Olympic games. I say hogwash. I say nonsense. Where does politics fit in when you run 100 meters? Or 1500 meters?

Or put the shot? Or even play basketball against each other? What politics are involved? The first man across the finish line wins. No matter what the race.

The man who puts the shot a longer distance than any other is the gold medal winner, or spins the discus, or throws the javelin or whatever the event. There are no politics amongst the athletes. You talk about politics amongst the nations.

Certainly. But not as far as the Olympic games are concerned. They don't exist.

Politics are not involved in terms of winning and losing. That's a good kasook right?

Q: Well I just clearly nations have used those gold medals in a political framework.

A: I don't believe that at all. I don't believe that the uh, having uh, medal winners for a particular country in terms of anything important, anything solid. After all, the East Germans were terrific as long as East Germany existed and they uh sought and worked hard to get, to develop great Olympic athletes. And the Soviet Union won many, many medals, dominated a couple of Olympic games, and, and certainly the uh, the uh the Italians to some extent won many Olympic events as well as other Fascist countries doing well and centered their interest in the Olympic games. And where is the Soviet Union today? Where are the East Germans today? Where is Nazi Germany today? They just don't exist any more and Nazi Germany won more medals in the "36 games than the United States did.

33 to 26. Although they won medals for dressage and for pistol shooting and rifle shooting and things like that. Uh I don't see the importance of international athletics in terms of politics at all. They say that the governments use it, but even the successful Olympic teams like Germany and East Germany and the Soviet Union, where are they? What good did it do them?

Q: I don't necessarily need to belabor this, but except for that in 1936 Germany's successes not only in presenting the Olympics but in also winning a lot of medals, may have been an encouragement, may have spurred them on in ways at that time.

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A: Many people say that uh the 36 Olympic games were the Nazi Olympics or Hitler's Olympic games. I saw that they were Jesse Owens Olympic games. The myth of Nazi Aryan supremacy was smashed to smithereens by the great non -- Aryan athletes. Black athletes, wonderful black athletes, won the 100, the 200, the 400, the 800, the long jump, uh the high jump, medaled in many other events as well. It was the Olympic games of Jesse Owens not of Adolph Hitler. Jesse was idolized by the German population. He couldn't walk into the stadium using the regular player's entrance into the stadium. He had to be secreted into the stadium. He had to use a secret entrance to get in. Otherwise he'd been mobbed by the uh idolizing uh German population or whoever the spectators were and they were mostly Germans in the 120,000 seat stadium. It was Jesse Owens Olympics as far as I was concerned, and I think as far as the world was concerned.

And it certainly proved that uh this Aryan business of supremacy was ridiculous.

There were non -- Aryans winning the most important events.

Q: Let's go back to your story now. So you had this terrific boat ride over and tell me about your arrival and getting to Berlin and all of that.

A: We arrived at the Bahnof in Berlin at midday in a huge crowd.

Q: Let me just stop. You arrived on the boat in Hamburg. Yes?

A: Yes.

Q: Was there anybody there to greet you?

A: We went right to the train.

Q: Okay.

A: Nothing happened.

Q: All right.

A: There was a huge crowd waiting for us at the Bahnhof in Berlin, this huge railroad station, uh newspapermen, camera people with the newsreels, uh photographers, fans, officials of all sorts, uniforms of all sorts. Huge crowd waiting on the platform when we arrived. And as we uh got off the train and milled about on the platform I felt a tap on my shoulder. And I turned and saw a smallish looking young man in his mid -- twenties obviously an American as soon as he talked to me, and he said to me are you Marty Glickman. I said yes. He said you're Jewish aren't you. I said yes I am. Slightly taken aback. I said uh why do you ask. He said well I'm Jewish also. I said you're Jewish. What are you doing here. He said I'm going to med school here in Germany. I said you're going to med school here in Germany. He said yes. I couldn't get into an American med school. So the feeling I had of Berlin being very much like New York in it's anti-- Semitism

13 14 or it's lack of anti -- Semitism uh was similar to New York and Berlin. It was the same sort of city, I thought, particularly as a result of this conversation with this young man going to med school.

Q: What did he tell you about the political climate in Germany as a Jew?

A: I asked him what it was like for you as a Jew here in Germany. He says well in Berlin I go practically unnoticed. Nobody knows that I'm Jewish. Uh I'm going to med school here. Uh in the shtetels, in the smaller cities around uh Germany uh there are problems. But now during the Olympic games and leading up to the Olympic games everything is, is, is quite. Uh nothing seems to be going on in terms of anti-- Semitism. And as far as my being here in Berlin, I'm just like anybody else here in Berlin. I'm going to med school.

Q: All of these people who greeted you at the train station in Berlin, were they carrying swastikas, was there any of that?

A: There was a huge number of uniformed individuals. I noticed and we commented about it, my teammates and I, about the fact that uh there seemed to be no men under the age of approximately 35, no young men who were not in one uniform or another. They were wearing either gray, green or brown. In one uniform or another. No young men in street clothes, in civilian attire, except those who were older than 35 or obviously older than uh the age that we athletes were. Everyone seemed to be in uniform. As for banners and flags, they were all over the place, dominated by the swastika. The swastika was all over. On virtually every other banner we saw there was a swastika. But this was "36. This was before we really got to know what the swastika truly meant. This was two years before Kristallnacht. This was three years before the outbreak of the war. It was five years before the United States was involved in the war. So the swastika and those uh German flags, the black and red and white of the German flags, did, didn't mean very much to us except as a form of decoration.

Q: And it wasn't sort of an unnerving amount of patriotism?

A: I'd never been asked about the patriotism exhibited by the Germans at that time.

Uh it was a, a, a natural thing to see uh all these German flags. Uh but flags of other nations were exhibited as well. Uh they rimmed the stadium. They were on the streets. There were many flags. Mostly German. Most of those German flags were contained the swastika. Uh there was seemed to be no outward display of patriotism except when Hitler walked into the stadium. He would walk into his box overlooking the field and I was perhaps 50 to 75 feet away from Hitler's box.

And he'd walk in and the stands would rise and you'd hear it in unison. Seig Heil. Seig Heil. All together, this huge sound reverberating through the stadium.

That was the patriotism, the German patriotism I saw. Seig Heil, with a hundred and twenty thousand people shouting it, or most of the hundred and twenty thousand people. But that same shout of Seig Heil was matched by the sound of

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15 Jesse Owens name. Every time Owens came on the track and he was on frequently because he ran in four different races, and qualifying times and qualifying races for all those races. Every time Jesse appeared on the track the crowd would yell, Oo vens, Oo vens, the w in German is pronounced as a v. And they would shout with the same amount of fervor it seemed for Jesse as they sounded for Seig Heil. Oo vens. Oo vens. It was a remarkable thing to see this marvelous black athlete saluted by a hundred and twenty thousand Germans.

Q: That's a great story. Now when Owens wasn't coming out on the field was there anything alarming about this Seig Heil in unison, a hundred and twenty thousand, or I don't know how many people were actually shouting it, but what seemed like the entire stadium?

A: Uh, I never felt as though there was anything alarming in terms of uh the Seig Heil, a feeling of fear or anything like that. It was almost as though uh we in, in the States were singing the National Anthem or uh, uh stating uh the pledge of allegiance to our flag. Uh it was uh it was fairly brief. Hitler would walk in with an entourage of uh Goering and Goebbels and Hess and Himmler and Stryker and take their seats in this box with Hitler in the middle, slightly forward of the rest of the group, and Goering with his uh resplendent, outlandish uniforms uh wildly decorative and Goebbels the rat like face and the rest uh Hess with a very dark beard that he had. Uh they, they sat there. Uh and uh Hitler particularly was extremely nervous when German athletes ran. He'd sit in his seat and rub his thighs and, and, and move back and forth as I'm doing now, and uh he was obviously very much involved in the race. And he was, I thought he was nervous for his own athletes. When other athletes competed, he just sat there uh quietly and observed. Uh he was thrilled, overjoyed, smiled when uh German athletes went to the winning podium. When the black athletes went to the winning podium, Hitler was gone. As soon as the black athlete won his gold medal and was going to the podium to receive it, the box would empty out, Hitler's box would empty out. They'd all be gone and they would not pay homage to the great black athletes who were there. They stayed for the white athletes. But they left for the black athletes.

(adjustments to Marty's appearance)

Q: I want to know a little bit about what it was like being in Germany, the Olympic village, what that was like? Did you take little side trips into town or into other areas as a tourist? If you can tell me a little bit about the mood before the Olympics.

A: The event I was supposed to run, the 400 meter relay, was uh one of the last events in the track and field program. It came, the trials came on the penultimate day and the final day of the games for track and field was the final of the 400 meter run. So uh I had plenty of time and so did the other athletes, except fellows

15

16 like uh Jesse Owens and uh one or two others who competed in several events, uh [had plenty of time to uh go into Berlin during the morning hours usually or late in the afternoon after the afternoon events took place and I uh had my freedom throughout Berlin. I could hitch a ride if I chose to, get aboard a, a bus or a trolley, or whatever, because I was wearing a, an Olympic uniform and I had Olympic identification of all sorts on me, and uh it, it was, it was beautiful, it was lovely. Uh I walked along uh Unter der Linden uh I thought that Unter der Linden, later I went to Paris and walked along the Champs Elysee. I believed then that uh the Camps Elysee was not as attractive as Unter der Linden in Berlin but that was my own personal feeling about it. Uh the Olympic village was a, a beautiful campus of bungalows and low lying houses which uh housed the uh various teams of the Olympic games. Uh and it was like a college campus. Uh slightly rolling hills, low hills and uh dotted with uh these bungalows and different buildings there. There was a practice track, there was a swimming area, uh an indoor natautorium, and uh we worked out at the practice track. The single most important thing I got from the games was the fact that the other athletes of the world were just like me. And I was just like they. Uh I worked out with Hungarian athletes and uh, uh Romanian athletes and British athletes, French, Japanese athletes. We had many things in common. The things involving our sports uh and uh I'd jog alongside of the different athletes. I walked alongside of them of the dining room and rooms but we were with each other and we enjoyed each other's presence even though we couldn't communicate very well with most of the teams of the world because I didn't speak their language and they didn't speak mine. Talked to the English, of course, and talked to those who spoke English. Uh there was one Finn, a great Finnish athlete named Gunnar Harkert.

Uh Gunnar was uh the 5,000 meter champion. A young man in his early twenties who was a beautiful blond, blue -- eyed, apple cheeked young man, and a great, great runner. He won the gold medal. And he spoke good English. And we spent a great deal of time with Gunnar because he liked being with the American athletes. He liked speaking English and we liked Gunnar. And to my shock and horror, he was killed in the Russian -- Finnish war just a few years after the Olympic games. But knowing him and knowing the other athletes, even just being with them for this limited amount of time, made me feel like one of them.

And I think they felt like one of us. It was a wonderful education for all of us and me particularly.

Q: Did you mingle with German athletes?

A: The German athletes usually stayed to themselves. The German athletes worked out together. Worked out by themselves. Uh they weren't as free, as loose, as easy as athletes from other countries of the world.

(end Tape 2 of 4)

(Tape 3 of 4)

16 17

Q: You were saying that you had time before your event or your supposed event in the Olympics and you were able to go into Berlin and all that. In this did you feel anything about the atmosphere? Was it charged? Did you see signs saying No Jews Here? Did you experience any of what was to come?

A: In my time in Germany I felt and saw nothing overt. I saw no signs. I heard no verbiage of any sort. I speak a little German because of the Yiddish that I know and I took some German at school. Uh and I heard nothing and I saw nothing which was anti -- Semitic in any way, except for the day that I was supposed to tun the trial heats of the 400 meter relay. And uh, uh that was the first anti and only anti -- Semitism that I experienced. And I experienced it from American coaches and not from Germans. There was no overt sign of any anti -- Semitic feeling or activity at all that I saw in Berlin or wherever I went in Germany.

Q: Now Herman Goldberg your pal at the Olympics mentioned a trip into Berlin where I guess you hitched a ride with some German soldiers. What happened there?

A: One of the ways of getting from the Olympic village to the Olympic stadium which was about eight miles distant from the Olympic village was to hitch a ride.

And uh Herman Goldberg, my buddy and I, hitched a ride in what amounts to a German Army jeep. And it was driven by a German sergeant who looked like a Nazi sergeant and he sat alongside of his passenger who was a, a very handsome Lieutenant in the German army, blond, blue -- eyed, most attractive looking man.

And as we got into the jeep, hitching the ride, they asked for our autographs. And we said we'll give it to you when we get off the jeep. Which we did. Uh we took these uh eight miles at a what we thought was a reckless speed to begin with. We could see the speedometer going up to uh 70, 80, 90, 100. 100 kilometers we finally realized and not a 100 miles an hour, almost uh only half the speed. At any rate we get to uh the Olympic stadium and uh they, they give us some paper to sign our names and we scrawled our names, Herman Goldberg, Marty Glickman and left almost immediately. Uh we didn't want them to have them ask questions about our names, Goldberg, Glickman, were we Jewish, or do we have German Jewish background or whatever. We were aware of the fact that we were with this German Lieutenant uh and this German sergeant who looked every inch the typical Nazi Army officer and under officer.

Q: So you knew that there was potential for problems?

A: We were aware of the fact that uh there was anti -- Semitism in Germany. We were aware of the fact that these were obviously German soldiers, perhaps Nazis, but we thought all Germans uh all soldiers certainly uh were sympathetic to the Nazis. And uh we just didn't know what Nazism was. Remember. This is from the prospective of two years before Kristallnacht. Uh the Holocaust was not only not a thought, it didn't exist in our imagination, in our dreams uh we, we didn't have nightmares about the Holocaust. It was a word that I didn't even know in

17 18 1936. Uh certainly had we uh any inkling of what was going to happen, we wouldn't have been in Germany in the first place. But uh the uh, uh the feeling about anti -- Semitism for me and probably for Herman and the two other Jews who uh whom I knew uh on, on the team. There was a, a fine basketball player named Sam Bolter who was on the team and Herman and I and uh, uh there was another Jewish athlete uh, uh who. The Jewish athletes I knew on the team uh were Herman Goldberg, who was my buddy much of the time, and Sam Stoller who was team mate on the 400 meter relay, and Sam Bolter was a, a wonderful basketball player, a guard on the basketball team and uh the four of us were the only Jews I was aware of. I understand now there were three other Jews who were on the uh American Olympic team, but I didn't know them then. I didn't know they were Jewish. But the, the four of them I knew, the four of us were the Jews whom I knew. And we certainly were not aware of what was to come. I guess the whole world was not aware of, of what was to come.

Q: So Berlin was like any other big city, but very beautiful.

A: Berlin was like any other big city. If I would use a single word to describe Berlin during that period of time. The word would be carnival. There was an atmosphere of carnival about Berlin with the flags flying and the beautiful weather, almost every day uh it was, it was golden. Fleecy white clouds occasionally overhead.

Late in the day, on a couple of days, there was some rain at the stadium. But most of the time it was just lovely. The city was immaculate as I understand it still is and as I saw a couple of years when I was back there again. And uh the people were well dressed and seemingly well fed. Uh the beer flowed and uh it was a carnival atmosphere.

Q: Now before I get to, I want you to tell me about how you were basically dumped from the race, but I just wanted to ask you on the boat or in the Olympic village, did you get to know John Woodruff at all?

A: I knew John Woodruff uh slightly from the various track meets in which we competed at the same time. He ran the half mile. I was the sprinter running a 100 meters and sometimes 200 meters. And John and I were among the younger members of the team. Uh John was a, a uh a wonder athlete. He was taller than virtually anyone else on the, on the squad except for some basketball players, six feet four, a quiet, reserved, and a magnificent runner. He had the longest stride, running stride, in the world at that time. And he ran a marvelous race to win the gold medal at 800 meters. He was far better than the rest of the field as you probably know and have seen, he virtually came to a halt at the half -- way mark of the race, at the end of the first quarter, let the rest of the field go by because he was pocketed in. He couldn't get to the outside. He couldn't make a move because there were runners in front of him and along side of him, so he let the field go by him, ran around the entire field and then came on to win handily down the stretch and down the backstretch first, around the far turn and around the stretch, and uh, a quiet, self -- effacing, and a uh just a wonderful athlete.

18 19

Q: Now tell me about your anticipation for your event. I know you were training for it, and what happened?

A: The 400 meter relay was selected beforehand and the four of us in order, Sam Stoller would start, he had the best start of the group of us. I was to run the second leg down the back stretch straightway. Floyd Draper run the third leg.

And Frank Wycoff run the anchor leg. He was the great veteran. This was his third Olympic team that he was on. And we practiced passing the baton and passing the baton is terribly important in the 400 meter relay because the race is short and you to make a, a, a good pass, the best possible pass. And we practiced this every day. In that order. So that we knew each other and we knew the distance we had to start running and things like that. The morning of the day we were supposed to run in the trial heats, we were called into a meeting, the seven sprinters were, along with Gene Cromwell, the assistant head track coach, and Lawrence Robertson, the head track coach. And Robertson announced to the seven of us that he's heard very strong rumors that the Germans were saving their best sprinters, hiding them, to upset the American team in the 400 meter relay.

And consequently, Sam and I were to be replaced by Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe. Now there's no question that Jesse and Ralph were faster at 100 meters than Sam and I. They'd beaten us fairly regularly. And we were shocked. Uh Sam was completely stunned. He didn't say a word in the meeting. I'm a brash 18 year old kid and I said coach, you can't hide world class sprinters. In order to be a world class sprinter you must run in world class competition. And we don't know of any Germans outside of Erik Borkmaier who finished fifth in the 100 meter final beaten by Frank Wycoff, the, as well as Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe. He was the best German sprinter. Later I beat Borkamier in another post Olympic track meet, but we all knew we could beat Borkmaier, and you don't hide world class sprinters. I said coach there can't be any German world class sprinters. He says well we're going to take no chances, said Dean Cromwell. And Jesse and Ralph are going to take Sam pla, Sam's place and your place. At which point Jesse spoke up and said coach I've won my three gold medals, the 100, the 200, and the long jump. I'm tired. I've had it. Let Marty and Sam run. They deserve it, said Jesse. And Cromwell pointed his finger at him and said you" ll do as you're told. And in those days black athletes did as they were told. And Jesse was quiet after that. But he volunteered not to run, not to win his fourth gold medal so that Sam and I, the only two Jews on the track team, could run and win or try to win. The only way we could have lost that race is had we dropped the baton. Frank Wycoff later said that uh we probably would have run just as fast because our baton passing would have been superior because we had practiced. I spoke up, I said something else, I said coach no matter who runs we're going to win this race by fifteen yards. We won by fifteen yards. When you see the finish of the race, all you see is Frank Wycoff crossing the finish line.

You don't even see the next, second place finisher. He's out of the picture. He's that far back. Fifteen yards behind. The Germans didn't finish second or third.

They finished fourth. They were placed third because the Dutch team ran out of

19

20 their lane and so they were disqualified. But they finished third in the race some fifteen, sixteen yards back. So the story given us was an out and out lie by Robertson and by Dean Cromwell. I believe now that with Hitler's humiliation by having the black athletes stand on the winning podium the many times that they did in the 100, the 200, the 400, the 800, the long jump, the high jump. They were dominating the games. That it would have been further humiliation for Hitler to have Jews stand on the winning podium. And as I said the only way we would not stand on the winning podium had we dropped the baton. We would have won the race by, by fifteen yards or more. So we didn't get to run.

Q: Now you say now this is the way you look at it. Try to put yourself back to this time in the summer of 1936 as you were told that you weren't going to be running. What was going through your mind? What were you thinking?

A: As I was told that Sam and I would not run I thought that track politics was taking place, that uh Dean Cromwell, the assistant head track coach, wanted to make sure that both his boys, Floyd Draper and Frank Wycoff were on the team. And so he was making sure they were going to be on because in a trial race in the Olympic village three days before this race took place, the 400 meter race took place, we ran a trial heat. And Stoller won the race, beating me by about oh a shoulder, a foot, and we both beat Floyd Draper by a yard. So here is Draper running the relay, whom we had both beaten just a couple of days before and Sam and I were not running. In the entire history of the modern Olympic games, now going into it's 100" year, no fit American track and field performer has ever not competed in the Olympic games except for Sam Stoller and me, the only two Jews on the 1936 team. Every other American track and field athlete has competed, so long as he was physically fit, didn't have a pulled muscle or didn't have an appendectomy as one of our track athletes did have and couldn't run, a fellow named Hal Smallwood. But with that exception uh every athlete has run.

Q: Okay. But you didn't. I mean you weren't thinking in those terms in August of deg36. You were thinking it was basically favoritism again.

A: In August of "36 I thought originally, I did mention in that meeting I did say that coach you know we're the only two Jews on the track team, Sam and I. There's bound to be a furor about this back home. We'll worry about that later said Dean Cromwell. Later, of course, Dean Cromwell also was a member of the American First committee, that group in America which was sympathetic to the Nazi cause.

So my thoughts were that Cromwell was seeing to it that his boys were on that 400 meter relay. And uh about that threat of other German sprinters that was just uh had a whole cloth. It, it, it was a complete lie.

Q: What were you feeling? Here you had been preparing for this in a way for years and you'd been training especially hard, you were, I'm sure, very, very excited to participate in the Olympics.

20 21

A: I was fortunate. I was young. I was 18. Sam was three years older than I. He was a senior at Michigan. And uh in those days when you finished your college career that was usually it. And Sam was at the end of his college career. He vowed never to run again because of this terrible disappointment. He did run and won a collegiate championship the following year. He did change his mind a bit later on. I as an 18 year old, just out of my freshman year, I vowed that come 1940, I'd win it all. I'd win the 100, the 200, I'd uh run on the relay. I was going to be 22 in 1940 and I'd be at the height of my supposed uh athletic abilities in those years. Of course 1940 never came. There was a war on. 1944 never came.

But I was frustrated and angered enough so that I could look ahead and get even four years hence. Young enough to get even. In addition I was a football player uh at Syracuse and uh a month from the Olympic games I was going to be playing football at Syracuse University, my first varsity season then. And uh I had something to look forward to. I had something to dissipate my disappointment by having a, a football season too, looming for me.

Q: So you weren't even temporarily devastated by this?

A: I was, I was, I was not if you use the word devastated, I was not devastated. I was angered. I was frustrated. And as I say I was young enough to think ahead.

Q: Say that again without the as I say.

A: I was not devastated by not being on that 400 meter team. Terribly angry.

Terribly frustrated. But I was young enough to be able to look ahead to 1940 and perhaps win it all, to win the 100 and the 200. I might be at my athletic peak when I was 22 years of age. Here I was only 18. So I had something to shoot for, something to look forward to, come 1940 and the next Olympic games. I also had a football season I was looking forward to because I was going into my sophomore year, first year of varsity football, and that occupied my thoughts and time and energies immediately after the games.

Q: You mentioned that Owens stepped forward and said, let these guys run. Did you get that kind of support from the other athletes?

A: No one else said anything in that room during the course of this meeting. Ralph Metcalfe didn't say a word. I think he wanted to run on the relay and this justification, why, why not, if he could run on the relay. And the only other athlete involved who didn't run was Mac Robinson. Mac, Jackie Robinson's older brother, already had won the silver medal at 200 meters and he was not as good at 100 meters as he was at 200 meters. In addition he was not involved in the practice of passing the baton. That 400 meter relay was set as I say with uh leading off was Sam Stoller with that great start. I was running the second leg, Floyd Draper the third leg, Frank Wycoff the anchor leg and we practiced passing the baton in that order for two weeks in the Olympic village.

21 22

Q: Did the other athletes after this decision had been made, were they supportive or did they or did you guys just not talk about it?

A: They were supportive. The other athletes were supportive afterwards. Uh patted me on the back. Say, saying Marty you should have run. Uh not en masse.

Everybody was involved with his own uh achievements or striding. Uh the, the feeling was that tough luck. But for me, as I say, it was the feeling of I'll show them. [Pll get even. I was there. I sat in the stands and watched the race. The qualifying heats proved that we were by far the best team among the other countries of the world, the best 400 meter relay team. The following day I was walking across the campus of the Olympic village and I heard my name called to me, and 50 yards away was Lawrence Robertson, the head track coach, uh with his cane. He was an older man. Marty, Marty. And I jogged over to him. I just want to tell you how sorry I am. I made a terrible mistake. And uh he said he was sorry. Dean Cromwell didn't say a word. Never spoke to me again. Uh I don't know what he said or thought to anyone else, but he never said a word to me. Wycoff later said we would have run just as fast had you and Sam run because our superior baton passing because of practice could have enabled us to run and win.

Q: Now you started to say you were there watching your meet. What was that like?

A: Watching the trial heat and watching the final the following day were uh strange, weird, all sorts of emotions flashed through my being. Uh frustration certainly.

Anger certainly. I look out on the track and I see Metcalfe passing runners down the backstretch. He ran the second leg. And that should be me out there. As they warmed up, jogging up and down the track, I, that should be me. That, that's me out there. And you know frustrated at it uh feeling uh also feeling relief that I wasn't running in this race. I didn't have the pressure of receiving the baton, running with it and passing the baton. I wasn't fearful of dropping the baton.

And all relay runners have that uncertainty, that fear of the possibility. I've never dropped a baton in the many relay races I've run, but I've seen it dropped. So I it was some feeling of relief, but mostly it was anger and frustration and the feeling that should be me out there.

Q: Who were you sitting with during the event?

A: My recollection is I sat with Herman Goldberg uh during the events for either the trial race or the trial heats or for the finals. I don't know. I don't believe I sat with Herman both those days. Very often we would sit together and sometimes we would not. After all he had his own assignments to take care of. He was practicing and playing with the American baseball team. But I do believe that for one of those races either the trial heat or in the final that Herman was alongside me.

Q: Did you talk about what was going on?

22 23

A: No. IuhI didn't say a word. Words can't convey how you feel. Not at the moment anyhow. Uh words wouldn't have made me feel any better or less angry.

I uh I just sat there and uh suffered or just felt. I felt all these emotions. And again at the age of 18, the world is bright and glorious in front of you. I was a good athlete. I knew that. And uh four years hence I was going to be out there again.

Q: Now when the American team did win and went up to the podium to receive their honors, were you proud for them, were you happy for them?

A: When the American team was on the podium, I was not necessarily proud for them. I was pleased, of course, that they won, and I was particularly pleased that they won by fifteen yards to prove the point that uh anyone, anyone of the American uh sprinters could have won on the, run on the relay and won the event handily. But we, I don't feel as though uh I was an American athlete, or that I was a Jewish athlete. I was an athlete. I was a, a member of the Olympic team. I was in the Olympic stadium. Uh I was part of this overall thing, which I believe has done me so much good in all the years which follow, 60 years now, which have followed those "36 games. Where I began to realize that I'm just like the other athletes of the world, the other people of the world and they're just like me.

We're all alike. We're all brothers. And uh the whole point of the games, the whole point of all athletic competition is to learn to respect each other, to like each other, to love each other, to get to really know each other. And I was part of that. And I was also angry.

Q: Were you envious?

A: I don't think I was envious? I uh. The only feeling I have today, I'ma grandfather of 10, and I'm the great -- grandfather of 4. So I don't have the grandchildren or the great -- grandchildren I can show this gold medal to. That's the only feeling of disappointment I now have, that I can't show my grandchildren this gold Olympic medal. That's the only, the only feeling I have now. I think it's wonderful that I was on the team. I think it's great that I made this trip. Uh it exposed me to, to marvelous things. And also exposed me to the hurt of anti -- Semitism.

Q: Is there anything else you can tell me about what it was like, not necessarily for your competition in particular, but just what it was like being in the Olympic stadium? Can you describe it?

A: The Olympic stadium itself is a very impressive place. Uh it's a, it was particularly impressive then when filled with a hundred and twenty thousand people and it was virtually brand new. And I'll never forget walking into the stadium, marching in along with my American teammates in the opening day parade. And I use the word march loosely here because American athletes don't

23 24 march very well. We kind of sclumped in you know in line but ah walking in the manner of loose -- limbed, uh easy going American athletes. And I remember looking up at Adolph Hitler as we walked by, marched by, and he was glaring down at us we thought. And the comment heard in the ranks and I said it also, he looks just like Charlie Chaplin. And that's just the way we felt about him. He was almost a comic figure with his drab, khaki uniform he wore, khaki shirt and khaki pants. No decorations on it. That funny little moustache and the cowlick over his forehead and uh he was a comic figure. Uh I thought of him and I think many of us thought of him as like a typical South American dictator of those years who was here today and gone tomorrow. After all he'd just been in power some two and a half years and who knew how long he was going to last or how much power he would ultimately have. But uh he was comic to us. Uh along with the rest of his entourage and uh certainly they were funny looking in terms of uh Goering and his uniform and Goebbels with his rat like face and some of the diplomats in their with their long frock coats and ascots and uh, uh some of the Army uniforms and Naval uniforms around them. So uh it was uh it was uh an experience I'm pleased to have be a part of. And of I'm still angry at not having that medal to show the kids.

Q: Was there something awesome about marching in with a hundred thousand people sitting there?

A: We felt no feeling of awe. We were cocky, young, uh well -- trained, uh good athletes. And uh nothing awesome about going into a huge stadium. We'd been in huge stadiums before. We'd competed in these huge stadiums. Uh the ha the thing I remember, one of the things I remember most, was as part of the opening ceremonies these thousands of pigeons which had been kept in cages

Q: I need to stop you here cause the tapes...

(end of Tape 3 of 4)

(Tape 4 of 4)

Q: When we stopped you were describing what it was like being in the Olympic stadium, the pageantry.

A: The opening day parade. One of the things I, I best remember about the uh, uh the opening day ceremonies of the Olympic games was standing in the infield of the stadium while the Olympic oath was being taken and uh the various music was being played, was the release of these thousands of pigeons which had been cooped up and they were all, alongside the inner perimeter of the stadium. And now after being in these cages for I don't know how many hours or how many days, they were suddenly released and they flew up over the stadium and circled round and round. And we began to hear on our straw hats that was part of our uniform, the straw hats, splat, splat, splat from these pigeons. And we were afraid

24 25 to look up of course or else we'd get it in the eye. But there we were cringing in the stadium and the splat, splat of all these thousands of pigeons going round and round and finally they went far enough up to get out of the stadium and flew away. It was a very funny moment.

Q: Do you remember. Were you at the closing ceremonies?

A: No. We, we left before the end of the Olympic games. Avery Brundage I believe, the head of the American Olympic committee, was the basic reason, I believe that Sam and I didn't get to run in the Olympic games. Adolph Hitler was being humiliated by the great success of the black American athletes and I think that he wanted to see to it that Jewish athletes didn't stand on the winning podium and further humiliate Adolph Hitler, embarrass him with that nonsense about Aryan supremacy because here were the great black athletes who couldn't be kept off the winning podium because of their number and their great reputations.

And they were marvelous. But here were two rather obscure Jewish American athletes who could be kept from the winning podium and I believe that Avery Brundage who was close to Hitler, who had examined Germany for anti -- Semitism the year before to see whether or not the games should be held in Germany. Here was Avery Brundage keeping Jews from the winning podium so as not to further embarrass Adolph Hitler.

Q: This was something that you realized later.

A: I was, I was more aware of it later than Iam. I was more aware of it later uh than I was at that time. But uh Brundage was a most important figure. Head of the American Olympic Committee and later on the president of the International Olympic Committee.

Q: You mentioned you had wanted, or were thinking forward to the 1940 Olympics.

So apparently this experience didn't sour you at all on sports, or fairness, Olympics.

A; My experience in the Olympic games and the fact that I didn't run didn't sour me on the games at all. It soured me on Avery Brundage. It certainly soured me on anti -- Semitism and the Nazis as well. But as far as the Olympic games then and for many years thereafter, I was an Olympic uh booster. I didn't want us to boycott the games in the Soviet Union in 1980. I didn't want the Soviet Union to boycott the American games in 1984. But I'm not very happy with the current Olympic games. The Olympic games of "96 and the enormous commercialization of the Olympic games. I think that the Olympic ideal, the Olympic creed, doesn't exist any longer. It's all strictly professionalism. I think that the current Olympic games in Atlanta is a huge project for profit and that's about all.

Q: At what point after the games did you become more aware of what was actually taking place in Germany and in Europe?

25 26

A: I became aware of what took place in Germany in 1938, Kristallnacht was the beginning of the knowledge generally of what took place in Germany. In 1936 even the German Jews stayed in Germany until 1938. Many left but far more remained in Germany until "38 and then they started to try to get out of Germany.

Of course, I didn't know about uh the Holocaust until after the war was over. I was a, a marine in the, in the central Pacific during World War II on the Marshall Islands and uh the European campaign was that far distant from our involvement in the Pacific. So it wasn't until I came back in December of 45 that I began to realize, began to hear and know of what took place in the years, the closing years of World War II

Q: Did you rethink at all about your participation in 1936/ I mean when you started learning much more, did it make you think about it all in context?

A: I've been asked many times whether I have second guesses about going to Germany in 1936 and uh I persist in saying that I'm delighted I went. Uh I'm glad that the games took place in 1936. UhIsaw no harm from the games themselves. I saw a great deal of good from the games. For me as an individual learning about the other athletes of the world and for the great success of the non -- Aryan athletes, the marvelous black athletes who had this great success in helping smash that myth of Aryan supremacy. I think that was a very positive thing.

Q: Did you afterwards think more about being a Jewish athlete? I mean did it, because in fact that seems to be what happened in 1936 even though prior to that you never considered yourself a Jewish athlete. You were one.

A: Something took place in 1937 which uh was a direct result of what happened to me in 1936. I was playing football at Syracuse and uh for this particular I was the star of the team. We had upset Cornell the week before and uh I had uh scored both touchdowns for Syracuse against Cornell 14 to 6 was the final score. And Id had the best day I ever had on the football field. Lot of publicity about me then. And uh I'm embarrassed almost to say it, I was the star of the team going to a game against Maryland, in Baltimore. And as we're getting dressed for the game sitting alongside of me is the other starting half -- back. His name is Wilmoth Sedette Sing. He is a black man but his mother married a Hindu physician and Will and I played side by side. We're in the same class. We took classes together. He helped me through my physics class, my physics course.

Later he was a member of the uh the black airmen, the black squadron who helped form uh the one squadron of black aviators in World War II. But this was in Baltimore, Maryland. We're being dressed for the game. He's sitting right alongside of me, right here. He slept alongside of me where we slept in the, in the gym during the football season. And the coach came in, Ossie Solom along with the Director of Athletics Lou Andreas and he said uh fellows I've got some news.

Uh the local press and Maryland had just found out that Will is not a Hindu but

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27 he's a black man and consequently he won't play today. And I said to myself sitting there, stand up Marty and say if Will doesn't play, I don't play. And I'm one of the leaders of the team. I'm the star of the team, this week anyhow because of that previous game the week before. And I say stand up and say that.

And I think to myself, but if I do stand up and say that and the game is cancelled and there's ruckus or this furor develops as a result of the game being cancelled, if that happens they'll point to me and there's that Jewish guy getting in trouble again. Because just the year before I'd been involved in the anti -- Semitic incident in Berlin. And so I didn't say a word. And Will didn't play. And I played. And we got beat. We got beat twelve nothing. A couple of years after that, Will was killed in World War II and to this day I still feel very strongly about it. That I should have gotten up and said and he was good enough to die for our country, but he wasn't good enough to play against Maryland.

Q: I want to ask you one more question. (Straighten jacket and tieO

A: After the Olympic games uh many of the track and field athletes toured Europe and several different track meets. I ran on a 400 yard relay team in London at White City Stadium. I ran with Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe and Frank Wycoff and me. We set a world's record at 400 yards. That world's record still stands. Mostly because they rarely run that race and they don't run yards any more they now run meters. So um the four of us are still world record holders at the 400 yard relay. I also ran in Paris after the uh Olympic games. Ran against Frank Wycoff and uh I won the race against Wycoff that day and uh a combination of uh Japanese and French athletes as well as American athletes competed that day. And I won that race. Also ran in Scotland. Iran ina handicap race and uh didn't win that handicap race. Uh I was set back so far from the rest of the field because these were local athletes in uh in Edinburgh, Scotland, that uh I was literally off the track, uh that far back, and had to run up a slight incline to get to the track and then start running. I finished out of the money.

Q: So I think what you're telling me from those first few races is that you probably were good enough to run in the Olympics.

A: Well, I, I was on the team.

Q: But to have actually competed instead of all that stuff you were...

A: Do you want me to say that.

Q: Sure. All of a sudden a few weeks after the Olympics, you're making a world record in the same event.

A: I don't want to brag. I mean it's been said. I, | was on the team. That's the important thing. I made the team and the obviously I was good enough to be uh to run in the Olympic games because I was on the American team. And uh

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28 American athletes compete in the Olympic games when they make the Olympic team, except for these two Jewish athletes who didn't because of Avery Brundage and Adolph Hitler and anti-- Semitism. And I'd like to add one other thing that sometimes people feel sorry for me and what happened to me in, in Germany, in Berlin, in 1936. What happened to me was as nothing, absolutely zero to that which took place later on. There's just no feeling of uh comparison and no feeling of, of hurt. Uh there's still feeling of anger, but uh I was there and uh that mattered. What took place was much, much more important afterwards.

Q: I think I have one more question. You mentioned this race in Maryland.

A: The football game in Maryland.

Q: Right. I'm sorry. The football game. And the fact that you were very conflicted about standing up for this black Indian athlete. Have you thought about ways in which your experience from the 1936 Olympics impacted you or shaped you in terms of values or choices you made afterwards. I know it's a fairly broad question, but.

A: I think my experience in 1936, my experience in athletics generally specifically in 36 made me aware of the fact that I am not different than other people of the world. I am not different than blacks or browns or yellows or whites. That we're all one. And uh I think I've learned not to be tolerant necessarily because tolerance I think implies sort of a uh a superiority over individuals. But I've learned to appreciate other people I think because of my experience in "36 and my experience in athletics.

Q: Did it make you more vigilant toward racism, anti -- Semitism, discrimination?

A: I think the experience of all athletes makes me more conscious of other people, of bias and prejudice against uh Black and Asiatics and Latins and Jews. I think that we're people. I've learned that through sports. I think that at every level of sports from my days as a schoolboy to my days as a broadcaster has enabled me to thoroughly enjoy and appreciate the abilities of the great athletes. I was able to look at and broadcast about. The Jim Browns. The wonderful Black athletes, the wonderful Japanese athletes, uh the great athletes of the world uh regardless of what their background was.

Q: Sports is the great equalizer.

A: Sports is the great equalizer. The fellow who gets to the finish line first is the winner. Uh brings to mind another thought that uh the Olympic games should be uh a competition amongst individuals and not amongst teams because teams represent nationalities. Individuals represent themselves. Even though we wore the uniform of the United States Olympic Team, we ran as individuals. For the relay, the relay is a unique track and field event, four men running together but

28 29 running individually together. Uh basketball and hockey, great sports, they're wonderful sports, and football too, of course, but the, the point of sports is the exultation the individual athlete feels when he does it by himself. And that's the point of the Olympic games. Team sports are marvelous. They teach all the things that ought to be taught in terms of team work and cooperation and practice and respect for the other team and all that. But uh, the Olympic games are for the individual and for the extolling of the individual abilities, the excellence of the individual rather than the nation or the team.

Q: Thank you. Is there anything else you want to add?

A: I want to say hello to Margaret.

Q: Okay. Thank you.

(end Tape 4 of 4) 29