Who Was Jesse Owens? (Who Was?)

by James Buckley (Author) Gregory Copeland (Illustrator)

Reading Level: 4th – 5th Grade
Series: Who Was?
At the 1936 Berlin Summer Olympics, track and field star Jesse Owens ran himself straight into international glory by winning four gold medals. But the life of Jesse Owens is much more than a sports story. Born in rural Alabama under the oppressive Jim Crow laws, Owens's family suffered many hardships. As a boy he worked several jobs like delivering groceries and working in a shoe repair shop to make ends meet. But Owens defied the odds to become a sensational student athlete, eventually running track for Ohio State. He was chosen to compete in the Summer Olympics in Nazi Germany where Adolf Hitler was promoting the idea of "Aryan superiority." Owens's winning streak at the games humiliated Hitler and crushed the myth of racial supremacy once and for all.

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James Buckley
James Buckley Jr. is a prolific author of nonfiction for young readers, with more than 150 books to his credit (and still typing!). He is the author of more than a dozen titles in The New York Times' best-selling "Who Was...?" biography series, including the Wright Brothers, Milton Hershey, Betsy Ross, Jules Verne, and Blackbeard. Buckley has written more than thirty DK Readers on a wide variety of topics, plus two recent long-form bios of Adolf Hitler and Bonnie and Clyde for Aladdin Books. For Spring 2019, he created the first book in a new series for Aladdin--a bio of astronaut Michael Collins. Buckley is the co-author of Time Inc./Liberty Street's "X-Why-Z" series and wrote and produced the Animal Planet Animal Atlas for Liberty Street. A former editor at Sports Illustrated and the National Football League, he lives in Santa Barbara, California, where he runs a successful book producing company.

YouNeek Studios is a hub for "YouNeek" and creative character-based storytelling and entertainment. Through the use of animation, comics, graphic novels, and other popular media, we aim to build a library of eclectic characters that appeal to a broad audience. Simply put, we focus on telling extraordinary stories about extraordinary characters.

Ian Churchill is a 25-year veteran comic creator who has worked extensively for Marvel, DC, and Image Comics. Best known for drawing Deadpool, Cable, and Supergirl, he is also the creator, writer, artist, and colorist of the critically acclaimed comic book series, Marineman. For more of his work, follow him on Instagram (@ianchurchill).

John Roshell is a co-founder of Comicraft, the lettering and design studio best known for pioneering the process of digitally lettering comic books. He has lettered thousands of comics for Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, Blizzard, and more; created hundreds of typefaces widely used in comics and video games; and designed loads of logos for franchises like the Avengers, Daredevil, Black Panther, and Angry Birds. He lives in Santa Barbara with his wife Starshine, two boys, and a somewhat ugly dog.
Classification
Non-fiction
ISBN-13
9780448483078
Lexile Measure
880L
Guided Reading Level
R
Publisher
Penguin Workshop
Publication date
August 20, 2015
Series
Who Was?
BISAC categories
JNF018010 - Juvenile Nonfiction | People & Places | United States - African-American
JNF054110 - Juvenile Nonfiction | Sports & Recreation | Olympics
JNF054140 - Juvenile Nonfiction | Sports & Recreation | Track & Field
Library of Congress categories
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