Black History Month - 9 - George Poage, first Black Olympian

 The Olympic games were one of the few places that Black Americans were allowed to shine. Not to be flippant, but the American desire for winners outweighed American's racism against Blacks.

The 1904 Olympics in Saint Louis was considered an adjunct to the St. Louis World's Fair (remember "Meet Me In St. Louis"). Here is a quick overview from Wikipedia.

George Coleman Poage

(November 6, 1880 – April 11, 1962) was an American track and field athlete. He was the first black and the first African-American athlete to win a medal in the Olympic Games, winning two bronze medals at the 1904 games in St. Louis.

He was a University of Wisconsin graduate. After winning the medals, well .. let's visit Wikipedia again:

Later years

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Poage remained in St. Louis after the Olympics, working as a school principal for a year before becoming a teacher at segregated Charles Sumner High School. At Sumner, he was the head of the English department, teaching English composition, literature, and Latin, helped coach the school’s sports teams, and supervised various extracurricular activities such as debate and theater.^[2][4] 

In 1920, Poage moved to Chicago. He worked in a restaurant for four years. In 1924, Poage was hired by the United States Postal Service and worked as a postal clerk for nearly thirty years. After his retirement in the 1950s he remained in Chicago until his death in 1962.

Personal life

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Decades after his death in 1962, George C. Poage was revealed to have been a part of the LGBTQ+ Community. As featured in a 2023 PBS documentary entitled Wisconsin Pride. 

In those times, winning at the Olympics was not the ticket to the financial success that many of our Olympians find today. In fact, even Jesse Owens, the famed Hitler beater of the 1936 Olympics ended up working low paying jobs. Owens struggled to find work and took on menial jobs as a gas station attendant, playground janitor, and manager of a dry cleaning firm.  Sometimes he resorted to racing against motorbikes, cars, trucks and horses for a cash prize. He said you can't eat gold medals.