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Alice Coachman grew up in segregated Georgia, shut out of whites-only sports grounds, and trained barefoot on dirt roads, jumping over homemade bars of rope and sticks. At the 1948 London Olympics she won the high jump, the first Black woman to win an Olympic gold medal.

Alice Coachman

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Her winning jump of 1.68 metres, cleared at the first attempt, set an Olympic record. Britain's Dorothy Tyler matched the height but needed two tries, so the gold went to Coachman, and King George VI presented her medal. She was the only American woman to win an athletics gold at those Games. Her best years had fallen in wartime, when the 1940 and 1944 Olympics were cancelled, yet she won the national high jump title of the Amateur Athletic Union ten years running, from 1939 to 1948. In 1952 Coca-Cola signed her as a spokesperson, making her the first African-American woman to endorse an international product.

Türkçe oku
Alice Coachman ırk ayrımının sürdüğü Georgia'da, beyazlara ayrılmış spor alanlarına giremeden büyüdü; toprak yollarda çıplak ayakla koşuyor, iplerle sopalardan yaptığı çıtaların üzerinden atlıyordu. 1948 Londra Olimpiyatları'nda yüksek atlamada altın madalya aldı; olimpiyat şampiyonu olan ilk siyahi kadındı.

1,68 metrelik şampiyonluk atlayışını ilk denemesinde yaptı ve olimpiyat rekoru kırdı. İngiliz Dorothy Tyler da aynı yüksekliği geçti ama ancak ikinci denemesinde; bu yüzden altın Coachman'ın oldu. Madalyasını Kral VI. George verdi. O oyunlarda atletizmde altın kazanan tek Amerikalı kadındı. En güçlü yılları savaşa denk gelmişti; 1940 ve 1944 olimpiyatları iptal edilmişti. Yine de 1939'dan 1948'e kadar on yıl üst üste Amerikan Amatör Atletizm Birliği'nin yüksek atlama şampiyonluğunu kazandı. 1952'de Coca-Cola onu reklam yüzü yaptı; böylece uluslararası bir markanın reklamını yapan ilk Afro-Amerikan kadın oldu.

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Background reading: Alice Coachman
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