At home, most blacks smiled most whites smoldered. Then, late in the Games, Smith and Carlos came up with their almost impromptu plan for the silent scream of those raised fists. The black power movement was cresting, and Edwards became involved in trying to organize athletes and awaken their political awareness. But he remained at San Jose as a basketball player, and then went on to graduate school at Cornell. Edwards would never toss the discus again. One word led to another, and within minutes the two were locked in a near-violent confrontation.

In his sophomore season, Edwards approached Winter about the living conditions of black athletes at San Jose. He also brought in Harry Edwards, a behemoth discus thrower who, as Hoffer says, would soon become a political flamethrower. In the ’60s, the college’s eccentric but brilliant track coach, Bud Winter, was recruiting African-American speedsters like Carlos, Smith and Lee Evans. “Something in the Air,” Richard Hoffer’s skillfully told tale of the Mexico City Olympics, revolves around this arresting image.įormerly a senior writer at Sports Illustrated, Hoffer walks us back from the power salutes to where it all began, at San Jose State - or, as it was then known, Speed City. There they stood on the podium, heads hanging almost humbly and gloved fists raised in a defiant black power salute. 16, Smith won the gold and Carlos the bronze in the 200-meter race.

I am, of course, referring to the photos of Tommie Smith and John Carlos standing shoeless at a medal ceremony. One that has escaped the maws of oblivion, though, dates from the athletic circus that was the 1968 Summer Olympics. The images that make it into our long-term collective memory are few.

One moment in time review