On May 7, 1966, while he was at San Jose State, Smith set a world best of 19.5 seconds in the 200m straight, which he ran on a cinder track.[8] That record for 200m was finally beaten by Tyson Gay on May 16, 2010, just over 44 years later,[9] though Smith still holds the record for the slightly longer 220-yard event. Since the IAAF has abandoned ratifying records for the event, Smith still retains the official record for the straightaway 200m/220 yards in perpetuity.[10]
A few weeks later, on June 11, 1966, Smith set the record for 200 meters and 220 yards around a turn at 20.0, the first man to do that in 20 seconds. Six days later he won the NCAA Men's Outdoor Track and Field Championship. Smith also won the national collegiate 220-yard (201.17 m) title in 1967 before adding the AAU furlong (201.17m) crown as well. He traveled to Japan for the 1967 Summer Universiade and won the 200m gold medal. He repeated as U.S. 200m champion in 1968 and made the Olympic team.
Leading up to the Olympics, at the U.S. Olympic Trials at Echo Summit, California, San Jose State teammate John Carlos beat Smith and his world record, running 19.92A. John Carlos' record was disallowed because of the brush spike shoes he was wearing, as was a similar record by Vince Matthews in the 400 meters.[11]
As a member of the Olympic Project for Human Rights (OPHR) Smith originally advocated a boycott of the 1968 Mexico City Olympic Games unless four conditions were met: South Africa and Rhodesia uninvited from the Olympics, the restoration of Muhammad Ali's world heavyweight boxing title, Avery Brundage to step down as president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and the hiring of more African-American assistant coaches. As the boycott failed to achieve support after the IOC withdrew invitations for South Africa and Rhodesia, he decided, together with Carlos, to not only wear their gloves but also go barefoot to protest poverty, wear beads to protest lynchings, and wear buttons that said OPHR.[12]
At the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico, Smith nursed an injured groin into the 200m final. In the race, teammate Carlos powered out to the lead through the turn, while Smith got a slow start. Coming off the turn, Smith charged past Carlos and sped to victory. Knowing he had passed his training partner and closest opponent, his victory was so clear, he raised his arms to celebrate 10m before the finish line. Still, he improved upon his own world record that would last for 11 years until Pietro Mennea would surpass it on the same track. Smith's time of 19.83 was among the first automatically timed world records for the event as recorded by the IAAF.[13]
Carlos and Smith made headlines around the world by raising their black-gloved fists at the medal award ceremony. Both athletes wore black socks and no shoes on the podium to represent African-American poverty. In support, Peter Norman, the silver medalist who was a white athlete from Australia, participated in the protest by wearing an OPHR badge.[14]
IOC president Avery Brundage deemed it to be a domestic political statement unfit for the apolitical, international forum the Olympic Games were intended to be. In response to their actions, he ordered Smith and Carlos suspended from the US team and banned from the Olympic Village. When the US Olympic Committee refused, Brundage threatened to ban the entire US track team. This threat led to the expulsion of the two athletes from the Games.[15]
A spokesman for the IOC called Smith and Carlos's actions "a deliberate and violent breach of the fundamental principles of the Olympic spirit." Brundage, who was president of the United States Olympic Committee in 1936, had made no objections against Nazi salutes during the Berlin Olympics. He argued that the Nazi salute, being a German national salute at the time, was acceptable in a competition of nations, while the athletes' salute was not of a nation and therefore unacceptable.[16]
Smith and Carlos faced consequences for challenging white authority in the U.S.[17]Ralph Boston, a black U.S. long jumper at the 1968 games, stated: "The rest of the world didn't seem to find it such a derogatory thing. They thought it was very positive. Only America thought it was bad."[17] The men's gesture had lingering effects for all three athletes, the most serious of which were death threats against Smith, Carlos and their families. Following their suspension by the IOC, they faced economic hardship.[17] Silver medalist Norman's career suffered greatly in his native Australia as "he returned home […] a pariah, suffering unofficial sanction and ridicule as the Black Power salute's forgotten man. He never ran in the Olympics again."[18]
Smith stated in later years that "We were concerned about the lack of black assistant coaches. About how Muhammad Ali got stripped of his title. About the lack of access to good housing and our kids not being able to attend the top colleges."[19]
Athletics and later career
Tommie Smith leads the parade at his Youth Track Meet 2023
During his career, Smith set seven individual world records and also was a member of several world-record relay teams at San Jose State, where he was coached by Lloyd (Bud) Winter. With personal records of 10.1 for 100 meters, 19.83 for 200 and 44.5 for the 400, Smith still ranks high on the world all-time lists.
A year after his Olympic win, Smith finished his BA in Social Science at San Jose State University and went on to earn a master's in Social Change from Goddard College, whose program enabled Smith to integrate his teaching and writing practices into his coursework.[23][24]
After his track and football careers, he became a member of the United States National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1978. In 1996, Smith was inducted into the California Black Sports Hall of Fame, and in 1999 he received that organization's Sportsman of the Millennium Award.[25] In 2000 and 2001 the County of Los Angeles and the State of Texas presented Smith with commendation, recognition and proclamation awards.[26]
In August 2008, he gave 2008 Olympic triple gold winner Usain Bolt of Jamaica one of his shoes from the 1968 Olympics as a birthday gift.[28]
In 2010, Smith put his gold medal and spikes up for auction. Bids started at $250,000, and the sale was scheduled to close November 4, 2010.[29] In 2013, Goddard College honored Smith as an alumnus by awarding him the Presidential Award for Activism in 2013.[24]
Smith first married Jimi Denise Paschal from 1967 to 1973, with whom he had one child. He then married Denise M. "Akiba" Kyle in 1977, with whom he had four children.[32] The two divorced in 2000, and Smith married Delois Jordan in the same year.
Recognition
Tommie Smith in the 1960s
Tommie Smith is featured in the 1999 HBO documentary Fists of Freedom: The Story of the '68 Summer Games. The documentary looks at events leading up to, during and after the 1968 Olympics. It features interviews with Smith, Carlos and sociologist Harry Edwards. There is archival footage of the Games and the fallout after the raised fist salutes by Carlos and Smith. Smith says in the programme:[33]
We were not Antichrists. We were just human beings who saw a need to bring attention to the inequality in our country. I don't like the idea of people looking at it as negative. There was nothing but a raised fist in the air and a bowed head, acknowledging the American flag – not symbolizing a hatred for it.
For his lifelong commitment to athletics, education, and human rights, Smith received the Courage of Conscience Award from The Peace Abbey in Sherborn, Massachusetts.[34] In 2004, a sports hall bearing his name was inaugurated in his presence at Saint-Ouen, France.[35]
In 2005, a statue titled Victory Salute showing Smith and Carlos on the medal stand was constructed by political artist Rigo 23 and dedicated on the campus of San Jose State University.[36][37][38] Norman's silver medal position was left vacant at his request, so visitors could pose for photos in solidarity with Smith and Carlos, as Norman had stood.[39]
A mural of the photo taken with Smith on the podium at the 1968 Olympics with Carlos and Norman was painted on the brick wall of a residence in Newtown, New South Wales, Australia, titled "Three Proud People Mexico 68". The house's owner, Silvio Offria, allowed an artist known only as "Donald" to paint the mural, and said that Norman came to Newtown to see the mural and have his photo taken with it before he died in 2006.[40] The mural faces the train tracks linking Sydney city to the Western and Southern Suburbs. In 2012, the Sydney City Council heritage listed the mural to safeguard it, after it had faced possible demolition in 2010 to make way for a railway tunnel.[41] Smith and Carlos were pallbearers at Norman's funeral in Melbourne in 2006.[40]
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