Good morning!
Welcome to issue 12. It’s raining here in London which, I think, makes for perfect newsletter reading. But don’t let me tell you what to do!
For today’s letter I dive into my favourite subject, the early Olympic games. They are filled with strange and fascinating facts (pigeons, diets). But today’s story is an important one — what does an oak tree have to do with Hitler?
My thanks, as always, to Ferry Gouw for this letter’s illustrations.
Until next time!
Your pal,
Katie
THE GOLD MEDAL TREES
It was Hitler’s idea. The oak trees were a foot tall and awarded to the gold medallists of the 1936 Olympic games. They stood on the podium, one hand cradled awkwardly around the ceramic pot, the other giving the Nazi salute.
Oak trees featured occasionally in Hitler’s insignias and tied in nicely with the world wide stage the Olympics gave the Nazi party’s propaganda. Even Black and Jewish athletes were invited. It was just that Hitler left the stadium before he had to shake their hands.
On the first day of the games Cornelius Johnson, a young African American, set a new record in high jump. Corny, as he was known to his friends, returned home with his tree and planted it in the back yard of his parents house. For the next eighty-six years it grew so tall that even when viewed on Street View it looms large like a spindly giant.
That was until 2019. The Johnson family, having occupied the house for ninety-one years, sold to the Tomas family, who sold to property developers. And almost immediately they proposed to demolish the tree.
Many of the winners’ trees had disappeared without a trace, destroyed during WW2, or tossed overboard on the ships home. These oak trees, a direct link to historical events from Nazi Germany, show us the bravery of Black and Jewish athletes who participated in the games in the face of racism. To remove the tree would be to remove history. Today only twenty-five of the Olympic oak trees survive.
When neighbours caught wind of the proposed demolishment they contacted Christian Kosmas Mayer, an artist whose work is based on the Olympic oaks. A yearlong campaign ensued and in March of this year Los Angeles Department of City Planning officially granted the tree protection.
Johnson never lived to see his tree grow. In 1946, while working as a baker for the Marines, he developed bronchopneumonia and died. He was thirty-two.
AXED
The last Olympic tree in the U.K was chopped down in 2017. Awarded to Harold Whitlock for long distance walking (I’m sorry, what), who planted his tree in the grounds of his old school in North London. For 70 years it offered kids shade, before developing a fungal disease. It was axed, along with our ties to an important part in history.
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Well I never knew that! Very interesting