Olympics Posters and Art Prints
for the social studies, physical education classrooms, home schoolers, theme office decor.

Muhammad Ali
b. 1-17-1942; Louisville, KY

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Olympic Medalists Tommie Smith & Carlos Williams Giving Black Power Salute - 1968 Olympics, Mexico City

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Billy Mills
b. 6-30-1938; Pine Ridge, SD

Billy Mills, a virtually unknown runner, won the 10,000 Meter in Tokyo at the 1964 Olympic Games. Mills, a member of the Oglala Lakota Sious tribe attended the Haskell Institute in Lawrence, KS and earned an athletic scholarship to the University of Kansas

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• Running Brave (1983) DVD

Jesse Owens
b. 9-12-1913; Lawrence Co., Alabama
d. 3-31-1980; Tucson, AZ

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Steve Prefontaine
b. 1-25-1951; Coos Bay, OR
d. 5-30-1975; Eugene (car accident)

“To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift.”

Prefontaine died in a car accident before the 1976 Montreal Summer Olympics.

Wilma Rudolph
b. 6-23-1940; Clarksville, TN
d. 11-12-1994; Brentwood, TN

Poster Text: Wilma Rudolph was born in Tennessee in 1940, the 20th of 22 children. Her parents had to struggle mightily to make ends meet for their large family. Then, at the age of four, Wilma became seriously ill with scarlet fever and pneumonia. The illness left her with a crippled leg, and doctors told here she would never be able to walk normally again. But Wilma refused to give up. She soon recovered completely and grew to be an exceptionally tall and graceful young woman – and in time, she became a star athlete.

Wilma once scored 49 points in a high school basketball game – a school record that still stands! But her greatest triumph came during the 1960 Summer Olympic Games in Rome where she won gold medals in the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash, and the 400- meter relay. She set a new Olympic record in the 100 meter-dash with a time of 11 seconds. Wilma Rudolph overcame tremendous odds to become one of the greatest athletes in Olympic history. In 1993, just one year before she died of cancer, she was the first person ever to receive President Clinton's National Sports Awards.

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• American Women composite poster

Jim Thorpe, 1930s, Photographic Print

Jim Thorpe
b. 5-28-1888; Oklahoma
d. 3-28-1953; California

Jim Thorpe won Olympic gold medals in the pentathlon and decathlon, played football in college and professionally, and played professional baseball and basketball. His Olympic medals, which were taken away because he had accepted payment for playing minor league baseball before the 1912 Olympics, were restored in 1983. He died in poverty.

FYI - Thorpe's Sac and Fox traditional name was Wa-Tho-Huk, meaning “path lighted by great flash of lightning” or, “Bright Path”. His Catholic mother raised him in that faith, after she died his father sent him to Haskell Institute in Lawrence, KS.

• Native American posters

Kristi Yamaguchi, Great Asian Americans, Wall Poster

Kristi Yamaguchi
b. 7-12-1971; Hayward, CA

It has often been said that the key to success in sports, as in life, is dedication. Kristi Yamaguchi knows all about dedication. she began practing to be a figure skating champion at the age of 6. As a teenager she used to get up every morning at 3:45 so she could be out on the ice by 5 am. All of her hard work and dedication paid off in 1992, when she became the first American woman in 16 years to win an Olympic gold medal in figure skating.

Like many Asian-Americans, Kristi Yamaguchi has always lived in two worlds. Her father and mother are both Japanese, but both sides of her family have lived in American for almost 100 years. And both her mother's and her father's families faced discrimination during the 1940s, when many Japanese-Americans were cruelly and unfairly punished for Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, Kristi's mother, Carole, was born in one of the so-called "internment camps" in which thousands of Japanese-Americans were imprisoned during World War Two. Her father's family was also sent tot he camps, and lost everything they owned.

Kristi Yamaguchi was born on July 12, 1971, and grew up in the California town of Fremont, mear San Francisco. Her father is a dentist, and Kristi is one of three children in her family. Although she was born with clubfeet, which means that her feet were bent in a way that made normal walking difficult, special shoes corrected the problem. In many ways, Kristi was a normal California kid – she loved sports and spent a lot of time outdoors. But Kristi also possessed an inner drive and strength that led her to take up the demanding sport of figure skating at a very young age. To be good at figure skating requires hours and hours of practice, and it can sometimes be boring and frustrating. But Kristi stuck with it, and in 1988 she won her first major amateur title at the World Junior Championships.

Early in her career, Kristi skated both singles and pairs. But after 1988, she concentrated on singles. The result was spectacular success, as Kristi finished second at the 1990 U.S. National Championships and first in the 1990 Goodwill Games. Kristi captured first place at the World Chamionships in 1991, and then went on to win the U.S. Nationals the following year. After that came her triumph at the Olympic, where she beat out her biggest rival, Japan's Midori Ito. Today, Kristi is a professional skater, and she continues to thrill audiences around the world with the beauty, grace and elegance of her skating.

• women athletes posters
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Emil Zatopek
b. 9-19-1922; Czechoslovakia
d. 11-22-2000; Prague

Poster Text: "A runner must run with dreams in his heart."
Emil Zatopek was a triple gold medalist in Helsinki 1952, with wins in the 5,000 Metres, 10,000 Metres, and Marathon. He decided to run the first marathon of his life at the last minute.

The Greeks
(2000 B.C. – 323 B.C.)

Ancient Greece was one of the world's greatest civilizations. The Greeks made many important and lasting contributions to humanity – including the idea of democracy and the art of drama. They were also the first people to study medicine, geometry, physics and philosophy. But the ancient Greeks also place a high value on physical fitness. They loved sports and games. The Greeks invented the Olympic Games, which are still popular today.

Greek civilization developed on a rocky peninsula that sticks out into the Mediterranean Sea, and on the many islands surrounding the peninsula. Ancient Greece was not really a single country. It was made up of many smaller, independent communities called city-states. These city-states did not always get along, and many wars were fought between them. Most people in ancient Greece made their living by farming. The Greeks grew crops like wheat, barley, olives, and grapes. Ancient Greek artists produced some of the most beautiful objects ever made. They were especially gifted at making pottery.

The Greeks built marvelous cities, the greatest of which was Athens. The statue shown here depicts Pericles, who ruled Athens during its greatest period. Athens was named for Athena, one of the many gods and goddesses worshipped by the ancient Greeks. Everywhere in Greece, you can find the ruins of wondrous temples built by the ancient Greeks to honor their gods. Ancient Greek civilization reached its peak from 461 B.C. to 323 B.C. During these years, Greek writers, teachers, and artists produced some of their greatest works. In later years, invasions and wars began to destroy Greek civilization. In 146 B. C., Greece officially became a part of the next great civilization – the Roman Empire.

Artwork depicts the bust of Pericles, ruler of Athens, and the Parthenon on the Acropolis.

• Greece & Greek Culture posters
• Ancient Civilizations poster
• History Pockets: Ancient Greece

Olympics - Fighting Well
Motivational Poster
“The important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but taking part. The essential thing in life is not conquering but fighting well.”
Pierre de Coubertin, 1863-1937, French educator primarily responsible for the revival of the modern games in 1894.

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