Kernan’s Final Post Cover
In the Eleventh Olympiad, Joseph Francis Kernan’s final cover for The Saturday Evening Post, a sprinter channels the speed and power of an eagle while preparing to represent the United States at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. Kernan created 26 covers for The Saturday Evening Post between 1924 and 1936.
Kernan’s depiction of the athlete was a fitting conclusion for the artist’s Post commissions, as much of his life’s work celebrated sportsmen and outdoor life. This now iconic cover held such impact that it was published twice – first on August 8, 1936, and later for the July / August 1996 issue to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the modern Olympic Games that took place in Atlanta, Georgia.
Jesse Owens and the 1936 Summer Olympics
The 1936 Summer Olympics were held from August 1 to 16 in Berlin, Germany, which was then under Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime. The track and field competition garnered special attention that year, as Jesse Owens, the African American sprinter and long jumper, took home a historic four gold medals. Owens took center stage at the Games, setting new records in the 100- and 200-meter sprints, the long jump, and helped his team win a record-setting 4 x 100-meter relay.
Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe were not initially scheduled to compete in the relay. On the morning of the event, it was announced that Owens and Metcalfe would take the places of Marty Glickman and Sam Stoller, the only Jews on the U.S. track team. Glickman later blamed the controversial decision on the U.S. Olympic Committee president Avery Brundage and track coach Dean Cromwell, accusing them of appeasing the Nazi regime’s anti-semitism.
The magnitude of Owens’ achievements as a black athlete was multiplied by the fact that Hitler had unsuccessfully attempted to use the Summer Olympics to validate his theories of Aryan racial superiority. As the first Games to be televised, and with radio broadcasts reaching 41 countries, Hitler envisioned the Olympics as a way to disseminate Nazi propaganda. The German Olympic Committee commissioned the filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl to document the spectacle, resulting in her film “Olympia.”
While Owens was championed for his athletic prowess and for his achievements when faced with intense racial discrimination in Nazi Germany, he still faced a segregated country upon his return to the United States.
Joseph Francis Kernan
Joseph Francis Kernan specialized in images of middle-class America that played on the viewers’ sense of humor and nostalgia. His images graced the covers and pages of major magazines from the 1910s through the 1940s, such as The Saturday Evening Post, Outdoor Life, and Liberty. As an avid outdoorsman and athlete, Kernan said he aimed to capture the “human side of outdoor sports, hunting, fishing, and dogs.” Though Kernan’s reputation has historically been overlooked in favor of his more famous peers like Norman Rockwell, modern collectors are finally beginning to give Kernan the recognition he deserves as we see an increased demand for Kernan’s original paintings in our contemporary art market.
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