Peter Norman

Peter George Norman ( born June 15, 1942 in Melbourne, † October 3, 2006 ) was an Australian athlete. The greatest success of the Sprinter was winning the silver medal in the 200 -meter run at the Summer Olympics in 1968 in Mexico City. Its that time of 20.06 seconds is still an Australian national record over this distance.

The pictures of the award ceremony aroused international attention. When playing the national anthem, the two U.S. sprinters Tommie Smith, the gold medal winner, and John Carlos fist stretched out to greet the Black Power movement upwards. Norman wore during the ceremony as a sign of solidarity, a plaque of the human rights movement Olympic Project for Human Rights ( OPHR ) on his tracksuit. Norman was also the one who suggested that Smith and Carlos were to share her black gloves for the salute, after Carlos had forgotten his pair.

Norman had to last a friendly relationship with the two Americans. After he had died of a heart attack on October 3, 2006 at the age of 64 years, Smith and Carlos bore his coffin to the grave. Peter Norman had qualified for the 1972 Olympics, because of his show solidarity with Carlos and Smith in Mexico it the Olympic participation was the Australian Association denied. Also at the Summer Olympics in Sydney in 2000, he received no official invitation. 2012, the Australian Parliament formally apologized for this behavior.