Abebe Bikila was born in Ethiopia on 7 August 1932, the day of the Los Angeles Olympic marathon. Twenty-eight years later, he entered the marathon at the 1960 Olympics in Rome. He and his coach, Onni Niskanen, decided that Bikila, who ran barefooted, should make his final move a little more than one kilometre from the finish line. It was at this point that the course passed the obelisk of Axum, a monument that had been plundered from Ethiopia by Italian troops and hauled away to Rome. When Bikila reached the obelisk, he was running even with Rhadi Ben Abdesselem of Morocco. Bikila successfully pulled away and won by 200m. Although no one had ever won the marathon twice, Bikila returned to the Olympics in 1964, even though he had undergone an appendectomy 40 days before the race. This time he ran with shoes and socks. Bikila took a clear lead by the halfway mark and steadily pulled away to win by more than four minutes. His time, 2 hours 12 minutes 11.2 seconds, was a world best for the marathon.
Abebe is our hero, an Ethiopian hero, at this time when most important historical heros have been discredited for political reasons, he remains upthere, untouchable. Our artists and athletes seem to be the only ones left. I recently saw Tilahun Gesesse live for the first time in my life. I couldn't help being teary. I felt patriotic for the first in a long time.
Our heros, arbegnoch fought and died fending of facist theifs, and they stole it. And Abebe saw it on his way to win the first Olympic Gold Medal for his Ethiopia. Oh ya and he was barefeet. And now it is returned, on its way to being erected where it belongs.
On Aug 7, 2006; Abebe if alive would have truned 74. Remember him, and say your peice! Oh dont forget to pick this up!
Published by August 6th, 2006 in Childhood, History and Shameless Plug.Send this post to a friend
Happy Birthday Abebe!
Nolawi, your article is missing the ’shamelss plug’ tag :-p
This article has made it deeply unpatriotic to be without a bikila t-shirt, so you need to hook us up. Are your t-shirts still restricted to USians? How long before non-USians (at least those in the UK) get treated right? We don’t want to suffer an identity crisis.
Hmm Yonas good point, Its edited, for some reason since I remembered his birthday, I thought it was not so shameless… but I tagged it regardless…
we do not as of now shipping outside of the US, only because its time consuming to fill out the exporting commerce form… but on occasion we have shipped to europe..
once the next set of shirts are out we will ship to europe… we do receive a lot of inquires from UK, & Italy…
so email us and we will figure out a way to ship to U: info @ bernos.org
Still sold out and no EU shipping… ho hum.
Sold out yes, EU shipping is available though.
not in stock but they ARE available in EU
fuuuuuuuunnnyyyy
Happy Birth day Abebe Bekila…..You may be gone but your name will live forever….
Long live our great Hero ABEBE BAKILA!