Olivia Puccio Wins Sports History Award for Jesse Owens Project

Huntington sophomore Olivia Puccio captured the Outstanding Entry on Sports History for her National History Day Individual Website category entry titled “Running Against Racism: Jesse Owens and the 1936 Berlin Olympics.”

Ms. Puccio’s most recent academic weighted average exceeded 103. She is also an excellent tennis and lacrosse player. The teenager tallied 10 goals and four assists last spring as a freshman playing on the Blue Devils’ county and Long Island championship squad.

The sophomore spent many weeks researching Jesse Owens and his amazing story, organizing her findings and developing the website through which she displayed her work.

“I decided to write about Jesse Owens because his accomplishments were not limited to the sports world and they had a significant influence on history,” wrote Ms. Puccio in a process paper that accompanied her website. “How the achievement of one athlete could break the racism and political beliefs in the era of the global tensions was of interest to me. The performance of Jesse Owens at the Berlin Olympics in 1936 was quite appropriate to the theme of National History Day since it was an expression of how one individual can defy the injustice and make a difference.”

Ms. Puccio said she used diverse research sources. “I began with the secondary sources like history textbooks, documentaries, and reliable websites to get to know Jesse Owens, 1936 Olympics, and Nazi Germany,” she wrote in the process paper. “Primary sources, such as photographs and newspaper articles, speeches during the period were also used by me so that I can have a better insight into how the people responded to the victories by Mr. Owens. These materials allowed me to know the direct and indirect consequences of his accomplishments.”

This year’s National History Day contest showcased Huntington students spread across grades 6-12, who submitted exceptional projects in a variety of categories consistent with the 2026 national theme of “Revolution, Reaction, Reform in History.”

Participants vied in categories ranging from research papers to individual and group websites, exhibits and documentaries. Teams of teachers served as judges for each category and spent hours evaluating the projects, many of which were displayed prior to the announcement of this year’s award winners.

Ms. Puccio said she chose the website category because a website allowed her to arrange the information clearly and creatively. “The site format ensured that my research was easy to divide into various parts, including historical context, short-term and long-term effects,” states the process paper. “It also enabled me to add pictures and captions to complement my information and enable the viewers to comprehend the subject more. The story of Jesse Owens is closely connected with the theme of challenge and change. His victories proved to be a threat to the Nazi racial ideology and a contradiction of the myth that race can be the determinant of ability. Simultaneously, his success also underscored how African Americans were still being discriminated in the United States. Mr. Owens made future athletes inspired and he also became an icon of equality and perseverance in the long run.”

James Cleveland Owens is one of the greatest athletes in American history. At the 1936 Berlin Olympics, which Adolf Hitler in attendance and his hideous racist philosophy already known, Mr. Owens won four gold medals and set Olympic records in all four events.

“This project helped me to understand that historical change is not always instant, but significant events have the potential to change the attitudes and inspire further generations,” wrote Ms. Puccio in the process paper. “The legacy of Jesse Owens demonstrates that bravery and will can question the wrong and contribute to the history.”