I’ve never seen a GIF of this.
I was just reading about this during a wiki binge on Olympics incidents and did a little research on it. I never knew how deep the message was that Smith and Carlos were trying to send. Just about everything they wore and how they wore it had symbolism attached to it. (unzipped tracksuits for solidarity with blue collar workers, necklace of beads for lynching victims, etc) Calling it a “black power salute” is really reductive and it’s a shame (and predictable) that if it’s taught at all, that’s what it’s boiled down to.
Another thing I didn’t know: the Australian guy who came in second wore a patch for solidarity with them, he was protesting racist Australian immigration policies. When he passed away, Smith and Carlos were pallbearers at his funeral.
Some bits from articles at the time of Peter Norman’s death (I got these from Norman’s wikipedia entry—I noticed either a factual or citation issue in that entry, so I thought I’d link the articles instead):
Norman, who had run second behind Smith, stood with them wearing the badge of the Olympic Project for Human Rights.
Smith and Carlos paid an immediate price. They were withdrawn from the relays and expelled from the Olympic Village. When they returned home, they were ostracised and had difficulty getting employment. They received death threats and Carlos’ home was attacked.
Carlos recounted the conversation they had before going out for the medal ceremony. They asked Norman if he believed in human rights. He said he did. They asked him if he believed in God. Norman, who came from a Salvation Army background, said he believed strongly in God.
“We knew that what we were going to do was far greater than any athletic feat. He said, ‘I’ll stand with you’.” Carlos said he expected to see fear in Norman’s eyes. He didn’t. “I saw love. Peter never flinched (on the dais). He never turned his eyes, he never turned his head. He never said so much as ‘ouch’. You guys have lost a great soldier.”
Yesterday’s ceremony included a letter of respect from dual world record holder Michael Johnson and an anecdote relating the deep regard in which Norman was held by long-time 400-metre hurdling champion Edwin Moses. (Source)
Carlos had forgotten his gloves and, at Norman’s suggestion, each of the Americans wore one of Smith’s gloves. The protest caused a worldwide uproar. (Source)
The repercussions for Norman were immediate. Seen as a trouble-maker who had lent a hand to those desecrators of the Olympic flag, he was ostracised by the Australian establishment. Despite qualifying 13 times over and being ranked fifth in the world, he was not sent to the following Munich games, where Australia had no sprinter for the first time in the Olympics. Norman retired soon afterwards without winning another title.
Divorce and ill health all weighed down on him over the next few years. He suffered depression, drank heavily and grew addicted to painkillers after a lengthy hospital stay. During that time, he used his silver medal as a door-stop.
One of the things that kept him going was the hope that he would be welcomed and recognised at the Sydney Olympics. As his nephew puts it: “Then his life would have come full circle.”
He was to be disappointed. In 2000, Peter Norman found himself the only Australian Olympian to be excluded from making a VIP lap of honour at the Games, despite his status as one of the best sprinters in the home country’s history.
But the US athletics team were not going to ignore this omission. They invited Norman to stay at their own lodgings during the games, and welcomed him as one of their own. In an extraordinary turn of events, it was hurdling legend Ed Moses who greeted him at the door, and that year’s 200m champion Michael Johnson who hugged him, saying: “You are my hero.”
In 2004, Peter’s nephew Matt started work on Salute, a documentary that, for the first time, brought all three athletes together in a room to tell their story of that day in Mexico.
Two years later, Peter had just seen the film for the first time and was about to embark on a publicity tour to the US when he had a heart attack and died. Tommie Smith and John Carlos, to whom he had always stayed close, travelled to Melbourne to act as pallbearers at his funeral, and remember their friend. (Source)