The World’s Greatest Athlete
The title “World’s Greatest Athlete” began when King Gustav V of Sweden told Jim Thorpe after Jim won the decathlon at the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, “You sir, are the World’s Greatest Athlete.” Jim Thorpe was of mixed Native American and white ancestry. Despite struggling with racism for most part of his life, Jim excelled as an athlete. He won Olympic gold medals in the pentathlon and decathlon, played collegiate and professional American football and also played professional baseball and basketball. He was so great that he was given his own national holiday in 1978 which is celebrated every May 28 the day he was born.