Like almost everything he's done in this lifetime, Andrew Young says the decision to become the co-chair for the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games was rooted in his spirituality.
“We were doing it for the love of the city (and) for the love of the Olympic ideal that people all over the world could live and work together in peace,” the civil rights activist and former city mayor and U.N. ambassador said. Young was Atlanta’s mayor for much of the 1980s.
Aside from Atlanta Olympics CEO Billy Payne's idea to run the 1996 Games as a private corporation without the use of government funds, Young said Payne's involvement in the church led Young to believe Payne's mission was ordained by God. In this regard, he said, his decision to work on the 1996 Olympics bid was much like his decision to work with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
A self-proclaimed "Olympic nut" since age 4, Young said it was once a personal dream of his to win an Olympic medal. Watching the Movietone News at the Orpheum Theater in New Orleans as Jesse Owens competed in the 1936 Olympics inspired his love for track.
He joined Howard University’s track team in college, before eventually giving up his Olympic dreams.
“I went to Marion, Ala., (after graduation) and instead of getting an Olympic medal, I got a wife and a career,” Young said.
When Payne approached Young about an Olympics bid decades later, Young’s role changed from spectator to organizer.
He used his international network to help secure enough votes to win the bid for a city he says embodies the ideals emphasized by the Olympic Games.
“If it’s a part of the world, it’s here,” Young said. “We’ve managed to live together and respect each other in spite of our differences.”
His favorite moment from the 1996 Olympic Games: watching “ordinary enemies” Iran, Iraq and Israel march into the opening ceremony.
