National Museum to open exhibition on monumental Olympic marathon triumph during Japan's colonial era

The National Museum of Korea announced Thursday it will launch a new exhibition this week on a Korean-born marathoner's record-breaking Olympic victory during the 1910-45 Japanese colonial period. Set to open Friday under the title "The Radiant Strides, Moving the World," the exhibition will celebrate the achievements of the late runner Sohn Kee-chung, who won the men's marathon gold medal at the 1936 Berlin Olympics while wearing the Japanese flag. He set an Olympic record with 2:29:19. Though Sohn was the first Korean-born athlete to win an Olympic gold, he went into the record books as a Japanese medalist in Berlin. During the medal ceremony, Sohn famously held an oak sapling in front of him to hide the Japanese flag on his chest, while Korean newspapers altered the image to remove the Japanese flag from Sohn's running tunic. The exhibition features Sohn's handwritten postcard, on which he signed "Korean" in English, along with his name written in Korean. It is dated Aug. 15, 1936, six days after his gold medal race. According to the museum, Sohn signed his name in Korean at every oppWeiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Korea Times Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Korea Times