SMITH: University of Georgia legend Spec Towns was one of the world's best athletes

This summer, eighty-four years ago, Nazi Germany was peaking with its war production and would soon shock the world with its senseless aggression and heinous brutality, but was at parade rest in the summer of 1936 when Berlin would host the games of the XI Olympiad.

Taking a boat across the ocean, in the company of University of Georgia athletic director Herman J. Stegeman and his wife, Dorothea, was a freckled faced collegian from Augusta, Forest Grady Towns, better known as “Spec,” a dual sport star for the Bulldogs. Towns would compete for an Olympic gold medal in the 110-meter hurdles. The race, in U.S. competition, measures 120 yards but the distance between the hurdles is the same as in 110 meters.