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PREVIOUS SPREAD: COURTESY NBCUNIVERSAL Championship Track Meet at The Garden gave fans that and more, also serving as something of a healing agent. The war had been raging on for years and seemed like it was finally drawing to an end, especially in the European theater. Hitler would be dead the following month, and there was talk over in the Pacific about a bomb to end all bombs destined for Japan. The track meet would be a diversion from the real- ity of war for at least one night, and also a tribute to Louis "Louie" Zamperini, who was projected to be the first human to break a four-minute mile. Zamperini was internationally known since his appearance at the Berlin Olympics nine years earlier. He didn't win the 5,000- meter race that year, but his final lap of 56 seconds was so noteworthy that Hitler wanted to meet him. "Ah, you're the boy with the fast finish," the Führer said while shak- ing Louie's hand. Louie Zamperini, however, was not at the track meet. He had been missing since 1943 when his B-24 Liberator went down almost 900 miles off the coast of Hawaii and he was listed by the government as "killed in action." But his mother refused to believe her son was dead — official documentation be damned — and made the promoters change the "Louis S. Zamperini Memorial Mile" to the "Louis S. Zamperini Invitational Mile" at the track meet. Unbeknownst to event organizers, Madison Square Garden executives, the U.S. War Department — even to Louie's mother — the first lieutenant was alive, al- beit barely. As the crowd roared inside Madison Square Garden, Louie was half a world away, clinging to life as he shivered atop a flimsy bed of straw in Naoetsu, the most notorious of all the Japanese prisoner-of-war camps. A M I D T H E PR E-LU NCH c om mot ion at The Grill, a see-and-be-seen eatery on the back lot of Universal Studios Hollywood, the beautiful people are preparing for the noonday crush of beautiful people. Everyone here — servers, bussers, hosts and patrons — looks extremely laid back and happy, thereby casting a beautiful aura. Only one of them, however, has been ordained by the bibles of the beautiful (Vogue, People, Vanity Fair, Esquire) as the Most Beautiful Woman in the World. It takes no less than a glimpse from the back of The Grill where I'm sitting to the front entrance where she's standing to affirm those Most Beautiful testaments. She is wearing no makeup. Just a little lip gloss. And she is more than a sight. All eyes are on her before they even register that no, that's no look-alike, but the Most Beautiful Woman in the World herself. M ADISON SQUARE GARDEN roared at a frenetic, almost hysterical pitch, as did the crowd milling about the 20-year-old venue on Eighth Avenue between 49th and 50th streets in Manhattan. It was March 3, 1945, and The Garden, widely regarded — if not universally so — as the pre-eminent indoor spectator-sporting facility in the world, was the site of the most anticipated track meet since the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. Those games were hosted and opened by the Führer himself, Adolf Hitler, whose doctrine of Aryan supremacy was crushed by Jesse Owens when the African-American sprinter/long jumper won four gold medals. That thrilled Americans and elevated track to new heights. But others continued advancing the sport, especially a very deep field of distance runners, including Jim Rafferty, the country's fastest miler. ¶ The 1940 Olympics in Tokyo and the 1944 games in London had been canceled because of World War II, so the sporting world was clamoring for a big track meet with big-name stars. The IC4A Intercollegiate Indoor FROM TOP: Jolie meets with refugees at the Zaatari refugee camp outside of Mafraq, Jordan, and helps refugees at the Al-Waleed refugee camp in Iraq. NOW YOU KNOW: Angelina Jolie's decision to go public about her preventative surgery in light of her BRCA1 positive diagnosis is what inspired Kimberly Ferrante-Pitluk, wife of American Way editor (and the author of this story) Adam Pitluk, to elect to undergo preventative surgery in light of her BRCA2 positive diagnosis. To read Kimberly's story from the October 2014 issue, go to aa.com/americanway and click on "Editor's Note." 5 6 D EC E M B E R 2 01 4 A A .CO M/A M E R I C A NWAY

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