Chicago mom Julie Sondgerath is
expected Thursday to deliver more than 40,000 signatures to General
Mills calling for Greg Louganis to be put on the cover of Wheaties.
Sondgerath says that she decided to
start a
change.org petition after watching the HBO documentary Back on
Board, which follows Louganis
over the past three years as he reunites with diving, the sport he
once dominated.
Louganis, who came
out gay and HIV-positive in his 1995 best-selling memoir Breaking
the Surface, was hailed as the “greatest diver ever” by
Swimming World after he set a diving record at the 1984
Olympics in Los Angeles, where he won two gold medals.
But General Mills
denied Louganis the cover, telling a reporter at the time that he did
not meet their “wholesome demographics.”
“Greg Louganis
deserves (still) to be on the cover of the Wheaties box,”
Sondgerath said. “And with marriage equality passing in June of
2015, what a great way to pay it forward to Greg and all of his
accomplishments.”
Louganis himself
has backed Sondgerath's efforts, writing in a Huffington
Post op-ed this week that the cover would have been “cool”
in 1984 “but after all we've been through, it would be even more
iconic now.”