This post was written by Monica Smith, Chief of Informal Learning at the Library of Congress.
Once again people across the world are collectively tuning in to watch the Summer Olympic Games, held every four years. Well, mostly; the global COVID-19 pandemic delayed the 2020 Tokyo Summer Games by one year, but now they are back on track literally and figuratively.
This time all eyes are on Paris, France, where more than 10,000 athletes representing 206 national Olympic committees, plus a team of refugee athletes under the Olympic flag, are competing for individual and team glory in a wide variety of sports (including breaking for the first time!) through August 11, 2024. This year’s Olympics are officially called “the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad.” (Those Roman numerals XXXIII equal 33.)
“Merci” to Baron Pierre de Coubertin for inventing—or reinventing—what we know as the Olympic Games in 1896. He was inspired by ancient Greek culture and the original “Olympics” held in Olympia, Greece, every four years between 776 BCE and about 394 CE. Coubertin wanted to build on that historic example to promote the universal activity of sports as a bridge for global communication, collaboration and trust in the modern age.
Officially known as “the Games of the I Olympiad,” the 1896 Olympics were organized by a new International Olympic Committee (IOC) created by Coubertin. Coubertin established the three core values of the modern Olympic Movement: “Excellence, Respect and Friendship.” However, some readers may be more familiar with the Latin Olympic motto “Citius-Altius-Fortius” (“Faster-Higher-Stronger”) that Coubertin also selected. To honor their classical roots, these first Olympic Games in modern history debuted in Athens, Greece, in April.
The Games continued every four years—Paris, France (1900), St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. (1904), London, United Kingdom 1908) and Stockholm, Sweden (1912)—until 1916 when the Berlin Games were canceled due to World War I.
During the break, Coubertin designed the original Olympics logo of five, interlocking colored rings—blue, yellow, black, green and red. Contrary to popular belief, each ring was not directly associated with a continent; rather he incorporated the colors of national flags in use when creating the logo. The preferred white background is considered a sixth Olympic color symbolizing the universality of the Games.
Shortly after World War I ended, the Olympic Games were revived in Antwerp, Belgium, in 1920. Then they returned to Paris in 1924—the last time the Summer Olympic Games were held there. It seemed fitting for the Olympics to return to founder Coubertin’s home city, honoring him during his final year as the president of the IOC.
The 1924 Paris Summer Games are credited with some Olympic “firsts.” While people now mostly watch international sports competitions on television, that didn’t exist back then. However, the new communication technology of radio had just emerged, and the first radio broadcast of the Olympics occurred during these Games. More than 1,000 journalists attended, eager to share stories via voice as well as the written word with fans back home.
Also, for the first time, all athletes stayed at an Olympic Village, which was simple by today’s standards. It comprised temporary wooden houses, a restaurant, post office and a place to exchange foreign money. The athletes’ village was located near the Stade Olympique de Colombes in the northwestern suburbs of Paris. Previously a racecourse, the Olympic Stadium was refurbished for the 1924 Summer Games to serve as the venue for track and field, football (soccer) and rugby competitions, with seating for 20,000 spectators. Sparse as it may look in the image below, the largest total crowd to date attended these Games: 625,000 spectators!
At the 1924 Paris Olympics—or Games of the XII Olympiad for those keeping count—3,089 athletes (only 135 of them women) competed in 126 events in 17 sports. This marked the largest number of competitors to that point in the Games’ history.
Three male swimmers on the U.S. team achieved a podium sweep in the 100-meter freestyle race when gold medalist Johnny Weissmuller beat brothers Duke and Sam Kahanamoku, winners of the silver and bronze respectively. Weissmuller also earned gold that same year in the men’s 400m freestyle and 4x200m freestyle relay and helped the U.S. men’s water polo team earn the bronze medal.
Weissmuller went on to win more swimming gold medals for the U.S. at the 1928 Amsterdam Summer Olympics and then dove into acting. He became most famous for playing the title role of Tarzan in 12 films through the 1930s and 1940s. His swimming rival from Hawaii also did some acting, but Duke Kahanamoku is best known as the “Father of Modern Surfing.” He also helped popularize the iconic Hawaiian floral “aloha” shirt.
On the women’s side, American swimmers included teenager Aileen Riggin. The only woman to ever win medals in both swimming and diving in the same Olympics, she took silver in springboard diving and bronze in the 100m backstroke. Riggin was the subject of the first known underwater swimming film in 1922 and the first slow-motion swimming and diving films in 1923. Like her male teammates, she later appeared in several films (in uncredited roles) including “Roman Scandals” (1933).
Gertrude “Trudy” Ederle won a gold medal in the 4x100m freestyle relay and bronze medals in the 100m and 400m freestyle races at the Paris Games. Then two years later, aged 19, she gained even more fame as the first woman to swim across the English Channel. Not only that, but she swam faster than the five men who achieved the feat before her. Ederle’s story is dramatized in Disney’s 2024 film Young Woman and the Sea.
Other notable American athletes at the 1924 Paris Games included tennis players Richard (R.) Norris Williams, and Helen Wills. After surviving the infamous sinking of the Titanic in 1912, Williams fought in World War I and then continued a successful tennis career. At the Paris Games he won a mixed doubles gold medal with Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman, who also won the women’s doubles with Wills. [Note that tennis was removed as an Olympic sport after 1924 and not reinstated until the 1988 Summer Games.]
During her career, Wills won 31 total singles and doubles grand slam tennis titles. To this date, her 19 women’s grand slam singles titles make her the 4th most successful player in women’s tennis history behind Margaret Court (24), Serena Williams (23) and Steffi Graf (22).
May today’s American Olympians—and all athletes lucky enough to participate in this international sports extravaganza in Paris—have wonderful memories to bring home with them like their counterparts did one hundred years ago.
Additional Resources:
Library of Congress Research Guides about the Olympics:
- Introduction – Olympic Games: Finding Pictures in the Prints & Photographs Division – Research Guides at Library of Congress
- Introduction – Olympics: Topics in Chronicling America – Research Guides at Library of Congress
Selection of Library of Congress blogs on Olympics-related topics:
- He Shoots, He Scores! A Love of Winter Games
- London Olympic Games Then and Now: 1908 & 2012
- Memories of an Olympic Protest: John Carlos, Oral History, and the 1968 Mexico City Games
- An Olympian Effort: The Story of Jesse Owens in Library of Congress Primary Sources
- Olympic City: Rio de Janeiro in Historical Maps
- Olympic Gold: Harrison Dillard and Military Athletes
- Pindar, Poetry, and the Olympics
- Today in History – July 30
- Trending: Olympic Games
Comments (2)
What a great, informative, and timely blog.
Thanks so much, Muhannad, for the kind feedback on my blog post. It was a pleasure to research and write!