Olympic Archives

Olympic Archives finds interesting archival material on the Olympics scattered in the European archives, edition by edition, day by day throughout the games - may the best archive win!

ATHENS 1986

The Modern Olympics games were first held (and it could not have been otherwise!) in Greece in 1896, two years after the International Olympics Committee (IOC) was established in order to revive the games in the modern era. The two creators were Demetrios Vikelas, a wealthy Greek businessman, and French aristocrats Pierre de Coubertin, who is considered the father of modern Olympics. Interestingly, both men had left their professions to become historians – so history made the Olympics!

General State Archives of Greece, Γενικά Aρχεία του Kράτους, Picture of the French winner of the cycling race at the Olympic Games of 1896 in Athens. Source: "Le Petit Journal. Supplement Illustré (April 26, 1896). Tribute to the Olympic Games.”

General State Archives of Greece, Γενικά Aρχεία του Kράτους, From the album "Greece during the 1896 Olympic Games. Panhellenic Illustrated Album - Acropolis V. Gavrielides" by K. Meissner and N. Kargadouri, Hestia Printing House, 1896. Cover; the Panathenaic stadium during the games; the 400 meters race; the entrance of the royal family to the Panathenaic Stadium; the Obstacle course race.

PARIS 1900

The second edition of the modern Olympics was held in France, with Baron Pierre de Coubertin in charge of the main organisation. The games were held as part of the Paris 1900 Universal Exposition; allegedly, some of the athletes were not aware that they were competing in the "Olympics," and there was also a lot of consuion about which sports were part of the Olympics, and which not; indeed, before 2021, the IOC never had a say about which sports would be in the Olympics, leaving it to the local organising committees. For the first time, women could compete in the games: about 22 women participated in five sports: tennis, sailing, croquet, equestrianism, and golf. Charlotte Cooper (Great Britain) became the first female Olympic champion, by winning the women's singles tennis event; Hélène de Pourtalès (American of origin but competing for Switzerland was part of the winning crew in the 1-2 ton sailing class, making her the first female Olympic champion in a mixed-gender team event; Margaret Abbott (USA) won the women's golf competition; she was one of those athletes not knowing she was competing in the Olympics, thinking that it was just another tournament. On the contrary, Helen Preece (from Great Britain) competed in equestrianism, but the sport at the time was not officially recognised as an Olympic programme, so her "participation" in the Olympics remains a matter of debate.

Interestingly, the second edition of the games were also prone to religion-related disputes, like Paris 2024: the US delegation strongly protested that they were forced to play on a Sunday, as they were expected to withdraw in the religious day of rest.

Here are some images about the 1900 Exposition Universelle from the Archives Départementales de la Somme, which conveys the atmosphere of Paris during the games

...and here is golf winner (and unaware Olympic champion) Margaret Abbott

STOCKHOLM 1912

Stockholm 1912, or the Games of the Games of the V Olympiad, were perhaps the first "contemporary" modern Olympic Games: after a few editions characterised by informalities and uncertainties, the Fifth Olympic Games saw twenty-eight nations competing, 2408 competitors (of which 48 were women), 102 events for 14 sports. Japan participated for the first time, expanding the Olympics from its European-US previous outlook to embrace Asia. It was also the first Olympics to issue medals not only for sports, but for ARTS competitions associated with sports: gold medals were awarded in architecture (to Swiss Eugène-Edouard Monod and Alphonse Laverrière for the building plan of a modern Olympic stadium); literature (to Baron de Coubertin for the Ode to the Olympics); music (to Riccardo Barthelemy from Italy, for the "Olympic Triumphal March"; painting (to Italian Carlo Pellegrini for three friezes representing winter sports);

Carlo Pellegrini, "Winter Sports"

and in sculpture, to Walter Winans (USA) for the bronze statuette "An American trotter" and (only silver medal awarded in the arts) to French Georges Dubois, for a model of the entrance to a modern stadium.

Walter Winans - An American Trotter.

Our Content Provider the Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee (Comité Olímpico de Portugal), which will feature extensively in our exhibition, hosted an exhibition in 2002 dedicated to Stockholm 1912, featuring amongst others the original poster:

and uniforms:

ANTWERP 1920

The Sixth edition of the Olympics was supposed to be held in Berlin in 1916, but it was cancelled due to World War I; after the war, the games were assigned to Antwerp as a tribute to what the people of Belgium suffered during the conflict. The 1919 Paris Peace Conference, which reshaped the world at the time, also affected the Olympic Games, as the sanctions against the nations that lost the war and were blamed for starting it (Hungary, Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire) were banned from competing in the Games. Soviet Russia, which had just emerged from the revolution, chose not to participate. This edition of the olympics (the Seventh, as Berlin 1916 remained as the "sixth") was the one with the smallest amount of time to pepare, as Belgium was awarded the games less than two years before the event took place; when the games started, the Antwerp stadium was unfinished; some of the events were hosted in fortifications and other exhisting locations; the athletes head quarters were small and packed, with athletes slept on folding cots, more like hostels than olympic villages. The amount of spectators was also quite low, as in a devastated economy few people could afford tickets; students were eventually allowed to attend the games for free, which caused Belgium to record a loss of more than 600 million francs as a result.

However, these were also the first Olympics to be inseparably linked with the idea of world peace, a moment for all humankind to rejoice together and compete in a healthy, organised way. Doves were released as a symbol of peace, and the Olympic Flag, designed by Baron de Couberville in 1913, was flown to display the unity of the world's continents through its 5 rings.

Interestingly, our content provider Stadtarchiv Karlsruhe from Germany, one of the countries banned from participating in this edition of the Games, holds a lot of interesting material about Antwerp 1920; you can read more about it here

From the Panini sticker collection "Scudetto Campioni dello Sport 1968 - 1969" - available on Wiki Commons

PARIS 1924

The Olympics came back to France for the VIIIth edition, making Paris the first city to ever host the Olympics twice. This time, the record number (for the time) of 45 countries participated in the event, some of them for the first time: China, Ecuador, Ireland, Lithuania, Uruguay, Latvia, Poland, and the Philippines - which means they are now celebrating their 100th anniversary of Olympics participation! Thanks to our content provider the Lithuanian Central State Archives, we have amazing pictures about the Lithuanian participation:

Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, The opening ceremony of the 8th Summer Olympics, in July 1924

Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, The Lithuanian national football team in the 8th summer Olympic games in Paris. 1924. From the left: Hancas Getcas, Zigmas Sabaliauskas, Jurgis Razma, Juozas Žebrauskas, Valerijonas Balčiūnas, Leonas Juozapaitis, team captain – Steponas Garbačiauskas, Jurgis Hardingsonas, Vincas Bartuška, Stasys Janušauskas.

Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, Lithuania V Switzerland at the Olympics, 25 May 2024 (games back then were not as compacted as they are now). Unfortunately, Lithuania lost with an ignominious result of 9-0.

AMSTERDAM 1928

The 9th edition of the Olympics Games, held in Amsterdam, was the first ones to be officially addressed as "Summer Olympics," because the Winter Olympics had taken place for the first time in 1924 in Chamonix, France. Interestingly, the Netherlands had tried to be appointed as host country since 1912, when a proper Dutch Olympic Committee was established for the bid. When the Committee was fainally awarded the games, however, Queen Wilhelmina refused to participate to the opening ceremony: the official justification was a holiday in Norway, but it was well-known that she opposed to the Games as she considered them an expression of Paganism. In any case, the Games were a success, with 46 nations participating; here is the invitation letter from the Dutch Olympic Committee to the Lithuanian Olympic committee (established in 1924) to participate:

Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, The invitation letter from the Dutch Olympic Committee to the Lithuanian Olympic Committee to participate in the 9th summer Olympic games in Amsterdam. March of 1927.

Fun fact, as many cars were expected to arrive with rich people from all over Europe travelling to see the Olympics on the new cool mode of transportation, the city created new parking sites just for the Games (Amsterdam at the time had at most 2000 car park spaces). In order to signal to the drivers the presence of the dedicated car parks, a new special parking symbol was launched: a white P on blue blackground, which remained ever since as the international traffic sign for parking!

A Car park in the Netherlands, in the 1920s

LOS ANGELES 1932

The X^th modern Olympic Games took place in Los Angeles, USA, for the second time after the 1904 edition. 1932 was in the midst of the Great Depression, and many countries could not afford to travel to participate: only 37 countries, compared to the 46 of Amsterdam 1928, took part. Amongst the absentees, Lithuania, which was particularly hit by the international financial collapse a few years earlier, and could not take part in either the III^rd Winter Olympics (held earlier in the year in Lake Placid, near New York) nor the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles – here are the invitation letters from the respective committees:

Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, An invitation letter of the 3rd winter Olympic games committee to the Lithuanian Olympic committee inviting to participate in Winter Olympic games in Lake Placid in 1932. February of 1930 (f. 933, ap. 1, b. 14, l. 204)

Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, An envelope of Los Angeles summer Olympic games, addressed to Lithuanian Olympic committee. 1930 (f. 933, ap. 1, b. 14, l. 200)

You can notice in the LA Logo the Olympic motto “Citius, Altius, Fortius”, Faster, Higher, Stronger, proposed by Pierre de Coubertin upon the creation of the IOC.

Another important quote by Baron de Coubertin (“The Important thing in the olympic games is not winning but taking part - the essential thing is not conquering but fighting well...") was engraved on the Olympic Stadium of Los Angeles, built for the occasion.

For the first time in the history of the Olympics, an Olympic Village was created ad hoc to host the male athletes, a practice that remained as part as the games’ organisations ever since. Female athletes, still far fewer than their male counterparts, were housed at the Chapman Park Hotel – the University of East London Archives hold some pictures of the venue

Finally, Los Angeles 1932 saw the invention of the Olympic mascot, credited to Smokey, a stray dog that visited the Olympic Village every day during its construction (some say it was born there on the opening day of the building site) and became the athletes’ favourite. While completely unofficially, Smokey officiated many Olympics events and since then, a mascot has always accompanied every edition of the games.

BERLIN 1936

The XI^th Summer Olympics in Berlin were marked, unsurprisingly, by extremes. Hitler’s government wanted to use them as a massive propaganda tool, having a 100,000-seat track and field stadium built to compete with the previous LA edition, as well as six gymnasiums and other smaller arenas – an entire Olympic park, or Reichssportfeld. This is the Maifeld field located outside, at the entrance of the Marathon Gate, for large gathering, which became an integral part of the totalitarian propaganda machine:

This is a monthly newsletter issued in the run up to the Games, giving progress updates on the preparations for the forthcoming Games, and previewing particular events and athletes:

University of East London Archives, 'Olympic Games 1936', nos 1-15, June 1935-[August 1936]. Official publication of the Publicity Commission for the XI Olympic Games Berlin 1936 and for the IV Olympic Winter Games Garmisch-Partenkirchen.

And here are the Olympic Art Exhibition Catalogue, which awarded 32 medals in 15 categories:

These were also the first games to be televised, with radio broadcasts reaching 41 countries. Controversial yet arguably genius filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl was commissioned by the German Olympic Committee to film the Games for $7 million; for the occasion, she pioneered many of the techniques still used in the filming of sports. This is a picture of Riefenstahl at the Reichssportfeld, talking to a cameraman:

A record of 50 nations participated; the 51th, Lithuania, was excluded from the Olympics because of its anti-Nazi policy, and particularly the conviction of subversive German politicians in the Klaipėda Region who had plotted to annex the area to the Reich.

Centro Documental de la Memoria Historica, The Argentinian team (50 men and one woman) boards the Cap Arcona in the port of Boulougne to go back home after winning 7 medals.

Hitler also wanted to make these Olympics a showcase for racial superiority, and tried to bar all Jewish althlets from competing, but he could only enforce the ban on German Jewish athletes. Jesse Owens, a Black American track and field runner, declared in an audio interview held at the Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg, Abt. 7. Hauptstaatsarchiv Stuttgart that he was hoping to win 3 medals; in the end, as we all know, he was the most successful athlete of the XI^th Olympics, bringing home four medals.

LONDON 1948

After two lost editions due to World War II, the Olympics Games resumed in the post-war order with London 1948, the last ones to feature the arts competition, due to the fact that most entries were by professional artists, and not ordinary sports lovers as in the spirit of the original games.

TV and the media, since the 1936 editions, were now forever an integral part of the Olympic Games. Our country manager for Hungary, Ildikó Szerényi, tells us about the 14^th games from the point of view of Hungary.

Watching the Olympics on TV from the comfort of our armchairs at home is today taken for granted. But in 1948, this was not an option for everyone. Although the BBC provided television coverage of the London Summer Olympics, it was mainly limited to the London area. The number of TV sets in the households was still small anyway. As the London Olympics was particularly successful for Hungary, communist politician Gyula Hegyi decided to promote it further.

To give the public a taste of the Olympic atmosphere, at least afterwards, a sports show was held in Budapest on the 3 September 1948, which was broadcasted on the Hungarian radio. In addition to newspapers, the Hungarian Telegraphic Office, one of the oldest news agencies of the world, also informed the public about the event.

"At Friday afternoon's Sports Grand Assembly, after the report by Gyula Hegyi, Secretary of State, and speeches by Imre Németh and Tibor Csík, a sports show of high interest will take place, giving the audience a taste of the skills of our London triumphs.

The programme: first, Olympic gymnast Ferenc Pataki will demonstrate the Olympic floor exercise that won him first place in London. After that, Ilona Elek, two-time Olympic champion in Women’s Foil Individual, will perform an assault with her sister, Margit Elek, who finished sixth at the Olympics, followed by a sword fencing demonstration between our Olympic champion Aladár Gerevich and Tibor Berczelly, the hero of the Olympic sword team competition. The final event of the show will be the boxing match of Olympic middleweight boxing champion László Papp, who will have a round of boxing with three different outstanding boxers in succession.

All of our Olympic champions will be present at the Sports Grand Assembly, where they will take their places on the presidential podium."

Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár, MTI Sportkiadás, 31 August 1948. Reference Code: HU_MNL_OL_XXVI_A_14_b

The archives of the Hungarian Telegraphic Office have been digitised and are available here

Also from our archives:

From the University of East London Archives, The Olympic Travel Guide, a fold-out flyer issued by London Transport, giving travel information for the various venues of the London Olympic Games of 1948. Includes map of the Wembley area and lists of addresses of Embassies, Consulates and places of general interest.

And a few snapshots of the games from the press reviews held by the Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee:

HELSINKI 1952

After the post-war edition of London 1948, an ode to world peace, the XV^th Olympic Games were characterised again by a tense geopolitical situation, and were threatened with cancellation due to a possible escalation of the Cold War after the Korean war broke out in 1950, the Arab countries -Israeli situation continued to worsen, and the Chinese civil war ended with the victory of the Communist Party and the establishment of the People's Republic of China, with the Republic of China government exiled to Taiwan. In fact, the Finnish Olympic Committee decided to buy the “war insurance” offered for large events by the insurance company Lloyd’s of London!

In spite of all this, the Games were a big success, with 69 nations participating, and the most world records broken until Beijing 2008; the Soviet – US rivalry officially extended to sport.

The Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee hold extensive photographic collections of Helsinki 1952: these are a few pics from the opening ceremony (the full collection is available here)

ROME 1960

Rome was supposed to host the IV^th Olympiad, in 1908. However, in 1906 the Vesuvius volcano erupted violently, killing almost 100 people and destroying large parts of Naples and the surrounding villages; Olympic funds were diverted to reconstruction, and London ended up hosting the Games in 1908.

The Olympic torch came back to Rome only in 1960, with a strong showcase of Italian Style – one of the buildings erected for the occasion, the Palazzetto dello Sport for basketball, is still one of the most iconic concrete buildings in Rome:

After the geopolitics of Helsinki 1952, the Rome Olympics were able to concentrate exclusively on the athletes - here a few from our archives:

Team GB weightlifter Louis Martin, competing in the Middle Heavyweight, who won the bronze medal (University of East London Archives)

The Portuguese Delegation's parade at the opening ceremony. In the front row, it is possible to spot Fernando Machado (field and track runner), sprinter José Correia Leal, and coach Rui Margaça (Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee):

Track and field Karl Kaufmann (US), who won the silver medal in the men's 400 meters and broke the world record with 44.9 seconds, co-winner with his conational Otis Davis, as well as the gold medal in the 4x400 meters relay team. His performances at the Rome Olympics are remembered as a significant achievement in track and field history (Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee):

An unnamed Soviet athlete (in the original description from the Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee, she is defined as “Chris von Saltza nadadora dos Estados Unidos.”, “Chris von Saltza swimmer for the US” – but as you can see from the picture, this is quite unlikely!

In any case, the importance of Rome 1960 lays mostly in the fact that this was the first time that the Paralympic Games (back then called “Giochi internazionali per paraplegici”, “international games for paraplegics”) were held together with the Olympics, making them the first Paralympic Games in History – so this is an excellent time to close part 1 of our Olympics special, and resume at the end of the month with Paris 2024 Paralympic Games!

TOKYO 1964

The XVIII^th Olympic Games in Tokyo were held in October, to avoid the heat & monsoon season - which means that the II^nd Paralympics edition (or 13^th International Stoke Mandeville Games if we count the previous editions, unlinked to the Olympics) were held in November.

Fun fact, Zambia declared independence on the last day of the Olympics, which means they used a placard saying “Zambia” instead of “Northern Rhodesia” (the one used in the opening ceremony) during the closing ceremony – it was the first country ever to enter as one nation, and leave as another.

The Paralympics hosted 9 sports for 375 athletes and 21 nations; a small reduction compared to the first edition in Rome, but with weightlifting being added to the pool. The Schweizerisches Bundesarchiv hold the news report from the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation about the Swiss Paralympic team leaving for Tokyo.

The Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee holds the Palmarès of achievements for the Olympics:

MEXICO CITY / TEL AVIV 1968

The XIX^th Olympiad in Mexico, 1968, were the first Games to be held in Latin America, again in the autumn (October) to cater for the hot weather. Also, the high elevation of Mexico City (2240 metres above sea level) influenced many sports, and particularly track and field; no other Olympics ever took place at such high elevation. Due to organisational difficulties, Mexico could not organise the IIIrd Paralympic Games, as originally planned, together with the Olympics; Israel however suggested to take it on charge, organising the Games (known as the 17th International Stoke Mandeville Games at the time) in November, in Tel Aviv - 750 athletes from 28 nations participated, with 10 sports competing, and an organisational structure more and more specular to that of the Olympics. Fun fact, the Summer Olympics in Mexico were also the first that introduced doping tests, which resulted in the first doping-related disqualification, but it's not what one may expect: Swedish pentathlete Hans-Gunnar Liljenwall was disqualified for alcohol use, as he had drunk several beers just prior to competing!

Here is the Portuguese delegation in Mexico, marching during the ceremony, and then relaxing in the olympic village:

MONACO / HEIDELBERG 1972

The XX^th Olympic Games, the first to be held in West Germany, wanted to present an optimistic view of post-Nazi Germany to the world, with the motto "Die Heiteren Spiele" ("The Cheerful Games") - unfortunately, the whole event was overshadowed by the terrorist attack on the 5th September, in the middle of the Games, when the Black September militant organisation broke into the Olympic Village took eleven Israeli athletes and coaches hostages. The group managed to move the hostages to a military airport to board for an undetermined Arab country, where the German police planned to ambushed them; however, it ended with all of the hostages being killed, as well as five of the terrorists. The three survivors were held in custody by the German police, but they were released at the end of October, after the Black September group hijacked a Lufthansa flight to ask for their release. After the 5th September attack, the International Olympic Committee still decided to go on with the Games. Luckily, the Paralympic Games were held before the Olympics, from the 2nd to the 11th August, in Heidelberg, and it could focus solely on sport; while still restricted to wheelchair users, this edition hosted demonstrative games for the visually impaired, notably goalball and a 100 m sprint.

MONTREAL / TORONTO 1976

After the horrors of Munich, the XXI^st Olympic Games could go back to focus on sport. Two big highlights: Nadia Comaneci scoring the perfect 10 in artistic gymnastic, and Taro Aso, future prime minister of Japan, being part of the shooting team. On the contrary the Paralympics held in Toronto two weeks before became at the centre of global politics, with the protests against the participation of South Africa, which was excluded by the Olympics for its apartheid policies.

MOSCOW / ARNHEM 1980

The XXII^nd Olympic Games were the first (and only) to be organised in the Eastern bloc during the cold war. This led, inevitably, to be highly controversial from the beginning; the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 heightened the tension, and as a result 66 countries boycotted the Olympics, even though many athletes still competed, albeit as "independents", under the Olympic Flag - it was the first time this type of participation was allowed. Instead, for the Paralympic Games (which were held in Arnhem, in the Netherlands), South Africa was banned for the first time, mirroring the decision made by the IOC many years before. Amongst them, the Portoguese team - the Archives of the Portuguese Olympic Committee hold all the correspondence, paper clips, debates, and other documents related to the decision about boycotting:

and as for the other Olympic editions, the official press cuts and magazines updating about what the Portuguese delegation, even as independents, was doing:

LOS ANGELES / NASSAU COUNTY 1980

The XXIII^rd Olympic Games, which were back in Los Angeles after 1932, were boycotted by most of the Eastern Bloc and a few Global South countries, in retaliation fo the 1980 Moscow edition. Same with the paralympic games, held a few weeks earlier in Nassau County, New York. Luckily, by then, watching them from the comfort of your television was the norm!

Perhaps aided by all the geopolitical tensions, the Winter Olympics that year were held in a country that was in a truly neutral position: Yugoslavia. The University of East London Archives hold the documents about Belgrade's bid, as well as the IOC assessments and studies for decision!

SEOUL 1988

The XXIV^th Olympic Games were held in Seoul, Korea, 35 years after the end of the Korean war, which was one of the most tense times of the Cold War era. For South Korea, indeed, the idea of hosting the Olympics had to be a rite of passage for its economy and re-integration in the international community of the post-war era, as it had been for Japan two decades before. Korean announced it would be their "coming-out party", and indeed the Olympics gave an impetus to the development of the country's relations with the Soviet bloc, China, but also the West. Unlike the previous two editions of the Olympics, held in the Soviet Union and then the US, the Korean Olympics were boycotted by very few countries, notably North Korea and a few of its hard-core allies.

The Olympic Stadium

The Olympic Village

These were eventually the last Olympic Games of the Cold War, as well as for the Soviet Union and East Germany, which both had ceased to exist by the 1992 Olympic Games. The Soviet Union gave however a very good farewell to the history of the Olympics, dominating the medal count with 55 gold and 132 total medals.

It was also a historical editions for the paralympic games: indeed, the name "Paralympics" was used officially for the first time, and it was kept ever since. Also, from now on, the Games would always be hosted in the same country and town, as it had happened in Rome 1960 and Tokyo 1964.

The icons used for the Olympic Games in Seoul:

BARCELONA 1992

We end our journey through the history of the Olympics with the XXV^thedition, held in Barcelona, Spain. These were the first olympic games held in the post-cold war era and post-Apartheid era, with no boycotting in place - South Africa was invited for the first time in 35 years to compete, too. Like Japan, Germany, and Korea beforehand, Spain wanted to use the games to give a new idea of the country, open and democratic - successfully so, as the Games were considered as some of the best, if not the best, in the organisation, spirit, and audience. The infrastructures built re-shaped the image of Barcelona, and they are still active and an integral part of the life of the city. Also, this was the first edition in which the Paralympics were integrated in the Olympics, as Barcelona anounced that the Olympic and Paralympic Games would be managed, planned, and executed by the same people, without any type of differentiation, and paralympic athletes would have the same conditions and opportunities as their Olympic counterparts, competing in the same venues and having access to the Olympic village - Barcelona 1992 was the edition that ushered the Olympics into the present.

This was the second time that Barcelona bid for the Olympics, after the 1936 attempt, where it lost to Berlin. This is the correspondence from the Commissioner of the Support Council for Barcelona's candidacy for the 1992 Olympic Games, Joan Mas Cantí, about the candidacy:

And the Opening Ceremony, waiting for Los Angeles 2028 !

Research by: Anna Batzeli, Darius Bujokas, Mina Stathopoulou, Ildikó Sszerényi.