The chaotic history of the Olympics in Paris, where one games nearly ended the movement – and the other helped save it

By Vaughan Cruickshank, University of Tasmania, Brendon Hyndman, Charles Sturt University

Paris is about to host its third summer Olympics. While we don’t yet know what the legacy of this year’s games will be, let’s take the opportunity to reflect on the city’s previous Olympics of 1900 and 1924 – the first of which nearly ended the modern Olympic movement, whereas the second set it alight.

The disaster of Paris 1900

The 1900 Paris Olympics was negatively impacted by the decision to link the games with the World Fair, held in Paris at the same time. The committee of the much larger and more popular fair was given control of organising everything, despite its minimal knowledge of sport. The organisers saw the Olympics as far less important than the fair’s exhibits, focused on fashion and new technologies such as escalators and audio recorders.

As a result, the Olympic games were treated like a sideshow. This poorly organised event was held at inadequate venues over nearly six months and almost ended the modern Olympic movement in its infancy.

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Sports historians refer to 1900 as a farcical games and have debated whether it should even be considered an Olympics. The founder of the modern Olympics, Pierre de Coubertin, later commented it was a miracle the Olympic movement survived.

Confusing scheduling led to few spectators. Minimal venues were built and there were no officially agreed rules and regulations, which led to numerous disputes. There were no opening or closing ceremonies and many athletes were unaware they were competing in the Olympics.

Competing for one’s country was also not a concept yet, so numerous medals were won by teams with athletes from different countries. One Danish journalist became a last-minute substitute on a combined Danish-Swedish tug-of-war team that defeated France in the final. A young unknown French boy was also pulled out of the crowd to cox a Dutch rowing team to a gold medal, because the team had decided the adult cox was too heavy.

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