1924 Summer Olympics

Games of the VIII Olympiad

Emblem of the 1924 Summer Olympics
Location	Paris, France
Nations	44
Athletes	3,089 (2,954 men, 135 women)
Events	126 in 17 sports (23 disciplines)
Opening	5 July 1924
Closing	27 July 1924
Opened by	President Gaston Doumergue[1]
Stadium	Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir
Summer Winter

The 1924 Summer Olympics (French: Jeux olympiques d'été de 1924), officially the Games of the VIII Olympiad (French: Jeux de la VIII^e olympiade) and officially branded as Paris 1924, were an international multi-sport event held in Paris, France. The opening ceremony was held on 5 July, but some competitions had already started on 4 May. The Games were the second to be hosted by Paris (after 1900), making it the first city to host the Olympics twice.

The selection process for the 1924 Summer Olympics consisted of six bids, and Paris was selected ahead of Amsterdam, Barcelona, Los Angeles, Prague, and Rome. The selection was made at the 20th IOC Session in Lausanne in 1921.^[2] The cost of these Games was estimated to be 10,000,000 F (equivalent to €10.1 million in 2022^[3]). With total receipts at 5,496,610 F (equivalent to €5.53 million in 2022), the Olympics resulted in a hefty loss despite crowds that reached up to 60,000 in number daily.^[4] The United States won the most gold and overall medals, having 229 athletes competing compared to France's 401.

Highlights

Colombes Olympic Stadium

• The Uruguay national football team won the gold medal in football, which was recognized as a world championship by FIFA.
• The opening ceremony and several sporting events took place in the Olympic Stadium of Colombes, which had a capacity of 45,000 in 1924.
• This VIII Olympiad was the last one organized under the presidency of Pierre de Coubertin.
• The "Flying Finns" dominated the long-distance running, while the British and Americans dominated the shorter events. Paavo Nurmi won the 1500 m and 5,000 m (which were held with only an hour between them) and the cross-country run. Ville Ritola won the 10,000 m and the 3,000 m steeplechase while finishing second to Nurmi in the 5,000 m and cross country. Albin Stenroos won the marathon, while the Finnish team (with Nurmi and Ritola) was victorious in the 3,000 m and cross-country team events.
• The British runners Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell won the 100 m and the 400 m events, respectively. Liddell refused to compete in the 100-meter dash because it was held on a Sunday, and he was an observant Christian. Their stories were depicted in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire. In addition, Douglas Lowe won the 800-metre competition.
• DeHart Hubbard became the first African-American to win an individual gold medal in the Long jump.
• The marathon distance was fixed at 42.195 km (26.219 mi), from the distance run at the 1908 Summer Olympics in London.
• The 1924 Olympics were the first to use the standard 50 m pool with marked lanes.
• Dual-sport athlete Johnny Weissmuller won three gold medals in swimming and one bronze in water polo.
• Harold Osborn won gold medals and set Olympic records in the high jump and the 1924 Olympic decathlon. His 6' 6" high jump remained the Olympic record for 12 years, while his decathlon score of 7,710.775 points also set a world record and resulted in worldwide press coverage recognizing him as the "world's greatest athlete."
• Fencer Roger Ducret of France won five medals, of which three were gold.
• In gymnastics, 24 men scored a perfect 10. Twenty-three scored it in the now-discontinued rope climbing event. Albert Seguin scored a ten here and a perfect ten on the side vault.
• The Olympic motto Citius, Altius, Fortius (Faster, Higher, Stronger) was used for the first time at the Olympics. It had been used before by the Union des Sociétés Françaises de Sports Athlétiques, a French sporting federation whose founding members included Pierre de Coubertin.^[5] De Coubertin took the motto from his friend Henri Didon, a Dominican priest who had coined the phrase during a speech before a Paris youth gathering of 1891.^[6]
• Ireland was given formal recognition as an independent nation in the Olympic Movement in Paris in 1924, and it was at these games that Ireland made its first appearance in the Olympic Games as an independent nation.
• Originally called Semaine des Sports d'Hiver ("Week of Winter Sports") and held in association with the 1924 Summer Olympics, the sports competitions held in Chamonix between 25 January and 5 February 1924 were later designated by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as the I Olympic Winter Games. (1924 Winter Olympics)
• These were the first Games to have an Olympic Village.
• The Art competitions at the 1924 Summer Olympics were the first time that the Olympic Art competitions were contested seriously, with 193 entries in five categories. A total of 14 medals were awarded, though none were given in the music category.^[7]

Sports

Overall map of the Olympic venues

The "Olympic Number" of Life, 10 Jul 1924.

126 events in 23 disciplines, comprising 17 sports, were part of the Olympic program in 1924. The number of events in each discipline is noted in parentheses.

• Aquatics
  •  Diving (5)
  •  Swimming (11)
  •  Water polo (1)
•  Athletics (27)
•  Boxing (8)
•  Cycling
  • Road (2)
  • Track (4)
•  Equestrian
  • Dressage (1)
  • Eventing (2)
  • Show jumping (2)
•  Fencing (7)
•  Football (1)
•  Gymnastics (9)
• Modern pentathlon (1)
•  Polo (1)
•  Rowing (7)
•  Rugby union (1)
•  Sailing (3)
•  Shooting (10)
•  Tennis (5)
•  Weightlifting (5)
•  Wrestling
  • Freestyle (7)
  • Greco-Roman (6)

Demonstration sports

•  Basque pelota
•  Canoeing
• La canne
•  Savate ^[8]

Jeux de L’Enfance

The Jeux de L’Enfance, a program of youth sports competitions and activities, were held by Olympic organizers alongside the Games in cooperation with the YMCA.^[9][10] The following future Olympic sports were exhibited:

•  Baseball
•  Basketball
•  Volleyball

Venues

Map of Olympic sites

Seventeen sports venues were used in the 1924 Summer Olympics. Stade de Colombes served as the final venue for the 1938 FIFA World Cup between Italy and Hungary.

Venue	Sports	Capacity	Ref.
Bagatelle	Polo	598	[11]
Bassin d'Argenteuil	Rowing	2,216	[12]
Camp de Châlons	Shooting (600 m free rifle individual and team)	395	[13]
Fontainebleau	Modern pentathlon (riding)	Not listed.	[14]
Hippodrome d'Auteuil	Equestrian	8,922	[15]
Issy-les-Moulineaux	Shooting (trap shooting, including team event)	41	[16]
Le Havre	Sailing	541	[17]
Le Stade Olympique de Reims	Shooting (trap shooting, running target)	420	[18]
Le Stand de Tir de Versailles	Modern pentathlon (shooting), Shooting (25 m rapid fire pistol, running deer)	82	[19]
Meulan-en-Yvelines	Sailing	389	[20]
Piscine des Tourelles	Diving, Modern pentathlon (swimming), Swimming, Water polo	8,023	[21]
Saint-Cloud	Polo	7,836	[11]
Stade Bergeyre	Football	10,455	[22]
Stade de Colombes	Athletics, Cycling (road), Equestrian, Fencing, Football (final), Gymnastics, Modern pentathlon (fencing, running), Rugby union, Tennis	60,000	[23]
Stade de Paris	Football	5,145	[24]
Stade Pershing	Football	8,110	[25]
Vélodrome d'hiver	Boxing, Fencing, Weightlifting, Wrestling	10,884	[26]
Vélodrome de Vincennes	Cycling (track)	12,750	[27]

Participating nations

Participating Countries of the 1924 Olympiad

Number of athletes

A total of 44 nations were represented at the 1924 Games. Germany was still absent, having not been invited by the Organizing Committee.^[28] China (although it did not compete), Ecuador, Ireland, Lithuania, and Uruguay attended the Olympic Games for the first time, while the Philippines competed for first time in an Olympic Games as a nation (though it first participated in the 1900 Summer Olympic Games). Latvia and Poland also attended the Summer Olympic Games for the first time (having both appeared earlier at the 1924 Winter Olympics in Chamonix).

The 1924 Olympics saw a return of the following nations: Austria, Bulgaria, Cuba, Haiti, Hungary, Mexico, Romania and Turkey

At the time, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa and Ireland were all dominions of the British Empire. India was also part of British Empire, but was not a dominion. For other sovereign states (i.e. United States, France, Brazil, Japan, etc) and the international community as a whole (i.e League of Nations) the term dominion, used internally in the British Empire, was very ambiguous, meaning "something between a colony and state". It was only years later with the Statute of Westminster 1931 that this ambiguity would be dispelled.

And Philippines was an unincorporated territory and commonwealth of the United States.

Participating National Olympic Committees

Argentina (77 athletes)  Australia (36)  Austria (49)  Belgium (172)  Brazil (12)  Bulgaria (24)  Canada (65)  Chile (11)  Cuba (9)  Czechoslovakia (70)  Denmark (89)  Ecuador (3)  Egypt (33)  Estonia (44)  Finland (90)  France (401) (host)  Great Britain (267)  Greece (26)  Haiti (8)  Hungary (89)  India (7)  Ireland (39)  Italy (200)  Japan (9)  Latvia (41)  Lithuania (13)  Luxembourg (22)  Mexico (13)  Monaco (7)  Netherlands (153)  New Zealand (4)  Norway (62)  Philippines (1)  Poland (65)  Portugal (30)  Romania (51)  South Africa (30)  Spain (129)  Sweden (108)  Switzerland (75)  Turkey (31)  United States (299)  Uruguay (31)  Yugoslavia (37)

• China also took part in the Opening Ceremony, but its four athletes (all tennis players) withdrew from competition.^[29]

Number of athletes by National Olympic Committees

Country	Athletes
France	401
Great Britain	239
United States	229
Italy	200
Belgium	172
Netherlands	153
Spain	129
Sweden	108
Finland	90
Denmark	89
Hungary	89
Argentina	77
Switzerland	75
Czechoslovakia	70
Canada	65
Poland	65
Norway	62
Romania	51
Austria	49
Estonia	44
Latvia	41
Ireland	39
Yugoslavia	37
Australia	36
Egypt	33
Turkey	31
Uruguay	31
Portugal	30
South Africa	30
Greece	26
Bulgaria	24
Luxembourg	22
Lithuania	13
Mexico	13
Brazil	12
Chile	11
Cuba	9
Japan	9
Haiti	8
India	7
Monaco	7
Republic of China	4
New Zealand	4
Ecuador	3
Philippines	1
Total	3,089

Medal count

Main articles: 1924 Summer Olympics medal table and List of 1924 Summer Olympics medal winners

These are the nations that won medals the 1924 Games.

  *   Host nation (France)

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	United States	45	27	27	99
2	Finland	14	13	10	37
3	France*	13	15	10	38
4	Great Britain	9	14	12	35
5	Italy	8	3	5	16
6	Switzerland	7	8	10	25
7	Norway	5	2	3	10
8	Sweden	4	13	12	29
9	Netherlands	4	1	5	10
10	Belgium	3	7	3	13
11	Australia	3	1	2	6
12	Denmark	2	5	2	9
13	Hungary	2	3	4	9
14	Yugoslavia	2	0	0	2
15	Czechoslovakia	1	4	5	10
16	Argentina	1	3	2	6
17	Estonia	1	1	4	6
18	South Africa	1	1	1	3
19	Uruguay	1	0	0	1
20	Austria	0	3	1	4
	Canada	0	3	1	4
22	Poland	0	1	1	2
23	Haiti	0	0	1	1
	Japan	0	0	1	1
	New Zealand	0	0	1	1
	Portugal	0	0	1	1
	Romania	0	0	1	1
Totals (27 entries)		126	128	125	379

• Pierre de Coubertin—founder of the IOC & father of the modern Olympics movement—personally awarded 21 gold medals to members of the 1922 British Mount Everest Expedition including 12 Britons, 7 Indians, 1 Australian and 1 Nepalese.^[30][31]

Legacy

The 1924 Summer Olympics was the second edition of the Summer Olympics to be held in Paris. 100 years later, the city has hosted the games once again with the 2024 Summer Olympics, marking its third time, becoming the second city ever to host the Summer Olympics three times (after London, which hosted the 1908, 1948, and 2012 Games). Paris 2024 also marks the centenary of Chamonix 1924, which in turn marks the centenary of the Winter Olympics; making Paris 2024 the sixth Olympic Games hosted by France (three Summer Olympics and three Winter Olympics), and the first French Olympics since the 1992 Winter Games in Albertville.

Notable debuts of participating countries for the Paris 1924 Olympics include Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Philippines, Poland, Romania, and Uruguay; all of which celebrated their centenary participation at the 2024 Summer Olympics back in Paris.

One venue from the 1924 Games was used in the 2024 Games. The extensively renovated and downsized main stadium, known since 1928 as Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir, hosted field hockey.

The last surviving competitor of the 1924 Summer Olympics was Croatian swimmer Ivo Pavelić, who died on 22 February 2011 at the age of 103; he competed for Yugoslavia, which Croatia was part of at the time. ^[32]

Continuation of Jeux de L’Enfance, games for youth sports and competition, from the Paris 1924 was embodied through the creation of Youth Olympics Games inaugurating in Singapore with the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics with 3,600 athletes aged 14–18 from 204 nations competing in 201 events in 26 sports.

See also

• 1924 Winter Olympics
• Olympic Games held in France
  • 1900 Summer Olympics – Paris
  • 1924 Summer Olympics – Paris
  • 1924 Winter Olympics – Chamonix
  • 1968 Winter Olympics – Grenoble
  • 1992 Winter Olympics – Albertville
  • 2024 Summer Olympics – Paris

• List of IOC country codes
• Chariots of Fire

Notes

1. "Factsheet - Opening Ceremony of the Games f the Olympiad" (PDF) (Press release). International Olympic Committee. 13 September 2013. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 August 2016. Retrieved 22 December 2018.
2. "Past Olympic host city election results". GamesBids. Archived from the original on 24 January 2011. Retrieved 17 March 2011.
3. 1262 to 1789 Leonardo Ridolfi, The French economy in the longue durée: a study on real wages, working days and economic performance from Louis IX to the Revolution (1250–1789), Ridolfi, L. (2019). Six Centuries of Real Wages in France from Louis IX to Napoleon III: 1250–1860. The Journal of Economic History, 79(3), 589-627. 1798 to 1809: Mitchell, B. R. (Brian R.). (1975). European historical statistics, 1750-1970. New York: Columbia University Press, 1810 to 1903: Sauvy, Alfred. Variations des prix de 1810 à nos jours. Journal de la société française de statistique, Volume 93 (1952) , pp. 88-104 1904 to 2022: Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques, Coefficient de transformation de l'euro ou du franc d'une année, en euro ou en franc d'une autre année – Base 2015 – Série utilisée par le convertisseur franc-euro – Identifiant 010605954
4. Zarnowski, C. Frank (Summer 1992). "A Look at Olympic Costs" (PDF). Citius, Altius, Fortius. 1 (1): 16–32. Archived from the original (PDF) on 25 May 2017. Retrieved 10 August 2017.
5. The Official History of the Olympic Games and the IOC- Athens to Beijing, 1894–2008: David Miller (2008)
6. "Opening Ceremony" (PDF). International Olympic Committee. 2002. p. 3. Archived (PDF) from the original on 11 December 2011. Retrieved 23 August 2012.; "Sport athlétique", 14 mars 1891: "[...] dans une éloquente allocution il a souhaité que ce drapeau les conduise 'souvent à la victoire, à la lutte toujours'. Il a dit qu'il leur donnait pour devise ces trois mots qui sont le fondement et la raison d'être des sports athlétiques: citius, altius, fortius, 'plus vite, plus haut, plus fort'.", cited in Hoffmane, Simone La carrière du père Didon, Dominicain. 1840 - 1900, Doctoral thesis, Université de Paris IV - Sorbonne, 1985, p. 926; cf. Michaela Lochmann, Les fondements pédagogiques de la devise olympique „citius, altius, fortius"
7. M. Avé, Comité Olympique Français, pp. 601–612
8. "Demonstration sports : history at the Olympic Summer Games / The Olympic Studies Centre". Olympic World Library. 19 January 2024. Archived from the original on 19 January 2024. Retrieved 27 January 2024.
9. Barker, Philip (3 March 2015). "Did the first Youth Olympics really take place in Paris 100 years ago?". International Society of Olympic Historians – ISOH. Retrieved 29 January 2024.
10. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 628. (in French)
11. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 528-9. (in French)
12. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 165-7. (in French)
13. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 565-6. (in French)
14. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 501-3. (in French)
15. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 222-3. (in French)
16. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 544-6, 549. (in French)
17. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 584, 587. (in French)
18. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 563-5, 568. (in French)
19. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 489, 548-9.
20. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 582-3, 587. (in French)
21. 1924 Olympic official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 438-40, 443-4, 499 (in French).
22. 1924 Summer Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 318, 320. (in French)
23. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 50-5, 96-7, 121, 152, 216, 222, 238, 248, 265, 318, 339, 375, 499, 503, 536. (in French)
24. 1924 Summer Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 318, 321. (in French)
25. 1924 Summer Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 318, 322. (in French).
26. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 182-3, 203-4, 255, 266, 400, 425, 507. (in French)
27. 1924 Olympics official report. Archived 5 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine pp. 200-217. (in French)
28. Guttmann, Allen (1992). The Olympics: A History of the Modern Games. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. p. 38. ISBN 0-252-01701-3.
29. M. Avé (ed.). Les Jeux de la VIII^e Olympiade Paris 1924 – Rapport Officiel (PDF) (in French). Paris: Librairie de France. Archived from the original (PDF) on 5 May 2011. Retrieved 16 October 2012. 39 seulement s'alignérent, ne représentant plus que 24 nations, la Chine, le Portugal et la Yougoslavie ayant déclaré forfait.
30. Georgiou, Mark (26 March 2012). "Everest Olympic medal pledge set to be honoured". BBC News. Archived from the original on 22 September 2014. Retrieved 31 August 2012.
31. Douglas, Ed (19 May 2012). "My modest father never mentioned his Everest expedition Olympic gold". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on 25 December 2018. Retrieved 31 August 2012.
32. "Ivo Pavelić". Olympedia. Archived from the original on 8 June 2021. Retrieved 8 June 2021.

External links

• "Paris 1924". Olympics.com. International Olympic Committee.
• Comité Olympique Français. Avé, M. (ed.). Les Jeux de la VIII^e Olympiade Paris 1924 – Rapport Officiel [The Games of the VIIIth Olympiad Paris 1924 – Official Report] (PDF) (in French). Paris: Librairie de France. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 April 2008. Retrieved 30 June 2018.
• 1924 medal winners – from CBS
• Picture of the Olympic Stadium of Colombes
• Original footage of the opening ceremony of the 1924 Summer Olympics (by Polygoon) (in Dutch)
• Olympic games handbook; containing official records of the seventh Olympiad

Summer Olympics
Preceded by Antwerp	VIII Olympiad Paris 1924	Succeeded by Amsterdam