The First Winter Olympics Was a Very Modest Affair

This poster promoted winter games in the shadow of Mont Blanc as an extension of Olympic Games held in Paris that summer.  The competition was retroactively declared the official first Winter Olympic Games.

The XXV Milan Cortina Winter Olympic Games are underway and sprawling across northern Italy from the chic fashion and design center to the Alps. 2,900 athletes representing 90 National Olympic Committees will compete in 116 events across eight sports and 16 disciplines.  Preliminary competition began Thursday before the pageantry of the Opening Ceremony on Friday and will stretch past the Closing Ceremony on February 22. 

Despite NBC’s patriotic drum beat for the U.S. team, American athletes might face hostile crowds since Donald Trump succeeded in making the country a pariah nation.  Expect plenty of moments of geo-political drama between those inspiring athlete bio-reels and Medal Ceremonies. 

The first Winter Games were a much more modest event. 

On January 25, 1924 athletes from 16 nations gathered at the foot of Mont Blanc in Chamonix, and Haute-Savoie, France for an International Winter Sports Week.  The event was considered by its host, the French Olympic Committee, to be an informal extension of the Olympics Games held that summer in Paris.  It was in response to a clamor, particularly by Nordic countries, for an international venue for amateur winter sports. 

It was only after the conclusion of the successful games that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to formally inaugurate the Winter Games at their meeting in 1925, that they retroactively proclaimed the Chamonix games the I Olympic Winter Games.  Thereafter, the games would be held every four years in the same years as the Summer Games—interrupted by World War II—until 1994 when the current schedule of holding the game two years after the last Summer event was adopted. 

Norway dominated Alpine events like the ski slalom. 

The French event was not, however the first time some winter sports were part of Olympic games.  Figure Skating was an Olympic event in both London and Antwerp, and Ice Hockey was contested in Antwerp on indoor rinks.  Obviously, events which had to be held outdoors could not be accommodated in a normal Olympic schedule. 

The sole American Gold Medal was in Speed Skating.

The first games were totally dominated by Nordic teams.  Norway won four Gold Medals and 17 total medals, Finland had four Golds and 11 total.  The United States only took a Gold in Speed Skating, a very distant Silver in Hockey, Silver in Lady’s Figure Skating, and a Bronze for Men’s Ski Jump.  But that was better than the hapless home team, despite fielding the second largest number of athletes.  The French won just three Bronze medals, one of them not actually awarded until 2006. 

An unofficial sport at the games, curlers were finally awarded medal for the competition in 2006.  Note the woman on this team--the only event in which women competed along side men.

Curling was presented during the games but was not considered an official sport.  In 2006, the IOC retroactively awarded medals to the 1924 curling teams after an appeal on behalf of the victorious British by a Glasgow newspaper. 

The Curling medals were not the only ones awarded tardily.  When officials in 1974 discovered a mis-entered score in a ski jumping event, American Anders Haugen was elevated from fourth place to third and the 86-year-old athlete finally received his Bronze. 

The last medal presented during the competition was awarded to a sport that was not even contested during the games.  The French Olympic Committee presented a Gold Medal for alpinisme to Charles Granville Bruce, the leader of the expedition that tried but failed to climb Mount Everest in 1922. 

Athletes at the games competed in 16 events in 9 sports—Bob Sled, Curling, Ice Hockey, Military Patrol, Figure Skating, Speed Skating, Cross Country Skiing, Nordic Combined Skiing, and Ski Jumping. 

Norway's 13-year-old Sonja Henie placed last in 1924 but was the darling of the games.  She went on to win Gold Medals in the next three Winter Games and a career in Hollywood movies.

In Figure Skating Sweden’s Gillis Grafström became the first—and last—individual to successfully defend a Gold Medal won at a previous Summer game, Antwerp in 1920.  He went on to notch a third win in 1928 and a Silver in 1932.  On the distaff side 11-year-old Sonja Henie skated for Norway.  She finished last but became the darling of the competition.  She went on to win the next three consecutive Gold Medals, a career as one of the highest paid movies stars in Hollywood, and the first ice show queen. 

Since they crushed all opposing teams in hockey 110 to 3 points and dominated the first seven Winter Games, the Canadians have been all about the puck.

Then there was Ice Hockey.  The Canadians, like Grafström defending Gold won at Antwerp, achieved the most devastating complete domination of an event in Olympic history, Summer or Winter.  They finished their qualifying round with 4 wins, and a total score of 110–3 against Switzerland, Czechoslovakia, Sweden, and Great Britain then breezed to a win topping the U.S.  This domination continued through most of early Olympic history.  The Canadians won six of the first seven Gold Medals.  Frankly, the whole country has had a swelled head and been a dick about this ever since. 

All in all, it was an exciting and successful week of completion.  Unlike the enormously expensive Summer games that year in Paris, the winter events even turned a modest profit.  They helped popularize winter sports in Europe and North America.  Not a bad debut.