1.
Here’s a scene from the 1924 Olympics gold medal hockey game between the USA and Canada. Canada won 6-1:
2.
And here’s the goalkeeper for the 1924 United States team, Alphonse Lacroix, standing proud in a rickety old goal:
3.
The first-ever Olympic Village was in Paris for the 1924 games. As you can see, it looked a bit… ramshackle:
4.
Here’s a better shot of the Paris Olympic village, complete with a whole bunch of athletes just relaxing:
5.
The 1912 Olympics, held in Sweden, were the first to allow women to compete in swimming events. Here are some of the British swimmers looking extremely tough:
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And this is Greta Johansson, the first woman to ever win an Olympic gold medal in diving at the 1912 games:
7.
And here are the top two finishers in the first-ever women’s 100 m freestyle event, Mina Wylie and Fanny Durack:
8.
Speaking of swimming, here’s the United States swimming team looking absolutely thrilled to be at the 1924 Paris games:
9.
Here’s Barbara Ann Scott, often called the greatest figure skater in Canadian history, being photographed by what looks like a million members of the press:
10.
And here’s figure skater Dick Button doing Dick Button things, as only he could. He would go on to win the 1948 championship:
11.
Among the more unusual events at the 1908 Olympics was the sport of Bicycle Polo. Here are the German and Irish teams facing off in a match for the ages:
12.
Here’s the absolutely electric start of the 1908 marathon, won by American Johnny Hayes with a time of 2:55:
13.
Here’s the American water polo team at the 1924 Paris games looking like they just went to war:
14.
This is a scene from the first-ever modern 100-meter dash, held at the 1896 Athens Olympic Games. It was won by American Thomas Burke with a time of 12 seconds:
15.
The 1920 games in Belgium were the final olympics to have tug of war as a sport. here’s the united states tug of war team locked in an epic battle with great britain’s team in the final.
16.
Here’s the United States four-man bobsled team looking ready as ever at the 1932 Lake Placid Games on their way to winning a gold medal:
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And here’s that same bobsled team in action, whipping around a bend in front of some very rickety-looking stands:
18.
Here’s the Norwegian Birger Ruud flying through the air at the 1932 Lake Placid Games en route to a gold medal, surrounded by a crowd in very rickety-looking stands:
19.
Some wrestling events at the 1960 Olympics held in Rome were held at the ancient Basilica of Maxentius and Constantine:
20.
Here’s the 1908 bronze medal-winning archery athlete Mrs. A Hill-Lowe looking extremely intimidating:
21.
And here’s another picture of an early women’s archery competition, also from 1908:
22.
Here’s a picture of Team USA looking ever-so not-intimidating at the 1900 Paris Olympics:
23.
This is Bill Russel of the United States absolutely destroying the Japanese team during the 1956 Australia games. The United States won this game by 50:
24.
This is the very first opening ceremony of the very first modern Olympics, held in Athens, Greece, in 1896:
25.
36 years later, the games would be held in Los Angeles for the first time. This is what the opening ceremonies of the 10th Olympiad looked like:
26.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t feature at least ONE curling picture in this article. Here’s the British team looking positively OVERPOWERED at the 1924 Chamonix games:
27.
Here’s the absolutely enormous crowd of onlookers watching the ski jump at the 1952 Winter Olympics in Oslo, Norway:
28.
This is Helen Wills and Hazel Wightman, two of tennis players representing the United States at the 1924 Paris games:
29.
Here’s a Danish gymnast at the 1908 games in London perfectly dismounting the pommel horse:
30.
There were actually no medals awarded to women gymnasts at the 1908 Olympics, with the Olympic Committee opting for demonstrations instead. Here’s another woman demonstrating some balancing on the, well, balance beam:
31.
Here’s French champion weightlifter Roger Francois looking appropriately jacked sometime in the early 1900s:
32.
Here are the gold medal–winning champions of Germany’s two-man bobsled team sharing a victorious moment at the 1952 Oslo Games:
33.
This is the Italian team from the first-ever Paralympics, held in Rome in 1960. For the first Games, only athletes with spinal injuries were allowed to compete:
34.
This is DeHart Hubbard, the first Black American to win a gold medal in an Olympic event, taking first place in the long jump at the Paris Games in 1924:
35.
Here’s another USA-Canada hockey game, this time from the 1936 Olympics held in Germany:
36.
This is the 100 meter swimming pool built specifically for the 1916 games held in Berlin:
37.
Here’s bronze medal winning British figure skater Jeannette Altwegg at the 1948 Switzerland games jumping high up into the air:
38.
Back to Olympic Villages, here’s a worker carefully sorting through signs before they’re put up throughout the village:
39.
And here are some athletes from India playing a game at the 1932 Olympic village in Los Angeles:
40.
This is the United States’ Eileen Riggin, a THIRTEEN year-old girl who competed on the diving team in the 1920 Belgium games:
41.
This is a look at the opening ceremony of the 1920 Belgium Summer Olympics. Perhaps you, like I, thought for one brief moment I thought Mr. Canada was barefoot:
42.
Here are the 1928 gold medal winners in couples figure skating, Andree Joly and Pierre Brunet of France, no doubt pulling off an impressive manuever:
43.
Pictured here is a water polo matchup between Brazil and Germany from the 1932 Los Angeles games:
44.
This is Russian speed skater Yevgeny Grishin, winner of the 500 m speedskating race at the 1956 Cortina Games in Italy, taking a sharp turn:
45.
Here’s another epic tug of war match between Belgium and the Netherlands:
46.
This is the 1948 discus champion Micheline Ostermeyer absolutely winging that discus:
47.
Snow, or lack thereof, was a problem at the 1964 Games held in Austria. As a result, soldiers were put to work carrying literal buckets of it to the events:
48.
This is German runner Lina Radke winning the gold medal in the women’s 800-meter race at the 1928 Netherlands Games:
49.
This is Sonja Henie, a Norwegian figure skater who not only won the gold medal in ladies’ singles at three Olympics in a row but also went on to become a Hollywood star after her Olympic career:
50.
Finally, here’s a procession through the town of Cortina en route to the opening ceremony for the 1956 Games:
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