APRIL 6th - Resurrecting the Olympic Games Instead of The Games



On this day in 1896, the 1st Modern Olympic Games opened in Athens, Greece, and James Connolly of the United States became the first Olympic champion of modern times when he won the triple jump and received a silver medal and an olive branch. Yes he won and got silver. Gold Medals weren’t given in the first games. Pretty cool that the first Olympic champion was American. If you’re American. If you’re Russian or British or Greek or German or anything else really, it might chap you a bit. But let’s also take a moment to applaud the choice of bringing the Olympic games back. Promoting competitive spirit and international camaraderie are check pluses in my book. Especially when you consider that the two major ancient civilizations are the Greeks and the Romans. They both had particular ideas when it came to sport and entertainment. The Greeks were all like let’s compete in feats of strength and skill. Races, boxing, wrestling. But the Romans? They were like let us take our slaves and criminals and conquered people and have them fight to the death in front of crowds for our enjoyment. Or fight animals to the death. And while I’m all for high drama, I think the powers-that-be made the right call. I enjoy the stories of Spartacus and Maximus as much as the next guy, but the Modern Olympic games help to bring people together not satiate baser desires. Plus, I’m not sure how Michael Phelps would have fared as a gladiator, and despite his problems, I like Michael Phelps.

This day has been Marked.

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