Winter Olympics

Winter Olympics

1924

In 1921, the International Olympic Committee set plans to have a Winter Sports Week to take place in 1924 in Chamonix, France. This event was a great success, attracting 10,004 paying spectators, and was named the First Olympic Winter Games.  There were 12 events all together involving a total of six sports during the first winter Olympic. The first gold medal that was awarded in the Olympic Winter games was won by Charles Jewtraw of the United States in the 500-meter speed skate. The official medal ceremony was not held until 5 February, and by that time some athletes competing had already gone home so their medals were handed to other athletes on their team. During the parade of the opening ceremony, many athletes marched with their equipment on their shoulder such as skis, hockey sticks and more. According to the rules at the time, the athletes had to march in sportswear, and the skis or hockey sticks were part of their equipment to support their sport in the parade.

 In the first cross country skiing event, the 50km race, had a wining time of 3 hours and 44 minuets by Norway’s Thorleif Haug. The last place finishing time was two hours and 30 minuets after. Hockey and ice-skating were held in both the summer and winter Olympic games. This put a figure skater named Gillis Grafstrom to become the first one ever to successfully defend his Summer Olympics title at the Winter Olympics. Finding themselves in the same situation as Gillis Grafstrom, the Canadian ice-hockey team is the last ever to successfully defend its Summer Olympics title at the Winter Olympics. Canada would dominate ice hockey in early Olympic competition, winning six of the first seven gold medals.

http://www.olympic.org/chamonix-1924-winter-olympics ( there is cool footage of the first winter olympics on this website)
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/first-winter-olympics