St Louis 1904: the Olympic Games cross the Atlantic
The Games of the III Olympiad were originally awarded to Chicago in 1901 but were moved to St Louis two years later in controversial circumstances and following much debate.
The catalyst for the change came with the postponement of the St Louis World’s Fair to 1904, the event having originally been scheduled to take place a year earlier to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the USA’s purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France. In recognition of the fact that having two major international events taking place in the same year, in cities 475 kilometres apart, was far from ideal, it was ultimately decided – by then-US President Theodore Roosevelt – that St Louis should stage the Games in conjunction with the Fair, billed as the Louisiana Purchase Exposition.
The decision did not please everyone, least of all Chicago. The fact that it was the second Games in a row, after Paris 1900, to be staged around a World’s Fair also led to criticism from Baron Pierre de Coubertin, who later argued that holding two such events together meant that Olympic sporting competitions were merely a sideshow and failed to garner the full attention they deserved. The Olympic Games St Louis 1904 marked the last time this would happen, though London 1908 coincided with the Franco-British Exhibition – a celebration of the industrial and cultural achievements of France and Britain – and Antwerp 1920 with “Olympic-related festivities” that included an air show. Following St Louis 1904, the IOC also announced that it would decide which events would be given the official Olympic tag.
As was the case at Paris 1900, the Games of the III Olympiad were spread out over a period of five months, though the track and field competitions were held between 31 August and 3 September and the weightlifting, tennis, fencing, swimming and diving events over a two-week period from 29 August to 10 September. The official duration of the Olympic Games is now 16 days.
Only 12 countries were represented at St Louis 1904, with the USA accounting for 523 of the 651 athletes who took part. More than half of the events were contested entirely by home competitors, who won 238 medals in all, the largest ever haul by one nation at a single Olympic Games edition, with Germany a distant second in the medal table, with 13.
The cost and time involved in travelling to St Louis deterred many athletes from making the trip, at a time when they often had to pay their own way to compete and when there were no such things as National Olympic Committees to support them. Even so, the number of athletes comfortably eclipsed the 241 who had competed at Athens 1896, though it was barely half the Paris 1900 figure of 1,226.
No official report of the Games was published by the organisers, though two documents later came to be accepted as substitutes: “Spalding’s Official Athletic Almanac” for 1905, compiled by James E. Sullivan, the head of the Department of Physical Culture of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and the director of the 1904 Games, and “The Olympic Games 1904”, by Charles Lucas.