A Very British Olympics (Material Offered to National Press)

This is the second of my Olympic articles series. It was probably the most enjoyable to research from a trivia point of view. This was offered to the Mail and the Express. Neither seemed arsed, and about a year later some chancer published a full book about the '48 Games and nixed any chance of me being the world authority on it.

A VERY BRITISH OLYMPICS

By Christopher Stanley

   Almost three years to the day that the United States changed the face of the world by destroying the city of Hiroshima in an atomic firestorm, Britain had hardly changed. In 1948, the population found themselves not only under rationing, but conditions were arguably harsher than they had been at any other time since D-Day. It was hardly the best time to be hosting the Olympic Games, the biggest sports event on the planet.

   Yet against all odds, the first post-war Olympics, and the second held in London, would be remembered as the last truly amateur Games, the embodiment of the sporting spirit that has long since ceased to exist whenever the Olympics rolls into town. History remembers London 1948 as ‘the austerity Games,’ but that gives a false impression; they had a lot more to offer than that.

   Britain got its second Games by default; the 1940 Games had been handed to Tokyo, Japan, and London was supposed to take up the mantle of hosts in 1944. But in 1939, the trifling matter of a world war meant a forced suspension of 12 years. Tokyo wouldn’t see its Games until 1964. An IOC postal vote awarded the Games to London. Although there were protests that most of Europe was too poor and damaged to be concerned with an Olympics, organisers were confident that they had enough resources to cope.

   Miraculously, Wembley Stadium had survived World War Two unscathed, and the structure remained sound until its demolition until 2001. It was here rather than White City Stadium that the Olympics would be based; the latter had seen the 1908 Olympics but would find itself increasingly marginalised as the century wore on. The preparations for the forthcoming Games were in retrospect rather sweet – rowing events were to take place in the leisurely surroundings of Henley, and the sailing events at Torbay in Devon. No new facilities were built – Britain couldn’t afford them – so male athletes were to be housed in an army camp, women in college dormitories.

   But these tales of hardship and making-do belied the enormous social change that was the backdrop to the 1948 Olympics. In 1947, the worst winter in living memory devastated large swathes of crops and bought the country to its knees. The food shortage got so bad that bread and potatoes were rationed, something that not even Hitler managed to accomplish.

   The Labour party elected at the end of the war had begun to radically overhaul the country. The Beveridge report led to the creation of welfare state, and in 1948 the National Health Service was instituted. For the first time Britons would get state help from cradle-to-grave. But the mood was not so positive elsewhere; Pathe newsreels of the time show slum housing, cities half-demolished, and shortages of food, accommodation and money. For many people, the misery of war had not dissipated.

   1948 was also the year the British Empire came home to roost, as India and Pakistan gained independence and the first ship from the West Indies, the famous Empire Windrush, docked in Southampton. The repercussions of these events would resonate for decades, but for the time being Britain was still sure of her place in the world. The Olympics would show what made the country so great. All competing countries were required to bring their own food, though.

   With a temporary running track laid at Wembley Stadium, the 1948 Games began on 29^th July, with former Cambridge student John Mark carrying the flame that had been lit only twelve days earlier in Greece. The flame had to travel just over 3000km from Olympia to London; contrast this with the 51,000km it had to travel to Sydney in 2000.

   But the 1948 Olympics were about the sport rather than the razzmatazz, and the Austerity Games didn’t disappoint. In all, 59 countries managed to make the journey to the capital, including fourteen appearing for the first time, such as Jamaica, Iran, Iraq and Pakistan. There were notable absences; after pressure from IOC members Germany and Japan were barred from competing, and the Soviet Union declined to send any athletes. When they finally changed their stance in the 1950’s, the Soviets would change the face of Olympic sport forever.

   There were no fierce rivalries at the 1948 Games, no bust-ups or tiffs blown out of proportion by the media. Part of this was due to the strictly amateur status of the athletes on show, but also due to the fact that there was no media apart from the BBC covering the event. The corporation paid only 1,000 guineas (£1,050) for the rights to the Games, and reported on them in the most impartial way possible. Remarkably, it would not be until Rome’s Olympics in 1960 that the Games became a mass media event, and four years after that saw the first satellite broadcast of the Games. Just as Mexico ’70 brought the World Cup into the technological age, Tokyo ’64 did so for the Olympics.

   But in 1948 athletes were happy for any publicity, and as they trained in Hyde Park under the occasional stares from the public or the random appearances by the cameras, the pressure was off, and the Games bought some much-needed colour to Britain.

   The undoubted star of the Games was Dutch athlete Fanny Blankers-Koen, nicknamed ‘The Flying Housewife’ by the press. Blankers-Koen had competed at the Berlin Olympics of 1936, but in the 12 year hiatus she had married her coach and given birth twice. During the war she had competed sporadically, setting world records in six events, but she was stung into action when some newspapers contended that at thirty, she was too old to compete at the top.

   Blankers-Koen came to London to compete in six events, but rules at the time barred her from competing in more than four. She reasoned that as she already held records in High jump and long jump, she should concentrate on the track, and she exceeded all expectations by winning all of her events. There was drama in all of them.

   The 100m Final was competed in heavy rain, but the Dutch athlete held on to win her country’s first Olympic athletic gold medal. The 80m Hurdles saw a photo finish between her and Britain’s Maureen Gardner; Blankers-Koen thought she had lost when the British anthem was played in the stadium, but it was to honour the entrance of the Royal Family. The day after, Blankers-Koen overcame a bout of severe homesickness to capture the 200m title, and the final race, the 4x 100metres, was almost dashed when she almost missed the race. Typically for the spirit of the Games, Blankers-Koen was not injured; she was out buying a raincoat and lost track of the time.

   There were other notable athletes in London that year. Duncan White from Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) became his country’s first Olympic medallist, gaining a silver in the 400m Hurdles. It would be Sri Lanka’s only medal until 2000, and still stands as their finest achievement at the Olympics. India took home the gold medal in field hockey, pushing Britain into third. 

   A nice piece of trivia for any film buffs would be the silver medal gained by Harold Sakata of the USA in the weightlifting. A Japanese-American from Hawaii, the short, squat athlete would find fame, or infamy as Oddjob, the hat-throwing henchman in the Bond film Goldfinger.

   Despite the shoestring budgets and comical amateurism that pervaded London’s last Olympics, everybody agreed it was a complete success. The only black mark against Britain’s name was the performance of its athletes. Despite finishing twelfth in the overall medal table, it belied the fact that Britain only managed to win three gold medals at its home Olympics.

   These medals, made predictable by the upper-class and academic nature of British sport at the time, were made away from Wembley Stadium and the Empire Pool in the rowing and sailing events. In a fine portent of things to come, Laurie and Wilson took gold in the coxless pairs, much like Steve Redgrave would half a century later. But it’s worth mentioning that Laurie’s son Hugh would compete in the Boat Race in his youth, before finding fame with comedy partner Stephen Fry.

   The most notable British medal did come in Wembley Stadium, however, and it belonged to speed-walker Terrence ‘Tebbs’ Lloyd-Johnson. Although he took only bronze in the 50km Walk, Tebbs was 48 years old when he did so, making him officially the oldest person to ever win an Olympic medal.

   By the time the Olympics returns to Britain, it will understandably find a very different place. 2012 will see an event awash with cash, crammed with different nations, full of scandal, substances and sour grapes. Whether it will be a success is anyone’s guess.

   But if it retains any of the spirit of the last Games to be held in Britain, with its housewives, newsreel cameras and part-time Bond henchmen, then it will be something we can all be proud of. It might not have made a poor country rich, or rebuilt a shattered capital, but the 1948 Olympics bought some pride to a nation changing under everyone’s nose. 

   And for the record, 1948 will influence 2012. Only those who remember that starting blocks were first used at London’s last Olympics will realise it, though.