1924 Chamonix: Olympic Winter Games Quiz

Answer: France

Chamonix is in the Haute-Savoie region of France, in the Alps mountain range. Specifically, "International Winter Sports Week" was held at Mont Blanc in Chamonix. Today, the Stade Olympique de Chamonix is an equestrian stadium.

France is very much involved in the history of the modern Olympic Games, as Pierre de Coubertin was a co-founder of the International Olympic Committee and the revival of the Games, in 1894-95. France was originally considered as a venue for the first ever modern Games, in 1896, but Athens was ultimately chosen. They were next held in Paris, in 1900, as part of the World's Fair.

Other French venues for the Winter Games include Grenoble (1968) and Albertville (1992).

Answer: False

Some traditionally-winter sports had previously been played as part of the Summer Olympics. Figure skating was an event in London (1908) and Antwerp (1920), and ice hockey was also played in Antwerp. However, most winter sports were unplayable at the Summer Games, due to both the season and the host countries' geography.

At the 1921 International Olympic Committee convention, there was a demand for equal opportunity for winter sport enthusiasts, and they thus decided to create the "International Sports Week" for 1924.

It was in 1925 that they decided to have a permanent Winter Olympics every four years, and declared the 1924 competition to be the first of those Olympics.

Answer: Australia

The 16 competitors were France, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Great Britain, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Norway, Poland, Switzerland, Sweden, United States and Yugoslavia. Norway and Finland dominated the Games, with Norway winning 17 medals total (four gold) and Finland winning 11 total (also with four gold).

The next highest medal total was four, with Great Britain and the United States each winning four (and one gold medal each).

Answer: Sonja Henie

11-year old Sonja Henie (of Norway) competed in ladies' single figure skating in 1924, and came in dead last. She went on to win gold in the next three Winter Olympics in 1928 (St. Moritz), 1932 (Lake Placid), and 1936 (Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria).

Henie was also a 10-time World Champion and a six-time European Champion. She gave up her amateur status in 1936, and skated professionally for awhile, while also pursuing her childhood dream of being a Hollywood actress.

Answer: Biathlon

Military patrol combines cross-country skiing with mountaineering and shooting, in a team of four (traditionally a military unit with an officer, an NCO, and two privates). Military patrol is still competed in today in other competitions, such as the International Military Sports Council Skiing Championship and the Patrouille des Glaciers. The rules for military patrol are now different than the traditional competition, however, in that the competitors do not wear heavy backpacks, the team leader carries no weapon, and the other team members' rifles are considerably smaller.

The 1924 Games was the only time that military patrol was part of the official Winter Olympics programme. It was also played at three other Winter Games as a demonstration-only event. In 1924, the Swiss team of Adolf Aufdenblatten, Alphonse Julen, Antoine Julen and Denis Vaucher won gold. Biathlon was added to the Winter Olympics program in 1960.

Answer: Yes

Canada dominated in ice hockey in the early years of the Winter Olympics, winning gold in six out of the first seven Games. Canada had also won the Ice Hockey competition held in the 1920 Summer Games. The team that competed at Chamonix in 1924 was the Toronto Granites.

They won the Group A qualifying round with a total score of 113-0, and gave up a total of only three goals in the medal round - one to the US (silver medal winner) and two to Great Britain (bronze medal winner).

Answer: Alpinisme

Alpinisme, or 'haute montagne', is essentially a European term for mountaineering. Charles Granville Bruce was the leader of a team who had tried to climb Mount Everest in 1922. IOC co-founder Pierre de Coubertin presented the prize to Bruce.

Answer: 1974

50 years after the fact, a mistake was uncovered in the scoring of the ski jumping event. Specifically, the error had been in calculating the total score of Thorleif Haug (of Norway) who had been awarded the bronze medal for the event. When corrected, Haug was found to actually have been in fourth place, and a bronze medal was given to the real third place finisher, Anders Haugen (originally of Norway, but competed for the US), in 1974.

Answer: Curling

1924 was the first time that curling was contested in the Olympics. However, for many years, many people believed that the 1924 competition had been a demonstration event and not an actual medal event, though medals were given out at the time. Shortly before the start of the 2006 (Torino) Games, the International Olympic Committee came to a consensus and confirmed that curling had been part of the official program in 1924, and the medals won at those Games counted toward the official medal count.

The decision came after a Glasgow newspaper started the investigation into the matter, on behalf of the family of the Great Britain team that had won first place in curling in 1924.

Answer: Yes

The Games of the VIII Olympiad were held in Paris in 1924. From 1924 to 1992, the Winter and Summer Olympics were always held in the same year. In 1992, the decision was made to space them two years apart to allow more time for planning the two events separately. Thus, Winter Olympics were held in both 1992 (Albertville) and in 1994 (Lillehammer), and then every four years from that point forward.

In addition, the Summer and Winter Olympics were always held in the same country in the same year, up until 1936 when both were held in Germany, though the 1940 Games (cancelled due to WWII) would both have been held in Japan.

When the Olympics resumed post-war in 1948, the Summer Games were held in London and the Winter Games in St. Moritz.