1896 Athens No official poster was made for

1896 Athens No official poster was made for the 1896 Olympic Games, but the cover page of the official report is often used to refer to the Games of the I Olympiad.

1900 - Paris During the 1900 Universal Exhibition, certain events of international physical exercise and sports competitions were recognized as Olympic.

The poster shows a view of the host city, enhanced by the use of a "fish's eye" effect. It is the reproduction of the cover of the program of the Games.

The 1908 Olympics were originally awarded to Rome, but were reassigned to London.

The nudity of the athletes was a reference to the Games of Antiquity, although it was judged as too "daring" by some managers and not distributed in some countries.

The 1916 Olympics were scheduled to be held in Berlin, but were canceled because of what came to be known as World War I. The 1920 Games were awarded to Antwerp to honor the suffering that had been inflicted on the Belgian people during the war.

At the 1924 Paris Games, the Olympic motto, "Citius, Altius, Fortius", (Swifter, Higher, Stronger) was introduced.

At the Opening Ceremony, the team from Greece led the Parade of Nations and the host Dutch team marched in last. Greece first, hosts last would become a permanent part of the Olympic protocol.

For the first time, the male athletes were housed in a single Olympic Village. (The women stayed in a luxury hotel).

The 1936 Olympics, held in Berlin, are best remembered for Adolf Hitler’s failed attempt to use them to prove his theories of Aryan racial superiority. As it turned out, the most popular hero of the Games, was the African-American sprinter and long jumper Jesse Owens, who won four gold medals.

The 1948 London Games were the first to be shown on home television, although very few people in Great Britain actually owned sets.

The most impressive achievement in Helsinki belongs to Emil Zatopek of Czechoslovakia, who became the only person in Olympic history to win the 5, 000, 10, 000 and marathon at the same Olympics.

Melbourne won the right to host the 1956 Olympics by one vote over Buenos Aires. Australian quarantine laws were too severe to allow the entry of foreign horses, so the equestrian events were held separately in Stockholm in June.

Fifty-four years after Italy had to give up hosting the Olympics, Rome finally got its chance.

The final torchbearer Yoshinori Sakai was born in Hiroshima the day that the city was destroyed by an atomic bomb.

The 1968 Games also saw the first drug disqualification, as a Swedish entrant in the modern pentathlon, Hans. Gunnar Liljenwall, tested positive…for excessive alcohol.

The 1972 Games were the first to have a named mascot: Waldi, the dachshund.

The 1972 Munich Games were supposed to celebrate peace and, for the first ten days, all did indeed go well. But in the early morning of 5 September, eight Palestinian terrorists broke into the Olympic Village, killed two members of the Israeli team and took nine more hostage. In an ensuing battle, all nine Israeli hostages were killed. The Olympics were suspended and a memorial service was held in the main stadium.

In Memoriam Weightlifters David Berger, 26, Joseph Romano, 32, Zeev Friedman, 28; weightlifting instructor Yacob Springer, 51; wrestling coach Moshe Weinberg , 33 wrestlers Eliezer Halfin, 28, Mark Slavin, 18; wrestling referee Yosef Gutfreund, 41; fencing coach Andre Spitzer, 45; athletics coach Amitzur Shapira, 32, marksmanship coach Kehat Schorr, 53,

Fourteen-year-old gymnast Nadia Comaneci of Romania caused a sensation when, for her performance on the uneven bars, she was awarded the first-ever perfect score of 10. 0

U. S. -led boycott reduced the number of participating nations to 80, the lowest number since 1956.

Rhythmic gymnastics and synchronized swimming also made their first appearance, as did the women’s cycling road race.

The drug disqualification of sprinter Ben Johnson was the biggest story of the 1988 Olympics Steffi Graf concluded her Grand Slam tennis season by winning Olympic gold.

Men's basketball was open to all professionals, and the US sent a "Dream Team" that included Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan and Larry Bird.

For the first time in Olympic history, all 197 recognized National Olympic Committees were represented at the Games.

The Sydney 2000 Games were the largest yet, with 10, 651 athletes competing in 300 events.

In 2004 the Olympic Games returned to Greece, the home of both the ancient Olympics and the first modern Olympics.

Credit: IOC / Olympic Museum Collections Noemi, August 08