Aberdeen athlete coached Jesse Owens and US to glory at 1936 Olympics
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The 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp were hosted following a pandemic and it was anything but easy
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8 July 2021 9:46am
Since the global pandemic began, debate has raged over whether Tokyo should go ahead with the Olympic Games, now set to open on 23 July.
The same heated debates were heard the last time an Olympic Games were staged following a global pandemic – the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) strongly believed the Olympics would help bring the world back together – not just after the devastating Spanish Flu pandemic that killed at least 50 million people, but also the tumult of the first world war.
Only six months after the armistice that ended the conflict – and in the midst of the pandemic – Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympics and president of the IOC, called an extraordinary IOC session to award the 1920 Olympics to Antwerp in recognition of Belgium’s suffering.