Return to the Melting Pot: An Old American Olympic Story

Abstract

With the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks looming in the background, the US turned the 2002 winter Olympics in Salt Lake City into a nationalistic pageant. One of the surprises of American celebrations of ‘imagined community’ at the Salt Lake games was that an old and venerable theme in American Olympic interpretations re-emerged at the ‘white’ winter carnival in Utah. Notable performances by Mexican-American, Cuban-American, African-American, Chinese-American, Japanese-American, and other ‘hyphenated-American’ athletes rekindled the US tradition of claiming that a so-called ‘melting pot’ of immigrants produced Olympic victories and made the US a superpower. ‘Melting pot’ discourses of American Olympic prowess had been common in the early twentieth century but diminished thereafter. They had been noticeably absent before 2002 in US interpretations of winter games. The revival of this old American Olympic tradition illuminates the continuities and the breaks between twenty-first century US patriotism and earlier versions of US nationalism.

Acknowledgement

An earlier version of this essay appeared in Olympika: The International Journal of Olympic Studies 12 (2003): 1–22.

Notes

[1] Patrick O'Driscoll, ‘“Patriotic” Could Become Name of These Games’, USA Today, 22 Jan. 2002.

[2] Chris Maume, ‘Whining and Snivelling Arrogance As US Flies Flag’, The Independent, 23 Feb. 2002.

[3] Whitney, ‘The View-Point: Olympic Games American Committee Report’, 248.

[4] Gallico, Farewell to Sport, 331–3.

[5] Richard Hoffer, ‘Fellowship of the Rings’, Sports Illustrated, 18 Feb. 2002, 38–41; S.L. Price, ‘Speed Thrills’, Sports Illustrated. 25 Feb. 2002, 46–51; E.M. Swift, ‘Thorny Issue’, Sports Illustrated. 25 Feb. 2002, 58–63; George Vecsey, ‘Sports of the Times’, New York Times, 23 Feb. 2002; Vahe Gregorian, ‘Tears Keep Flowing in Crying Games’, St Louis Post-Dispatch, 23 Feb. 2002; Bernie Lincicome, ‘Whining Newest Olympic Contest’, Rocky Mountain News, 23 Feb. 2002; Gwen Knapp, ‘Despite Controversy, Games Take the Gold’, San Francisco Chronicle, 24 Feb. 2002; Michael Wilbon, ‘Hoarse Over a “Horse Race”’, Washington Post, 24 Feb. 24; Amy Shipley, ‘Contended, Contentious; Salt Lake Games Had Controversy From the Start’, Washington Post, 25 Feb. 2002; Jim Klobuchar, ‘Games Displayed the Good, Bad, and Glorious’, Christian Science Monitor, 25 Feb. 2002.

[6] Anderson, Imagined Communities.

[7] Vahe Gregorian, ‘US Team Glides Along on Medal Spree; New Sports, Home Court Contribute’, St Louis Post-Dispatch, 24 Feb. 2002.

[8] John Powers, ‘Let Us Count the Wins; US Medal Tally Was Over the Top’, Boston Globe, 25 Feb. 2002.

[9] Liz Clarke, ‘US Investment In Olympians Is Paying Off’, Washington Post, 24 Feb. 2002.

[10] Annette John-Hall, ‘Minorities Break the Ice at Winter Olympics’, Philadelphia Inquirer, 24 Feb. 2002.

[11] Steve Hummer, ‘Some Gold to Spare; US Piles Up Medals and Memories’, Atlanta Constitution, 25 Feb. 2002.

[12] Mark Kizla, ‘America Give Games Their Hue’, Denver Post, 21 Feb. 2002.

[13] Kizla, ‘America Give Games Their Hue’; Gregorian, ‘US Team Glides Along on Medal Spree’.

[14] Liz Robbins, ‘Home-Field Advantage; US Plan Pays Off in Avalanche of Medals’, New York Times, 25 Feb. 2002.

[15] Pam Lambert, ‘Fellowship of the Rings: From Unexpected Paths, These Olympic Stars Formed a Bond of Gold’, People, 11 March 2002, 62.

[16] S.L. Price, ‘Gold Rush’, Sports Illustrated, 4 March 2002, 32.

[17] Lambert, ‘Fellowship of the Rings’, 62.

[18] Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism Since 1780, 143.

[19] Hobsbawm argues that ‘What has made sport so uniquely effective a medium for inculcating national feelings, at all events for males, is the ease with which even the least political or public individuals can identify with the nation as symbolized by young persons excelling at what practically every man wants, or at one time in life has wanted, to be good at. … The individual, even the one who only cheers becomes a symbol of his nation himself’: Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, 143.

[20] Anderson, Imagined Communities; Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, 141–3.

[21] Higham, Strangers in the Land; Daniels, Not Like Us; Bodnar, The Transplanted; Handlin, The Uprooted; Takaki, A Different Mirror.

[22] Jacobsen, Whiteness of a Different Color; Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity; Sollors, The Invention of Ethnicity.

[23] Rieff, Los Angeles.

[24] Rodriguez, Brown; Borjas, Heaven's Door.

[25] Alba and Nee, Remaking the American Mainstream; Daniels, Coming to America; Dinnerstein et al., Natives and Strangers; Low, Immigrant Acts; Millman, The Other Americans; Reimers, Still the Golden Door; Takaki, Strangers from a Different Shore.

[26] Allen St John, ‘The Unbearable Whiteness of Skiing’, Skiing 50 (Sept. 1997), 108.

[27] For a history of the origins of the tradition of using the Olympics as a measuring stick for American culture see Dyreson, Making the American Team.

[28]‘The Olympic Games’, Outlook 89 (25 July 1908), 636.

[29]‘Race Questions at the Olympics’. The Independent 73 (25 July 1912), 214.

[30] Davis Edwards, ‘Col. Thompson Praises America's Olympic Athletes’, New York Times, 25 Aug. 1912.

[31] For a history of these processes see Dyreson, Making the American Team and Pope, Patriotic Games.

[32] James B. Connolly, ‘The Shepherd's Bush Greeks’, Collier's 41 (5 Sept. 1908), 13.

[33] Finley Peter Dunne, ‘“Mr Dooley” on the Olympic Games’, American Magazine 66 (Oct. 1908), 615.

[34] Dyreson, Making the American Team, 110–26.

[35]‘Race Questions at the Olympics’, 214–15. The Italian from Paterson, New Jersey, who killed a king was Gaetano Bresci (1869–1901). Bresci was an Italian anarchist and silk weaver who immigrated to the United States in December 1897 and joined the Italian-American anarchist conclave in Paterson. Bresci belonged to the ‘direct action’ wing of the anarchist movement. Loyal to his philosophy, he returned to Italy in 1900 and on 29 July that year he shot King Humbert I to death at Monza, near Milan. Bresci committed suicide in 1901 after being sentenced to life in prison for his crime. ‘The struggle between reactionaries and liberals ended grievously with the assassination, on 29 July at Monza, of the noble and chivalrous King Humbert by an anarchist recently arrived from America,’ lamented Benedetto Croce in identifying the assassin as American in origin. Croce, A History of Italy, 212. For information on Bresci see Seton-Watson, Italy from Liberalism to Fascism, 1870–1925, 167; and Coppa, ed., Dictionary of Modern Italian History, 52–3. The Italian from Paterson who ‘won’ a race actually finished third. Gaston Strobino, an Italian-American distance runner from the South Paterson Athletic Club won the bronze medal in the Marathon – the highest American finish – at the Stockholm Olympics in 1912. Two South Africans, K.K. MacArthur and C.W. Gitsham, beat Strobino's time of two hours, 38 minutes and 42.2 seconds: Sullivan, The Olympic Games: Stockholm, 1912, 73, 221.

[36] Mann, The One and the Many, 75–6.

[37] Ibid., 178.

[38] Dyreson, ‘Selling American Civilization’; Dyreson, ‘Scripting the American Olympic Story-Telling Formula’.

[39]‘Why America Wins Olympics’, Literary Digest 77 (26 July 1924), 10.

[40] Baker, Jesse Owens.

[41] John Kieran, ‘On Your Mark for the Olympic Games!’, New York Times Magazine, 26 July 1936.

[42] Frooks, The Olympic Torch, 15–23.

[43] Ibid.

[44] Ibid.

[45] Helen Madison was Frooks's thinly disguised version of Helene Madison, the American swimming star from the 1932 Olympic games in Los Angeles.

[46] Frooks, The Olympic Torch, 95–6.

[47] Gustavus T. Kirby, ‘Report of the Chef de Mission’, in AOC, Report of the United States Olympic Committee, 241–8.

[48] Arthur Daley, ‘Sports of The Times’, New York Times, 21 Aug. 1960.

[49] Wiggins, ‘The Year of Awakening’; Spivey, ‘Black Consciousness and Olympic Protest Movements’.

[50] Wiggins, ‘“The Future of College Athletics Is At Stake”’.

[51] Robert Lindsey, ‘Los Angeles: The Olympics May Help Show that the City has Finally Come of Age’, New York Times Sunday Magazine, 22 July 1984.

[52]‘Reagan Salutes Athletes’, Tucson Citizen, 14 Aug. 1984.

[53]‘Transcript of Reagan's Speech Accepting GOP Nomination’, New York Times, 24 Aug. 1984.

[54]‘Born in the USA’, New York Times, 1 March 1992.

[55] Ross Atkin, ‘US Draws from “Melting Pot” of Talent with 36 or More Athletes Born Overseas’, Christian Science Monitor, 2 Aug. 1996.

[56] Alba and Nee, Remaking the American Mainstream; Daniels, Coming to America.

[57] John Romano, ‘Extreme Gains’, St Petersburg Times, 26 Feb. 2002.

[58] For the linkage between Steinbrenner's plan, diversity and the inclusion of ‘American-friendly’ new sports that feature risk-taking, see Vicki Michaelis, ‘USA Basks in the Luster of Its Heavy Medal Push; Record Haul Highlights Team's Depth, Diversity’, USA Today, 25 Feb. 2002; Clarke, ‘US Investment In Olympians Is Paying Off’; Powers, ‘Let Us Count the Wins’; Robbins, ‘Olympics: Home-Field Advantage’; Bill Ward, ‘Smashing Success’, Tampa Tribune, 25 Feb. 2002; Lori Shontz, ‘Americans Had a Fruitful Games’, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 25 Feb. 2002.

[59] Dyreson, Making the American Team.

[60] Randy Harvey, ‘The Gold, the Cads and the Ugly’, Los Angeles Times, 25 Feb. 2002. ‘That non-white athletes living in warm areas in the deep South and cities in Florida, Washington, and California are pushing America to greater athletic heights in these Games is not a coincidence’, asserts Tashta Robertson, of the USOC's new strategy: Robertson, ‘Adding Diversity Changes Face of Winter Olympics’, Boston Globe, 24 Feb. 2002.

[61] Robertson, ‘Adding Diversity Changes Face’.

[62]‘All-American Ideals’, Baltimore Sun, 24 Feb. 2002.

[63] Mike Jones, ‘Melting Pot Medals; It Was An All-American Winter Olympics’, Tulsa World, 3 March 2002.

[64] Diane Pucin, ‘Dreams Create New Heroes’, Los Angeles Times, 23 Feb. 2002.

[65] Peter Rowe, ‘A Melting Pot of Gold, Silver and Bronze’, San Diego Union Tribune, 26 Feb. 2002.

[66]‘An Ethiopian Takes Notes’, New York Times, 9 July 1924. The essay was penned by a fictional correspondent for the Addis Ababa Evening News. The writer began the piece by asserting that ‘A single afternoon spent in the amphitheatre at Colombes is enough to furnish the intelligent observer with a complete picture of the habits and psychology of the American people’. The essay continued in that vein:

	As I watched those clean-cut American youths acknowledging victory or defeat with the same modest smile, I knew that they came from a quiet, sportsmanlike people.
	When I saw the silent and magnificent efforts of their runners and their jumpers, I knew that they came from a people that loved action and abhorred palaver.
	When I saw the young Americans soar like birds over the bars and the hurdles, I said to myself that this is the way every American surmounts the obstacles in his path.
	When I saw on the list of contenders names like SCHOLZ and LE GENDRE, I understood that I was dealing with a people utterly ignorant of the debasing sentiment of racialism and sectionalism.
	When I saw the swiftness and certainty with which the young Americans met every emergency as it arose, I said to myself that this is a people of magnificent individual initiative, a people who would take orders from no one.
	When I saw the splendid devotion of each athlete to the single cause of his country's victory, I knew that this was a people which sacrificed self to common good.

[67] One of the few appeared before the games and the melting pot hullabaloo: John Crumpacker, ‘US Team Lacks Racial Mix: Little Diversity Found on US Olympic Team, San Francisco Chronicle, 8 Feb. 2002. Ironically, early twentieth-century responses to Olympic melting-pot celebrations were also scarce. One of the only challenges came from a physician, Dr Charles E. Woodruff, whose virulent Nordic supremacy theories appeared in turn-of-the-century scientific journals. Dyreson, Making the American Team, 148–9.

[68] Marcus Breton, ‘As Exciting As They Are, Games Lack in Diversity’Sacramento Bee, 23 Feb. 2002.

[69] Ibid.

[70]‘An Olympics Born in Scandal Ends With A Since of Pride’, USA Today, 25 Feb. 2002.

[71] Wiebe, Who We Are, 212–20.