1924 Winter Olympics: History and Background

The 1924 Winter Olympics, officially known as the I Olympic Winter Games (French: Iers Jeux olympiques d'hiver) and commonly known as Chamonix 1924 (Arpitan: Chamôni 1924), were a winter multi-sport event which was held in 1924 in Chamonix, France. Organized by the French Olympic Committee and held as part of an "International Winter Sports Week", the competitions took place in Chamonix and Haute-Savoie, France, from 25 January to 5 February 1924. Although not initially termed "Winter Olympics", the International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to retrospectively grant the Chamonix competitions the status of the first Winter Olympic Games at the committee's 26th session on May 6, 1926.

The tradition of holding the Winter Olympics in the same year as the Summer Olympics would continue until 1992, after which the current practice of holding a Winter Olympics in the second year after each Summer Olympics began.

Although figure skating had been an Olympic event in both London and Antwerp and ice hockey had been an event in Antwerp, winter sports had always been limited by the season. At the 1921 IOC convention in Lausanne, there was a call for equality for winter sports. After much discussion, it was decided that France, host nation for the 1924 Summer Olympics, would hold an "international week of winter sport" in Chamonix.

While not one of the official 16 events (nor one of the six sports) during the "International Winter Sports Week", the closing ceremony included Pierre de Coubertin presenting gold medals in "Alpinism" (mountaineering) to the members of the 1922 British Mount Everest expedition, represented in Chamonix by Lt Col Edward Strutt, deputy expedition leader.

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