BOSTON (AP) – A gold medal awarded to the first Olympic Games organized on American soil was auctioned for more than half a million dollars, which is part of the hundreds of lots of souvenirs of games during Decades, a business announced on Friday.
The medal of the St. Louis Olympic Games of 1904, sold at auction for $ 545,371, carries the inscription “Olympiad, 1904” and shows a victorious athlete holding a crown on the front. On the other side, Nike, the goddess of victory in ancient Greek mythology, is shown alongside Zeus, the king of the gods of the Pantheon, and the words for the 110 -meter obstacles that were awarded. The medal, awarded to American Fred Schule, includes the original ribbon and leather case.
It was the first Olympic Games where the gold medals were awarded and the Americans took advantage of it, winning 78 of the 96 events. Unlike the Olympic medals these days which are mainly in silver with a gold veneer, they were smaller and entirely in gold.
Bobby Eaton, Olympic specialist in Boston based RR auction, said it was unusual that a medal of this kind is presented at auction, although the particular came from the collection of the Schule family.
“No one really knows exactly how many Olympic gold medals from 1904 are still there,” said Eaton. “What we know is that they are extremely rare. Of the 100 gold medals awarded in Saint-Louis, many have been lost for time or are hidden in collections and private museums.”
Beyond the gold medals, the 1904 games were also stored for a lot of controversy and quirks.
The games were initially awarded to Chicago, but the organizers of the world exhibition in St. Louis feared the competition for attendance and protested a second international event held simultaneously. The fair organizers have threatened to organize their own sporting events. It took the founder of the modern Olympic movement, Pierre de Coubertin, to forge peace by moving the 300 miles Olympic Games (483 kilometers) to the south.
If this drama was not enough, Fred Lorz seemed to have won the marathon race until it was discovered, it rose halfway in a car.
The organizers organized “days of anthropology” when members of Aboriginal tribes around the world at the exhibition for the purchase of Louisiana, the official name of the World Fair of Saint-Louis, were torn from the fair and said to compete without warning.
The games have also seen the beginnings of boxing and free struggle, sports that hung on to the summer Olympic Games to the present day, as well as longtime croquet and tug events.
“These medals are not only competition – they are an snapshot of the first days of modern Olympic Games,” said Eaton. “Having one like this, in such an exceptional state, is really remarkable and a unique opportunity for collectors.”
The sale is part of hundreds of Olympic items that were up for auction, including a bronze medal from the Paris Olympic Games in 2024, as well as gold medals from the 1932 Los Angeles Olympic Games, Olympic Games de Tokyo from 1964, 1998 Nagano Olympics and 2012 London 2012, 1964 Tokyo Olympics, 1998 Nagano Olympics and 2012 London 2012, 2016 Olympic Games.
Olympic memories have long recovered a good price.
In 2022, the silver medal captured by Luz Long, the long German jumper who became friends with Jesse Owens at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, sold at auction for more than $ 488,000. A first silver medal awarded to the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896 sold $ 180,111 when it was auctioned in 2021 and a gold medal at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver sold $ 68,750 in 2019.
The athletes also auction their medals for charity, including the double canoe champion Yuri Cheban of Ukraine whose two gold medals and a bronze were sold at auction for $ 109,451 in 2022 to help the effort war. The swimmer Ryan Lochte sold his six Olympic silver and bronze medals at the same year, the $ 166,779 collected to go to an organization benefiting children. He kept his gold medals.
The next summer Olympic Games will be in Los Angeles in 2028, marking the third time that the City has organized the Games. He also welcomed the games in 1932 and 1984.
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