1960 Winter Olympics

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VIII Olympic Winter Games
The emblem is made up of three red, white, and blue triangles, which represent a star or snowflake, and the Olympic rings.
Host city	Squaw Valley, California, United States
Nations participating	30
Athletes participating	665 (521 men, 144 women)
Events	27 in four sports
Opening ceremony	February 18, 1960
Closing ceremony	February 28, 1960
Officially opened by	Richard Nixon
Athlete's Oath	Carol Heiss
Olympic Torch	Ken Henry
Stadium	Blyth Arena

The 1960 Winter Olympics, officially known as the VIII Olympic Winter Games, were held in 1960 in Squaw Valley, California, United States (located in the Lake Tahoe basin). Squaw Valley won the bid in 1955.

Alexander Cushing, the creator of the resort, campaigned vigorously to win the Games. After being awarded the games, there was a rush to construct roads, hotels, restaurants, and bridges, as well as the ice arena, the speed skating track, ski lifts, and the ski jumping hill.

The temporary parking lot was built on the frozen flood plain of a nearby stream, but was destroyed when unseasonable rains washed it out. The U.S. military was called in to repair the damage to the packed-snow and ice lot before the Games began.

Walt Disney was the Head of Pageantry for the Games. CBS paid $50,000 for the right to broadcast the games in the United States. [1]

The Olympic Village housed all the athletes.

An early IBM computer was used to calculate the results.

This Winter Olympics introduced Disney artist John Hench's Olympic torch design, upon which all further torches would be based. The Olympic flame was lit in the cottage of Sondre Norheim in Morgedal, Norway, and was brought to Los Angeles by plane from Oslo. It is still burning in Squaw Valley.

There were 30 flagpoles for the flags of the participating nations. Each flagpole came with a plaque signed by Walt Disney [2]. After the Games the flagpoles ended up, among others, at the following places:

Walt Disney Elementary, Marceline, Missouri, United States [3]
Disney Studio Commissary, Burbank, California, United States [4]
Egmont H. Petersens Kollegium, Copenhagen, Denmark

Official flagpole

There were 15 alpine and ski jumping events, eight speed skiing events, and three figure skating events. However, there was no bobsleigh run, so the sport was not contested at these Games.

1960 was the first year for women's speed skating and the men's biathlon.

1 Highlights
2 Medal winners
3 Participating nations
4 Medal count

[edit] Highlights

Yevgeny Grishin, of the USSR, wins the men's speed skating, 500 m gold, 1500 m gold where he drew with Roald Aas.
Lidia Skoblikova, of the USSR, takes the women's speed skating 1500 m goldand also the 3000 m gold.
Jean Vuarnet, of France, wins the men's downhill gold medal.
Anne Heggtveit, from Canada, takes the womens slalom gold medal.
Penny Pitou, of the USA, takes the women's downhill silver medal and women's giant slalom silver.
The United States men's ice-hockey team wins the Olympic gold.

[edit] Medal winners

[edit] Participating nations

A total of 30 nations sent athletes to Squaw Valley. South Africa competed at the Winter Games for the first time. Athletes from West Germany (FRG) and East Germany (GDR) competed together as the United Team of Germany from 1956 to 1964.

[edit] Medal count

Main article: 1960 Winter Olympics medal count

These are the top ten nations that won medals at these Games:

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Image:Flag of the Soviet Union.svg USSR	7	5	9	21
2	Image:Flag of Germany-1960-Olympics.svg United Team of Germany	4	3	1	8
3	Image:US flag 49 stars.svg United States (host nation)	3	4	3	10
4	Image:Flag of Norway.svg Norway	3	3	0	6
5	Image:Flag of Sweden.svg Sweden	3	2	2	7
6	Image:Flag of Finland (bordered).svg Finland	2	3	3	8
7	Image:Canadian Red Ensign.svg Canada	2	1	1	4
8	Image:Flag of Switzerland.svg Switzerland	2	0	0	2
9	Image:Flag of Austria.svg Austria	1	2	3	6
10	Image:Flag of France.svg France	1	0	2	3

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