1948 Summer Olympics
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The 1948 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XIV Olympiad, were held in 1948 at Wembley Stadium in London, England. After a hiatus of 12 years caused by the outbreak of World War II, these were the first Summer Olympics to be held since the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. The 1940 Games had been scheduled for Tokyo, and later Helsinki as WWII started; the 1944 Games had been provisionally planned for London.
Highlights
- With World War II in recent memory, Germany and Japan were not invited to the Games.
- Dutch runner Fanny Blankers-Koen was the star of the Games, winning four gold medals on the track.
- Fencer Ilona Elek (Hungary) and canoeist Jan Brzak (Czechoslovakia) successfully defended their Olympic titles they had won 12 years earlier.
- In field hockey, India and Pakistan first participated as independent nations, and the homeland of the sport, Great Britain, played the triple Olympic champions from India for the first time and lost.
- For the first time, Olympic diplomas were awarded to the six highest placed athletes.
- In a dramatic finish in the marathon, Belgian Étienne Gailly entered the stadium first, but was so physically drained that he could barely walk around the track. Two men passed him before he finally crossed the line.
- Duncan White of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) won the first medal for his country, a silver, in the 400 meter hurdles.
- Harold Sakata, who won a silver medal in weightlifting, later went on to portray Oddjob in the James Bond film Goldfinger.
- Sweden, led by the Gre-No-Li trio, beat Yugoslavia 3-1 in the final to win the football tournament.
Medals awarded
See the medal winners, ordered by sport:
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Medal count
Note that these Olympic Games were the first time that the host nation did not win enough medals to be included in the top 10 medal winners.
| 1948 Summer Olympics medal count |
| ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pos | Country | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
| 1 |
United States | 38 | 27 | 19 | 84 |
| 2 |
Sweden | 16 | 11 | 17 | 44 |
| 3 |
France | 10 | 6 | 13 | 29 |
| 4 |
Hungary | 10 | 5 | 12 | 27 |
| 5 |
Italy | 8 | 11 | 8 | 27 |
| 6 |
Finland | 8 | 7 | 5 | 20 |
| 7 |
Turkey | 6 | 4 | 2 | 12 |
| 8 |
Czechoslovakia | 6 | 2 | 3 | 11 |
| 9 |
Switzerland | 5 | 10 | 5 | 20 |
| 10 |
Denmark | 5 | 7 | 8 | 20 |
Nations
Articles about London Summer Olympics by nation:
ArgentinaAustralia Austria Belgium Brazil Bermuda  British Guiana |
 Hungary Iran |
 Poland Spain Trinidad and Tobago |
See also
External links
| Olympic Games | Summer Olympic Games>Summer Games 1896, 1900, 1904, 1906, 1908, 1912, (1916), 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, (1940), (1944), 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020, 2024 | |
| Winter Olympic Games>Winter Games 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, (1940), (1944), 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022 | ||
| Athens 2004 — Torino 2006 — Beijing 2008 — Vancouver 2010 — London 2012 |
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