In his 1941 film
Never Give a Sucker an Even Break it seems that W.C. Fields accurately presaged the ridiculousness to which the Olympics would devolve some 83 years later:
"Bean-bag...ah, it's very good. Becomes very exciting at times. I saw the championship played in Paris; many people were killed."
View attachment 329189
It's funny, talking about the Olympics becoming ridiculous, because during the period between 1912 and 1948 olympic medals were awarded for music, literature, painting, sculpture and architecture.
Jean Jacoby of Luxembourg was a two times gold medalist at the summer games. His first gold was for a painting at the 1924 games in Paris. He won his second gold for the drawing titled 'Rugby'. Shown below, at the 1928 games in Amsterdam.
![1000021316.jpg 1000021316.jpg](https://pipesmagazine.com/forums/data/attachments/329/329191-1492a2ea6a0d5dff674dc8b99a34510a.jpg)
Artistic medals were removed from the summer games from 1952, not due to them not being in the nature of the olympic spirit, but rather down to the difficulty in proving the amateur status of the entrants.
In 1936 the German government sought to include a film category in the olympics, however this was rejected.
The artistic elements of the Olympics disappeared from the programme in the same way that croquet, hot air ballooning, tug of war and pistol dueling have also gone.
I then see nothing wrong with seeing more modern events having their moment in the sun at the games.