Tuesday's List: Olympic Games Sites Since 1968

You may be wondering why the following is a list of the sites of the Summer and Winter Olympic sites since 1968...why that year, considering that the former began in 1896 and the latter in 1924?  It's because 1968 is the year I began following the Olympic Games, at the age of eleven: I watched Peggy Fleming win the gold medal for the USA in figure skating.  So this list is more like a personal life memory project for myself: some of these Olympics I vividly remember...like the 1968, 1972, 1976, 1984, and 1996 Summer Games, while others slipped by almost unnoticed.  Of course, the United States boycotted the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics because of the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan the previous year and most folks here agreed that they couldn't care less about that one.  Corresponding to my 1968,1972, and 1976 interest in the Summer Games was my following of the Winter Games those years, as well as the Lake Placid Winter Olympics in 1980.  Through 1992, the Summer and Winter Olympics were held the same year, but in 1994 the Winter Games started during even-numbered off-years, the same year that the men's World Cup in soccer takes place...

It's interesting how during the Cold War, the communist bloc nations staged essentially professional Olympic athletes while strict rules of amateurism were enforced for the rest of the world...an offensive double standard, in my opinion.  Ironically, it was after the Cold War ended that standards for professionals competing in the Olympics were relaxed and suddenly you began to see all these multimillionaire pro athletes competing while at the same time being featured on commercial breaks...I see very little amateurism anymore and that's sad...

Well, here's that list...another one that probably works better for me than you, the reader.  The Summer Olympics sites I highlighted in red, the Winter in blue...

1968 Summer  Mexico City, Mexico
         Winter     Grenoble, France
1972 Summer  Munich, West Germany
         Winter    Sapporo, Japan
1976 Summer  Montreal, Canada
         Winter     Innsbruck, Austria
1980 Summer  Moscow, USSR
         Winter     Lake Placid, NY
1984 Summer   Los Angeles, CA
         Winter     Sarajevo, Yugoslavia
1988 Summer  Seoul, South Korea
         Winter     Calgary, Canada
1992 Summer  Barcelona, Spain
         Winter     Albertville, France
1994 Winter     Lilliehammer, Norway
1996 Summer   Atlanta, GA
1998 Winter     Nagano, Japan
2000 Summer   Sydney, Australia
2002 Winter     Salt Lake City, UT
2004 Summer   Athens, Greece
2006 Winter     Turin, Italy
2008 Summer   Beijing, China
2010 Winter     Vancouver, Canada
2012 Summer   London, United Kingdom
2014 Winter     Sochi, Russia
2016 Summer   Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
---------------------------------------------
-----------(Future Games)---------------
2018 Winter     Pyeongchang, South Korea
2020 Summer  Tokyo, Japan
2022 Winter     Beijing, China
2024 Summer   Los Angeles, CA