Yesterday, the International Olympic Committee restored the Olympic pentathlon and decathlon title to American Jim Thorpe, 110 years after he was stripped of it for violating the amateur laws of the era.
“The name of Jim Thorpe will henceforth appear as the only gold medalist in the pentathlon and decathlon,” Thomas Bach, president of the International Olympic Committee, said in a statement.
“This is an exceptional and unique situation as the remarkable gesture of fair play by the respective National Olympic Committees has resolved this issue,” he added.
Thorp, who was 25 at the time, tweeted about the 1912 Stockholm Olympics, winning the pentathlon and decathlon events, which were the first time the Olympics had been held.
But the American athlete lost two Olympic titles in 1913 when the media in his country reported that he played baseball and American football before the Olympics.
Two titles were awarded to Norway’s Ferdinand Bey and Sweden’s Hugo Weslander, who finished second to Thorpe in the pentathlon and decathlon.
“Following this decision, Jim Thorpe will now compete as the sole gold medal winner in the pentathlon and decathlon, with Ferdinand Bay and Hugo Wieslander as silver medalists,” the IOC said in a statement.
“American James Donahue and Canadian Frank Lockman will retain the silver and bronze medals in the pentathlon that were awarded to them when the results were changed in 1913. The same applies to Sweden’s Charles Lomberg and Gusta Holmer, respectively, who will retain their silver and bronze medals. medals in the decathlon.
Thorpe died in 1953 at the age of 64.
In addition to his track and field career, he played American football, baseball, and basketball and is considered the “greatest athlete of the 20th century” in the United States, according to a 2012 ABC poll.
Source: agencies