40 years ago the idea of disabled people doing sport was never heard of. But when the annual games for the disabled were started at Stoke Mandeville, England in 1948 by Sir Ludwing Guttmann, the situation began to change.
Sir Ludwing Guttmann, who had been driven to England in 1939 from Nazi Germany, had been asked by the British government to set up an injuries center at Stoke Mandeville Hospital near London. His ideas about treating injuries included sport for the disabled.
In the first games just two teams of injured soldiers took part. The next year, 1949, five teams took part. From those beginnings, things have developed fast. Teams now come from abroad to Stoke Mandeville every year. In 1960 the first Olympics for the Disabled were held in Rome. Now, every four years the Olympic Games for the Disabled are held, if possible, in the same place as the normal Olympic Games although they are organized separately. In other years Games for the Disabled are still held at Stoke Mandeville. In the 1984 wheelchair Olympic Games, 1064 wheelchair athletes from about 40 countries took part. Unfortunately, they were held at Stoke Mandeville and not in Los Angeles, along with other Olympics.
The Games have been a great success in promoting international friendship and understanding, and in proving that being disabled does not mean you can’t enjoy sport. One small source of disappointment for those who organize and take part in the games, however, has been the unwillingness of the International Olympic Committee to include disabled events at the Olympic Games for the able-bodied.
Perhaps a few more years are still needed to convince those fortunate enough not to be disabled that their disabled fellow athletes should not be excluded.
