What do you think of this fact?
That game from every kid’s birthday party once had Olympic status. And not as a side show: from 1900 to 1920, tug of war was an official Olympic event, with medals, national teams and everything.
Pulling for gold
Back then, tug of war was part of track and field. It appeared at six Games in total: 1900, 1904, 1906, 1908, 1912 and 1920. Teams started out with five or six people, and from 1908 on, there were eight.
The rules were simple. Pull the other team about six feet, a little under two meters, and you win. If nobody managed that, both sides got five extra minutes. After that, the team that had gained the most ground won.
Boots, ringers and a two-team final
As harmless as it sounds, the event had its scandals. In 1904, the winning team officially represented the Milwaukee Athletic Club, but according to Mental Floss it was made up of ringers recruited from Chicago.
In 1908 in London, the US team protested against their British opponents, a team from the Liverpool police. The complaint: illegal boots with cleats. The British even offered to pull barefoot. The Americans declined and withdrew.
In 1912, several countries pulled out, so in the end only Great Britain and Sweden faced off. Sweden won.
Three British athletes, Frederick Humphreys, Edwin Mills and James Shepherd, each won three Olympic tug of war medals, two of them gold.
The final pull
In 1920 in Antwerp, it was over. Great Britain won the last Olympic tug of war ahead of the Netherlands and Belgium. According to Olympedia, the event was dropped because of all the controversies, even though the 1920 contest itself went off peacefully.
The sport didn’t disappear, though. Tug of war has been part of the World Games since 1981, and its international federation now counts 76 member associations.
Great Britain still tops the all-time Olympic tug of war medal table. And nobody is ever going to pull that title away from them.