As we get set to soak up Vancouver’s Winter Olympic opening ceremonies where no doubt those crazy Canucks will wow us with some sort of Molson beer fountain spinning around a human sea of hosers in Timbits costumes, I thought it might be fun to take a look back at the history of the games on TV.  I mean, hey, we pretty much take it for granted that we can get half a dozen channels of coverage, showing us pretty much every second of the games combined with Internet streams of even the most overlooked events, but it was only fifty years ago that the Olympics were first broadcast in the U.S.

That’s right, 1960 was the first time these ancient games were transmitted into American homes, but not the first time a television set saw their competitions.

 Most famously, the 1936 Berlin games (starring civilization’s all star a-hole, Hitler) were sent to special viewing halls via a closed circuit broadcast that allowed nationalism to soar and The History Channel future access to creepy images of the beginnings of Nazi Germany.

An ominous beginning shifted to a more civil London in 1948 after a minor 12 year hiatus where the previous host nation bombed the hell out of the current hosts.  There’s a really bad “passing the torch” pun in there somewhere, but I’ll skip it.  The city of London explored TV broadcasts with a special service showing the games, but was only available in the city itself.

While these tests were important, the first wide broadcast over a free network was in 1960 when CBS paid the staggering amount of $50,000 to air the VIII Winter Olympic Games in the U.S.  That won’t buy you a commercial during Vancouver!  This is largely considered the first time the Olympics were truly broadcast on television although since the games were in Squaw Valley, it still remained a regional form of television.  It really took until about 1980 for most of the major nations to provide extensive international coverage.

Interesting footnote, CBS’  Squaw Valley coverage also brought about the idea and execution of “instant replay” in sports when judges asked to view the tapes of a slalom race to check if a skier had missed a gate.  Sheesh, took the IOC all of 10 seconds to go to the tape!  I’m looking at you baseball.

All three major networks have held the broadcast rights at one time or another.  Currently the tally (both Winter and Summer) stands at

• ABC with 10 games between 1964 and 1988
• NBC with 12 between 1964 and 2010
• CBS with a mere five games (two in 1960, and three more in the 1990s)

Although CBS was first, it’s only carried the Summer games once (in Rome 1960) and has basically looked on as ABC and NBC have traded coverage between years, Summer, and Winter editions.  NBC exploded coverage during the 2008 Beijing games with all but three events spilling over its affiliate networks USA, Telemundo, CNBC, MSNBC, and Oxygen.  Coverage was comprehensive if not a little pandering to a host country guilty of failing to meet many of the humanitarian promises it made in order to secure the games.

Arguably the most important moment in the history of U.S. athletics came during the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid, NY.  Actually, I’m sorry (or not sorry) but it was, without a doubt, the most important sporting event ever.  I am, of course, referring to the 1980 U.S. Men’s hockey team.  It happened on February 22nd, my 5th birthday.  As a very young hockey addict, it was the best b-day present I’ve ever gotten and an improbable victory for a bunch of average American farm boys over the big bad Russian juggernaut.  It was the unforeseen shot in the arm the country needed during a bitter time of economic, social, and political woes.  The team’s victory over Russia (and later winning gold against Finland) was an inspirational moment not even Hollywood could script, as an entire nation sat down to watch the purest example of what the Olympics were all about. and we heard one of the most famous calls in broadcast history, “Do you believe in miracles? yes!!”

By the bye, the game was portrayed perfectly on the big screen in Disney’s Miracle, but also had a great little TV movie about the team in Miracle on Ice starring Karl Malden and Steve Guttenberg!  HBO presented a documentary in 2001 called Do You Believe in Miracles? Even the X-Files made reference to the game when the Smoking Man claimed to have drugged Soviet goalie Vladislav Tretiak.

TV also gave us an up close and personal look at the Olympics lowest point, the 1972 Munich Massacre in then West Germany.  In less than 24 hours, Jim McKay led the broadcast of the capture and eventual murder of Israeli athletes in the Olympic village, a moment that scars the IOC to this day.

The Olympics will continue to be a television behemoth for the foreseeable future, bringing us both the good and the bad.  Ranking only behind the World Cup for viewers (soccer dominates even the Super Bowl these days), these centuries old competitions are full of the kind of stories of hard work and dedication that are often too inspiring to ignore.  I fully expect to get swept up in Olympic fever like everyone else for the next couple weeks, especially the hockey and the “ski and shoot.”  I know it has a real name but that’s what they do!  Ski a little, shot something, ski some more!  It’s bloody genius really.  Enjoy the games everyone!