Ahead of the 2020 Olympics starting in Tokyo next week, the Welwyn Hatfield Times looks back at how Panshanger’s Lord Desborough made London’s first games happen in 1908 - on just two years notice.
Lord Desborough, born William Henry Grenfell, proved to be in the right place at the right time in the summer of 1906.
He found himself leading the British fencing team at the 10th anniversary games in Athens, Greece, when he was approached to help save the 1908 Olympics.
Rome was originally designated as the host city but the eruption of Mount Vesuvius forced them to withdraw, leaving the games without a home.
After winning silver in Athens and being the first man to carry the flag for Great Britain in the parade of nations, Lord Desborough pushed ahead with the mammoth task of getting London ready for the games, with an official announcement coming a year later.
His prestige as a lord and politician was key to securing and organising the 1908 Olympics, but his sporting pedigree as a fencer, runner, rower and swimmer were just as important. He was also an adventurer, swimming the Niagara Falls rapids twice, climbing Switzerland’s Matterhorn three times and rowing across the English Channel.
“I should not have felt justified in making the announcement were it not for the fact that I have received assurances of support – and it will be no exaggeration to call it enthusiastic support – from nearly every one of those great associations which control the various branches of sport in the United Kingdom,” he wrote in late 1906.
He used his influence with the newspapers to encourage donations to the running cost, but his greatest achievement was negotiating the building of White City Stadium.
Desborough secured a favourable deal with the organisers of the Franco Britannic Exhibition, due to take place at Shepherd's Bush that summer, as they agreed to build the stadium at no cost and to the specifications of the International Organising Committee.
Revolutionary in its design, ‘The Great Stadium’ boasted a running track surrounded by a cycling track, with a swimming pool located in the infield. Lord Desborough himself laid the first stanchion when construction began.
The 1908 Olympic Games began in April, but the main events at the White City Stadium were not held until July, while King Edward VII was invited to perform the opening ceremony.
Despite the Olympic movement being in its infancy – with 1908 being just the fourth games of the modern era – London saw a record 2,008 athletes from 22 countries competing in 22 different sports.
There were some memorable moments too, including Italian marathon runner Dorando Pietri being helped over the finishing line as he struggled with exhaustion in a now iconic image.
The 1908 Olympics proved to be a roaring success and vindication for Lord Desborough’s efforts to bring the games to London.
There was no closing ceremony, but there was a euphoric farewell banquet held in Holborn:
“Whatever nationality we may belong to, we can all say tonight that both the summer and the autumn games of 1908 have been a success," he announced to a chorus of cheers.
“I will also say that we were able to extend to that great body of athletes a hospitality which will show them that we are not unmindful of the way we have been treated when we have gone abroad.”
He would later stand down from the IOC with the 1908 games as his great legacy, before retiring to the Panshanger estate which his wife, Ethel Anne Priscilla Fane, inherited in 1913.
His later life would be marked by tragedy as his sons Billy and Julian Grenfell – a renowned war poet – were both killed during the First World War, making his words written during the summer of 1908 poignant.
“These young men are also representative of the generation into whose hands, the destinies of most of the nations of the world are passing at this moment, and we may hope that their meeting thus periodically, the enthusiasm which they share may have a beneficent effect hereafter on the cause of international peace,” he wrote.
After the death of his third son, Ivo, in a 1926 car accident, Lord Desborough withdrew from public life and remained in Panshanger despite plans to return to his home of Taplow.
He would pass away on the estate at the age of 89. Just months after his death, in an unintentional nod to his legacy, it was announced the Olympics would again return to London in 1948.
With the 32nd Olympiad just days away, now is the time to remember Lord Desborough’s contribution not just to British sport, but to the early history of the Olympic games that helped shape it into the grand event it is today.
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