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History of the Olympics

1928 - Amsterdam, Netherlands

By Jennifer Rosenberg, About.com

The 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, Netherlands

The Olympic flame made its debut at these Olympic Games. Also making its debut were track-and-field events and gymnastics for women. There had been much resistance to these additions by Coubertin and others who feared that having women compete in these events would cause them to either become "masculine" or to ruin their health and make them unable to have children.*

About 3,000 athletes participated, representing 46 countries.

* Allen Guttmann. The Olympics: A History of the Modern Games (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1992) 45.

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