Quotes from David Goldblatt

Two debuted at Los Angeles: the introduction of the now familiar medal ceremony, with national anthems and a three-tiered podium; and the creation of an Olympic village, not just as a practical solution to an accommodation problem, but as a stage for the production of Olympic tableaux and messages. Berlin completed the curious evolution of the modern Olympics' use of mythic fire with the staging of a torch relay from Olympia to the host city.

Only with the London games of 1908 did the now familiar model of official gold, silver and bronze medals, awarded on the day they were won, emerge. Even then, the ceremony lacked drama. There was no podium, no flags, and no music, just the gruff words of IOC grandees and floral bouquets. Flags and music arrived in 1928, but there was still no podium.

And, for the everyday party members, it was, as the cheerful rhyme of the time went, 'Wenn die Olympiade vorbei, schlagen wir die Juden zu Brei' – 'When the Olympics are over, we will beat the Jews to a pulp'. It was open season again.