IOC Reinstates Wins of 'Most Remarkable Athlete'

Jim Thorpe, one of history's greatest and most versatile athletes, has finally been restored as the sole winner of two events at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics. The Native American athlete was stripped of the two gold medals more than six months after the Games when it emerged that he had violated the era's strict rules on amateurism by playing baseball for $25 a week a few years earlier. Indian Country Today reported Thursday that the Olympics website had been updated to show Thorpe as the sole winner of the two events. The International Olympic Committee made an official announcement on Friday, the 110th anniversary of Thorpe winning the decathlon.

At the 1912 Games, Thorpe also won the pentathlon, a now-defunct event involving a long jump, javelin throw, 200-meter dash, discus throw, and 1,500-meter run. After Thorpe was stripped of his medals, Swedish athlete Hugo Wieslander was named the decathlon winner and Norway's Ferdinand Bie was declared the pentathlon winner, but both men refused to accept gold medals, the New York Times reports. The IOC says it consulted the Olympic committees of Sweden and Norway, along with Wieslander's surviving relatives, before making its decision. "This is a most exceptional and unique situation," said IOC president Thomas Bach. "It is addressed by an extraordinary gesture of fair play from the concerned National Olympic Committees."

Thorpe, who died in 1953, was declared co-winner of the events in the 1980s. But groups including Bright Path Strong, a foundation that seeks greater recognition of Thorpe and other Native Americans, led a push for him to be declared sole winner. Co-founder Nedra Darling said the group is grateful that the "injustice has finally been corrected, and there is no confusion about the most remarkable athlete in history," ESPN reports. Bach thanked the "great engagement" of Bright Path Strong for helping find a solution. After he lost his amateur status, Thorpe played baseball and then football professionally. He was the first president of what became the NFL and didn't retire from playing until he was 41—16 years after his triumphs in Stockholm. (More Jim Thorpe stories.)