The Olympic Games were something new in our lives in 1980, even though we were already a sports-minded family. The Winter Games that year were at Lake Placid and had not gotten to be the corporate event that the Olympics are today.
Sally was able to get tickets and a hotel room in upstate New York, some miles from Lake Placid. The town itself was locked down, so everybody had to room elsewhere and then go to a location where buses brought you to Lake Placid.
I did not attend these Games because of work, but Sally and the girls went the second week in which the temperatures were much more moderate than the first week. They saw their first speed-skating event, which was held outdoors on the lake. They saw Eric Heiden, who won five gold medals.
And they started to collect pins for me. Pins were always part of the Olympics, but they not the craze they are now. The girls’ jeans were very popular with the group behind the Iron Curtain, but they were not ready to trade. That was also the first time we saw our friends the Keevers, Joan and Jake, who were with ABC and had lots of clients there.
The highlight of the week was attending the gold-medal hockey game in which the USA beat Finland after the USA had upset the Russians. It is referred to as "The Miracle On Ice.''
Calgary 1988
Eight years later, I didn't stay behind when we went to the Winter Games in Calgary. The Keevers were there, and we stayed in Banff, which was about 30 miles west of Calgary. I thought we would have time to see the local resort sites, but we didn’t. However, the people we were with arranged for buses to take us to the events.
We decided to just carry our thermal underwear and other thermal clothes and undress in a bathroom when we arrived at the ski area. We arrived, but the lodge had been taken over by IBM. There was a circus-sized tent, with food vendors along the sides with tables and chairs for us. There were no bathrooms in the tent. They had set up porto potties outside.
Have you ever tried to take all your clothes off in one of those things with no lights and zero temperature?
While we were sitting at a table figuring what to do, Sally went to get a cup of hot chocolate. When she returned, she said the lady at the concession stand would let me change clothes at her booth. I said great and was told not to forget the little things like a hat, gloves, scarf, camera and glasses. When I got there, I found out I was undressing behind the counter. So what.
The other problem was that I was about knee deep in hot chocolate. Sally had told the lady I was at Yale Hospital, so she proceeded to tell me about all her medical problems. I was trying to change clothes and pick up all my miscellaneous items and was not paying too much attention to how I looked. When I got back to the table, I proudly announced that I had not lost anything.
That's when Sally told me that I had forgotten my pants.
The thermal underwear fitted tightly, so I guess I must of looked like one of the ski jumpers who had colored, tight-fitting pants. In any case, nobody noticed. I returned to the concession stand and finished dressing.
The weather was so cold that the event was canceled. Later that morning, we went downtown to Calgary and entered a rundown bar for lunch. There was a bathroom, so Sally could change clothes. While we were having lunch, a native Canadian and somebody else got into a knife fight and we decided it was time to leave.
We then went to the Saddledome for hockey. While there, Sally changed out of her orange boots into walking shoes. By the time we went to dinner, we found out she had left one of the orange boots at the arena. That evening we were back at the arena for figure skating. I went to the lost and found department and they had the one boot.
They asked me, how do you lose one boot? I explained how and went on my way.
More and more people asked me the same thing. I finally explained that it was for my brother Harry, who only had one leg, you know. Again, I was being a pain in the butt.
We did a lot of pin-trading, which was in high gear by that time.
Forget About France
By 1992, we were hooked on the Winter Olympics and wanted to go to Albertville, France. But the French were so much of a problem, we decided not to go.
We did go to the 1994 Games at Lillehammer, Norway. We started out our trip at Newark Airport in a snowstorm that canceled our flight. After about eight hours, the airline was able to get a few of us airborne and we made it to Oslo.
We were taken to a very small town where many Americans were staying. No sooner did we arrive, we were given American flags and took part in a parade around the town before there was a rally with entertainment.
Every day, we were driven to Lillehammer and we had a grand time. The first day, we went to the opening ceremonies. This was followed by a hockey game. I had on a scarf that looked like an American flag filled with my pins. These were the pins I wanted to trade. The couple next to us was from San Diego, and the husband saw my pins and wanted to trade. I told him I had some from a man in New York by the name of Ho Ho who made a lot of pins. He said he knew of him and had dealt with him. I said there was another man in San Diego who had a license to make them, but I couldn’t get in touch with him. He turned around and tapped the shoulder of the man in front of him and said there is a man here who wanted to talk to him.
He was the pin man. He usually did not deal with individuals, but he gave me his card and his catalog, and I took him up on his offer when I got home.
We had a great time and great weather. Then we took an extra trip. We took a train over the mountains to Bergen. It was a beautiful little town in the mouth of a fjord. In the process of getting to Bergen, we were on a boat and spent the afternoon sailing down the fjord.
Visiting Sweden
Then we went to visit our friends in Stockholm who had invited us to visit. Gunnar Horenstein holds a Nobel Chair and asked me to give rounds at the Karolinska Hospital. I also gave a lecture at the Nobel Institute.
I was not allowed to trade any of my pins for one of theirs. We arrived about 10 a.m. Gunnar asked us what we would like to do that morning. I told him whatever they usually do on Saturday. He said they would skate for several hours on the Baltic Sea.
I knew my skating ability was not up to that, but I did have a few questions. I asked him how he knew the ice was thick enough wherever they went. He said no problem. They had two spikes attached to their coat with Velcro. When you were falling in, you grabbed those and hit the ice. Then your friends throw you a rope and pull you out.
Instead, we decided to settle for a tour of the town. They had a party for us and gave us a grand tour. My family chides me about my sailing ability. However, the local people many years ago built a sailing ship. After all, they are sailors for generations. The ship was put in the water and immediately turtled. It lay there for decades and then someone floated it and put a shed over it and fixed it up new. It is now a great maritime museum.
Gunnar and his wife visited us one more time the following year. They did not stay with us, but Sara and I took them to dinner at Minetta's Tavern in Greenwich Village. After dinner, we went to an Italian restaurant called Asti’s that catered to the after-theater crowd with singers from the Metropolitan Opera. After a while, Gunnar went to the bathroom and the next thing we see him in a monk’s robe carrying a candle in one of the skits. He had become part of the show and was very good-natured about it.
Pins and Needles
That about covers the Olympics except for collecting pins from future Games. We developed a great collection and put them in a display cabinet. The greatest pin I ever saw was one that our friends from ABC had from the 1984 Olympics in Sarajevo. The government made everybody come to town from Belgrade. They did not even let ABC and its equipment land. They did allow a 747 from Saudi Arabia to land and park at a military airfield.
Jake Keever asked the only two occupants to come to one of his parties. They gave him one of their Olympic pins. It was huge and it had the Saudi seal and a palm tree and the Olympic rings on it and it is about 8 inches long. It was also 18-karat gold. I could not pry it loose from Joan Keever for my collection.
I have told you about many trips in different chapters of this story. I will now tell you about other trips that do not fall into any other categories.