If you’ve been to the box suites at RFK Stadium, you may have noticed photos of acts that have played the stadium lining the hallway – U2, New Kids on the Block, the Promise Keepers and so on. But after we finished laughing at the New Kids, one plaque off to the side caught our eye: “Robert F. Kennedy Stadium, site of Olympic football, 19 July-4 August 1996.” What? The Olympics were at RFK? There was football at the Olympics?
Considering that the Redskins still played at RFK in 1996 and the Olympics were in fact in the United States, we thought that maybe American football was a demonstration sport, like wheelchair racing at the Athens games and cannon shooting (!) at the 1900 games. A little research disproved this idea (plus who would play, the U.S. versus Canada?) and showed that the stadium actually hosted part of the 1996 Atlanta Olympic soccer tournament, which we did not know. So D.C. has been an Olympic city, despite the 2012 Washington-Baltimore bid fizzling, due in part to the then-planned Iraq war. The Los Angeles Times even said “Once again, it seems, the foreign policy of the federal city has torpedoed the well-meaning, painstaking efforts of Washington to act like a normal town.”
Back to the 1996 Olympics, RFK hosted 6 men’s games, including team USA’s tie with Portugal. The home team finished 1-1-1 while the surprise gold medalists were Nigeria. Three women’s matches were held on site as well, and the American team fared better, taking home the gold, although there was no sports bra jubilation.
Photo by Andrew Wiseman
