Games Countries Play.(Olympics)(Rome 1960: The Olympics That Changed the World)(Book review)

Byline: Andrew Bast

If the 1960 Rome Olympics didn't change the world, it did reveal a changed one. Beijing is next.

On the final evening of the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, a little-known Ethiopian stepped to the starting line of the marathon, barefoot. He raced in the shadows of ancient ruins, including the Axum Obelisk, which Mussolini's Army had looted from his country more than two decades earlier. "In bare feet, dark red trunks, bright green shirt, the two vertical lines of No. 11 defining his narrow, bony back--that was Abebe Bikila," writes David Maraniss in his fact-packed new book, "Rome 1960: The Olympics That Changed the World" (Simon & Schuster. 496 pp.). Bikila set a world best of 2:15:16 and became the first black African to win a gold medal.

Since the modern Olympics began in 1896 in Athens, the international Games have regularly made history--and not always for what happened on the track or playing fields. In 1936, Nazis shrouded the games in swastikas despite prohibitions of propaganda in the Olympic Charter. Massive social protests in Mexico City in 1968 culminated in the Tlatelolco massacre. And in the second week of the 1972 Games in Munich, the radical group Black September took Israeli athletes hostage, prompting a standoff that ended with 17 dead. As for Rome, Maraniss makes his case in the subtitle: the 1960 Games "changed the world."

That may be pushing it, but they certainly reflected the dramatic ways the world was changing. The 1960 Olympics were the first ever to be televised. Light heavyweight Cassius Clay--years before he would become Muhammad Ali--won boxing gold for the United States. Rome's Games were also corrupted by the first doping scandal. On a sweltering Friday, Danish cyclist Knud Enemark Jensen dropped dead. It wasn't the heat, though; before the race, his trainer had given him Roniacol, a drug designed to increase blood circulation. An uproar ensued. Consequently, Maraniss writes, "imperfect and controversial as it was, a system evolved over the decades for testing ...