A Powerful False Positive: Nationalism, Science and Public Opinion in the ‘Oxygen Doping’ Allegations Against Japanese Swimmers at the 1932 Olympics
2014; Routledge; Volume: 31; Issue: 8 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/09523367.2014.900488
ISSN1743-9035
Autores Tópico(s)Historical and Scientific Studies
ResumoAbstractAt the 1932 Olympic games the Japanese men's swim team upset their heavily favoured American hosts. Among the many explanations offered for the surprising result, some Americans charged that the Japanese team had ‘doped’ by inhaling supplemental oxygen before they raced. The Japanese admitted to the practice while they and their supporters noted that no rule existed barring such a practice. Nevertheless, allegations flew and attracted the scrutiny of scientists interested in the question of whether or not oxygen enhanced sporting performances. The great majority of commentators concluded that Japan had done nothing illegal or unethical, that Japanese oxygen usage had not given their swimmers any advantage, and that the charges were ultimately a jingoistic attack by certain US swim officials against their rising rival. Nevertheless, the stigma of ‘doping’ clung to the Japanese team for many decades afterward. Scientists referred to this case in their textbooks, the press regularly re-circulated the charges and IOC officials who began in the 1930s to worry about the use of performance-enhancing substances treated the incident as the first ‘evidence’ of doping in Olympic history. Nationalism ultimately held more power in shaping the narrative of Japanese ‘oxygen doping’ than scientific opinion.Keywords:: dopingsciencenationalismswimmingOlympic games Notes 1. Steve Forsyth, as told to Phil R. Sheridan, “We Haven't Begun to Swim” Saturday Evening Post, July 22, 1939, 20. 2. For a deeper reading of this swimming ‘war’ see CitationDyreson, “Imperial ‘Deep Play’.” 3. “Japanese Confident of Swim Victories,” Los Angeles Times, June 18, 1932; “‘Who's Afraid?’ Say Japanese,” Los Angeles Times, July 7, 1932; “America's Swimming Hopes Invade Cincinnati,” Los Angeles Times, July 7, 1932; Paul Lowry, “Pick Your Own Champ,” Los Angeles Times, July 24, 1932; “Swimmers: Here Are Lads You Must Beat,” Los Angeles Times, July 29, 1932; and Ralph Huston, “Can Reigning Kings Hold Olympic Crowns Great Sport Query,” Los Angeles Times, July 30, 1932. 4. Mrs Eileen Garrett, visiting Cal Tech under the auspices of the American Institute of Psychical Research, admitted, ‘I don't know enough about athletics to predict the points’ but cautioned that in her visions: ‘I see the Japanese flag flying at the top; underneath that the flag of the United States; third the flag of Germany’. Mrs Garrett's prediction was for not only swimming but the overall medal count in all sports. “Seer Picks Japanese to Win,” Los Angeles Times, July 12, 1932. 5. Runar Ohls, “Who's Going to Win in the Olympic Games?” Game & Gossip, July 1932, 7–8, 60–62 and “N.Y.A.C. Swimmers in the Olympics,” Winged Foot, August 1932, 19. 6. Shinichiro Kudo, with Leslie LeCron, “Japan Makes Her Bid,” Game & Gossip, August 1932, 48. 7.CitationAbe, “Swimming Japan,” 20–22. 8. “Japanese Olympic Teams Welcomed,” Rafu Shimpo, July 10, 1932. 9. Yoshnori Suzuki, “Japan's Record in Olympiad History of Modern Sports in Japan,” Japan Magazine, February 1938, 38–44; CitationGuttmann and Thompson, Japanese Sports, 122–125; Allison Danzig, “Japan's Natators Impress Observers,” New York Times, August 8, 1932; “Japanese Triumph in Olympic Swim; Shatter Meet Record in Taking 800-Meter Relay Test as 10,000 Look On,” New York Times, August 10, 1932; “Japan's Hatators Provided Feature; Victories in Five of Six Racing Events Were Turned in Chiefly by Youngsters,”New York Times, August 15, 1932; Bob Ray, “Crabbe Annexes Swim Thriller by Inches,” Los Angeles Times, August 11, 1932; Bob Ray, “Japanese Take Honors in Swimming Events,” Los Angeles Times, August 7, 1932; “Japan's Natators Provided Feature; Victories in Five of Six Racing Events Were Turned in Chiefly by Youngsters,” New York Times, August 15, 1932; “The Talk of the Town,” New Yorker, August 20, 1932, 34; and Richard Ely Danielson, “The Olympic Games: Latest Show on Earth as One Man Saw It,” Sportsman, September 1932, 19–23, 45–46.10. “Japan's Swimmers Shone in Olympics; Dominated Men's Competition – American Girls Again Were Supreme” New York Times, December 25, 1932.11. “America's Olympic Victory: Athletes of the N.Y.A.C. Do Their Share in Scoring Points; Sexton and Anderson Two Record Breakers With Shot and Discus” Winged Foot, September 1932, 7–10. Over the past few decades a burgeoning literature has emerged that more fully places the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics into political, social, and cultural as well as sporting contexts. See, for instance, CitationDinces, “Padres on Mount Olympus”; CitationDyreson, “Endless Olympic Bid”; CitationDyreson, “Johnny Weissmuller and the Old Global Capitalism”; CitationDyreson, “Marketing National Identity”; CitationDyreson, “Marketing Weissmuller to the World”; CitationDyreson, “Republic of Consumption”; CitationDyreson and Llewellyn, “Los Angeles Is the Olympic City”; CitationKeys, Globalizing Sport; CitationKeys, “Spreading Peace, Democracy, and Coca Cola®”; CitationRiess, “Power Without Authority”; CitationWelky,“U.S. Journalism and the 1932 Olympics”; CitationWhite, “Los Angeles Way of Doing Things”; and CitationYamamoto, “Cheers for Japanese Athletes.”12. Grantland Rice, “Engineers Won for Japanese,” Los Angeles Times, August 21, 1932 and Bob Ray, “Weissmuller Explains Japanese Success in Olympics,” Los Angeles Times, August 21, 1932.13. This claim is based on an exhaustive search of hundreds of major newspapers and dozens of magazines in the USA for any mention of oxygen related to swimming at the 1932 games in both microfilm sources and electronic databases.14. “Doping of Amateur Athletes Is Charged,” Port Arthur (Texas) News, January 13, 1933; “Says Japs Doped Swimmers,” Massillon (Ohio) Evening Independent, January 13, 1933; “Charges Japanese ‘Doped’ Swimmers,” New York Times, January 14, 1933.15. Charles Fries, “‘Matt Mann’–Teacher and Coach,” in CitationMann, Swimming Fundamentals, viii. Michigan would go on to win future titles under Mann, including eight in a row in 1934, 1935, 1936, 1937, 1938, 1939, 1940 and 1941; and a final title in 1948. In addition to Swimming Fundamentals, see ‘Matt Mann’ of the International Swimming Hall of Fame website http://www.ishof.org/Honorees/65/65mmann.html, accessed May 8, 2013; “Matt Mann” at Wikipedia; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Mann, accessed May 8, 2013.16.CitationGleaves, “Enhancing the Odds” and CitationGleaves, “Doped Professionals and Clean Amateurs.”17. Newburgh added a warning that administering oxygen ‘would do no good and might harm the athlete’. “Says Japs Doped Swimmers,” Massillon (Ohio) Evening Independent, January 13, 1933 and “Charges Japanese ‘Doped’ Swimmers,” New York Times, January 14, 1933.18. “No Criticism from Kiphuth,” New York Times, January 14, 1933 and “Yank Swim Coach Scoffs at Jap Doping Charges,” Los Angeles Times, January 14, 1933.19. “Clyde Swendsen,” International Swimming Hall of Fame website, http://www.ishof.org/Honorees/91/91cswendsen.html, accessed May 9, 2013.20. “Swendsen Says Japanese Swimmers Just Too Good,” Los Angeles Times, January 14, 1933.21. “Charges Japanese ‘Doped’ Swimmers,” New York Times, January 14, 1933 and “Doping of Amateur Athletes Is Charged,” Port Arthur (Texas) News, January 13, 1933.22. A search of the 1933 editions of Rafu Shimpo failed to turn up a single reference to the burgeoning international scandal.23. “Physicians Advised Oxygen Administered,” Los Angeles Times, January 14, 1933 and “Japanese Gives Views,” New York Times, January 14, 1933.24. “Yank Swim Coach Scoffs at Jap Doping Charges,” Los Angeles Times, January 14, 1933; “Says Japs Doped Swimmers,” Massillon (Ohio) Evening Independent, January 13, 1933”; “No Criticism from Kiphuth,” New York Times, January 14, 1933”; “Charges Japanese ‘Doped’ Swimmers,” New York Times, January 14, 1933; and “Doping of Amateur Athletes Is Charged,” Port Arthur (Texas) News, January 13, 1933.25. “Bill Henry Says,” Los Angeles Times, January 14, 1933.26. Alan Gould, “Sport Slants,” Lawrence (Kansas) Daily Journal-World, January 23, 1933 and Alan Gould, “Sport Slant,” Moberly (Missouri) Monitor-Index and Democrat, January 25, 1933.27. Alan Gould, “Sport Slants,” Lawrence (Kansas) Daily Journal-World, January 23, 1933 and Alan Gould, “Sport Slant,” Moberly (Missouri) Monitor-Index and Democrat, January 25, 1933.28. Though he does not include strychnine in the list of the ‘doping’ cocktail, Gould seems to be referring to the medicinal slurry administered to marathon champion Thomas Hicks by the physician Charles Lucas during the 1904 St Louis Olympics. In 1905 CitationLucas published an extensive account of his experiments on Hicks in The Olympic Games.29. Alan Gould, “Sport Slants,” Lawrence (Kansas) Daily Journal-World, January 23, 1933 and Alan Gould, “Sport Slant,” Moberly (Missouri) Monitor-Index and Democrat, January 25, 1933.30. Luehring, “Swimming and Water Sports,” in Proceedings of the Twenty-Eighth Annual Convention. Luehring indicates a detailed report of all the committee's work appears in the September 1933 issue of the NCAA Bulletin, which we have been unable to obtain.31. “Roll of Members,” 6–13, and “Delegates and Visitors Present,” pp. 14–16, in CitationProceedings of the Twenty-Eighth Annual Convention.32.CitationGrady, “Americans, Japanese, and Swimming,” 35, 58. Grady tried out for but failed to make the 1936 US Olympic team in springboard diving. http://www.usaswimming.org/_Rainbow/Documents/cd7383ce-cdf5-48eb-812a-06d8a435497c/1936TrialsResults.pdf, accessed October 25, 2013. Grady went on to a long career as a swimming coach at the University of Pittsburgh and, like his mentor Mann, became a prominent author of texts on aquatic sports. “Ben Grady Wins Award,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 27, 1964 and CitationBarr, Grady, and Higgins, Swimming and Diving.33. Grady, “Americans, Japanese, and Swimming,” 35.34. Ibid., 58.35. On the Japanese side see CitationTeruoka, “Die Ama und ihre Arbeit.”36. For biographical data on Karpovich see Todd and Todd, “Peter V. Karpovich.” In the 1954 Karpovich served as one of the founders of the American College of Sports Medicine. CitationBerryman, Out of Many, One.37.CitationKarpovich, “Effect of Oxygen Inhalation,” 24–30.38. Ibid.39. Ibid.40. “CitationOxygen Inhalation and Athletic Activity,” 32.41. Dr Morris Fishbein, “You Can't Live Five Minutes without Oxygen,” Billings (Montana) Gazette, May 18, 1934.42. Dr Morris Fishbein, “Oxygen Aids Athletes Just Before Events,” Billings (Montana) Gazette, July 7, 1934 and Dr Morris Fishbein, “Oxygen Aids Athletes Just Before Events,” Coshocton (Wisconsin) Tribune, July 13, 1934.43. Peter V. Karpovich, “Oxygen Tests on Athletes,” Scholastic, November 24, 1934, 28.44. Karpovich, “Oxygen Tests on Athletes,” 28. For additional evidence of Hill and Flack's support of oxygen usage in sport see “To Oxygenize Athletes: Plan of Prof. Leonard Hill, F.R.S., to Break All World's Sporting Records,” New York Times, August 23, 1908.45. John J. Romano, “Ferris Predicts 4-Minute Mile; Bonthron Says ‘Impossible,’” ButteMontana Standard, February 17, 1935. Lest the image of a runner in with an oxygen mask and tank seem too whimsical to have ever been seriously considered, according to Scientific American in 1912 the eminent British scientist, Sir Edwin Ray Lankester, the evolutionary biologist who directed the natural history exhibits at the British Museum, petitioned the organisers of the Stockholm Olympics to permit a runner under his guidance to compete in the marathon while using a supplemental oxygen tank. The editors of the influential US journal condemned Lankester's effort as an affront to sportsmanship and labelled it as ‘doping’. “Doping Athletes with Oxygen,” Scientific American, April 6, 1912, 302.46. Fishbein, “Oxygen Aids Athletes Just Before Events.”47. “Have a Whiff,” Newsweek, December 15, 1952, 91; “Philadelphia Heirlooms, Fame & Fortune on Horseback, Are Pep-up Pills Cricket?” Sports Illustrated, November 15, 1954, 20.48.Proceedings of theCitation65th Annual Convention, 69.49.CitationMcCurdy and Larson, Physiology of Exercise, 248.50. Mary Margaret Yost, “The Effect of 100 Per Cent Oxygen Inhalation on Performance and Recovery in Swimming,” Ph.D. thesis, Ohio State University, 1949; Michael D. Giese, “The Effects of 100 Percent Oxygen Inhalation during Recovery in Intermittent Work,” M.S. thesis, University of Wisconsin–Madison, 1972.51. They accurately noted in their introduction that Karpovich's study cleared the Japanese of doping. CitationBrown and Kenyon, Classical Studies on Physical Activity, 390–395.52.CitationMorgan and Corbin, Ergogenic Aids and Muscular Performance, 325; CitationKlafs and Arnheim, Modern Principles of Athletic Training, 142; CitationWagenvoord, Swim Book, 13; CitationJenkins, Sports Science Handbook, Volume 2: I–Z, 158; and CitationKenney, Wilmore, and Costill, Physiology of Sport and Exercise, 414.53. Gleaves and Lewellyn cite a 1938 report to the IOC by an Italian doctor, G. Poggi-Longostrevi, “Relation sur la Question des ‘Excitants’”, held in the IOC archives in Lausanne, Switzerland. CitationGleaves and Llewellyn, “Sport, Drugs, and Amateurism.”54. Kiphuth, “Japan Challenges America in the Water,” Literary Digest, May 12, 1934, 24.55. Ibid.56. Kiphuth, “Japan Challenges America,” 24; Lawson Robertson, “Rising Sons: Japan's Bid for Athletic Supremacy,” Saturday Evening Post, June 23, 1935, 10–11, 67–68; Forsyth, “We Haven't Begun to Swim,” Saturday Evening Post, July 22, 1939, 20–21, 33–36.57. Mann, Swimming Fundamentals, 101.58. Elmer Peterson, “‘Energy Tablets’ Spur on Japan's Weary Soldiers,” Chicago Tribune, May 24, 1938 and “Japanese Soldiers Take ‘Energy Tablets,’ Inhale Oxygen to Obtain New Strength,” New York Times, May 24, 1938.59. The same racial and national ideologies that drove the oxygen doping controversy contributed to the war. Historians have long identified racial and national ideologies as central factors in both the origin and savagery of the Pacific War. CitationDover, War without Mercy; CitationIriye, Origins of the Second World War; CitationThompson, Empires of the Pacific.60. The reminiscence of one of the Japanese gold medallists, Masaji Kiyokawa, illuminates this disconnection. CitationKiyokawa, “My Golden Moment,” 10–14. See also, CitationNeihaus, “Swimming into Memory,” 430–443.61.CitationHunt, Drug Games.Additional informationNotes on contributorsMark DyresonMark Dyreson is a professor of kinesiology and history at Pennsylvania State University. He is an academic editor for the International Journal of Sport History, the co-editor of the Sport in Global Society: Historical Perspectives book series for Routledge Press, and has published several essays and books on the history of modern sport.Thomas RorkeThomas Rorke is a doctoral student in the History and Philosophy of sport programme in the Department of Kinesiology at the Pennsylvania State University. He has researched extensively on the dynamics of national identity formation in international sport.
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