INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC ACADEMY 7th JOINT - IOA

Vikelas journey to London as an "economic immigrant!", where
he would work in the trading and importing firm of the Melas
brothers, his uncles on his mother's side, allowed his literary talent to
flourish as he became proficient in many languages, French, English,
German, Italian and later Spanish. In London, Vikelas served the god
of Olympus himself, as well as his two forms, the Wise Hermes of
Letters and the Wise Hermes of Trade... In the course of time,
however, it would be the first the god of Letters who would win over
Vikelas. By he way, let me note two things:
The first concerns, the beneficial influence of Vikelas' uncle, Leon
Melas, the author of the novel "Old -man Stathis", that contributed to
the education of generation of young Greek during the second half of
the 19th century.
The second is his practice of different sports in his free time, like
rowing on the Thames, fencing and riding in the parks of the British
capital. Vikelas had already enjoyed sports games at the Evangelidis
School whose principal had settled in Syros after studying and
working in America for a while. At various points in his memoirs,
Vikelas clearly shows his predilection, for sport and physical exercise,
by means of references to his own experience or that of others.
This fact refutes the view that Vikelas had no connection with
sport when he was elected as the first President of the IOC. On the
contrary, his sporting experience, deeply buried in time, resurfaced
again when the Congress of the Sorbonne was convened in 1894. In
any event, Vikelas had himself declared his lack of any experience in
sports administration and organization matters to the president of the
historic Panhellenic Gymnastics Association (founded in 1891),
Ioannis Fokianos, his agent and honorary Vice-President of the
congress organized by Pierre de Coubertin with a large participation
of sports lovers from Europe, America and Australia, the congress that
gave birth both to the International Olympic Committee and the
revival of the Olympic Games of 1896 in Athens, the capital city of
the small country of Greece, small in population and resources but
rich in potential and vision, thanks also to Vikelas who, despite his
inexperience turned out to be the driving force for the organization
and revival of the first Olympic Games.
In the years that followed after young Vikelas (he was only 17
years old) had settled in London as a trainee in the City before moving
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