Alice Milliat welcomed the world to Paris as founder of the International Women’s Sports Federation, known in her native France as the Fédération Sportive Féminine International. In 1922, she said, “I hereby declare the first female Olympic Games open,” she said.
The male-dominated world of the mainline Olympics, busy preparing for the Paris Games of 1924, ignored the 1922 event, other than to complain about Milliat’s unauthorized use of “Olympics.” They dismissed the rising idea that women should compete at all.
Milliat, 100 years after the last Paris Olympics, is finally getting recognition as a pioneer, Billie Jean King of sorts for her age. Biographies are being published in France. A new documentary has been shown in theaters and on television. In Nice, The National Sports Museum has a temporary exhibit highlighting her achievements. A plaza outside a new Olympic arena was named for her.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/10/olympics-women-milliat.html
