The Pan American Games are the grandest sport festival of the Americas and the only one that brings together all countries of the hemisphere. Since 1951, when 21 countries and around 2,500 athletes participated in 19 events in Buenos Aires, the games have become an immense spectacle. The 1995 edition, returning to Argentina, involved more than 5,000 athletes (746 from the United States alone), 42 countries, and 37 sports. The games’ slogan—“América: Espírito, Sport, Fraternité”—uses the principal languages of the hemisphere:

Spanish, Portuguese, English, and French. The games are governed by the Pan American Sports Organization (PASO; known as the Pan American Sports Committee during its early years).

The 1951 games featured an Olympic-type program of baseball, basketball, boxing, cycling, equestrian, fencing, gymnastics,modern pentathlon, polo, rowing, soccer, swimming and diving, shooting, tennis, track and field, water polo, weight lifting, wrestling, and yachting.Women participated only in equestrian, fencing, swimming and diving, tennis, and track and field. Only a few U.S. athletes (including a seven-member basketball team and a single gymnast) made the long, costly trip to the initial Pan Ams, and host Argentina won the most gold and total medals.The Pan Ams have been characterized by frequent additions and deletions of various events.

Mexico hosted the 1955 games. The 1959 Pan Ams were planned originally for Cleveland, but financial problems intervened, and the games were held in Chicago. Fewer than 1,800 athletes, from 20 countries, attended the fourth games in São Paulo in 1963, the smallest participation in the games’ history. For the 1967 games in Winnipeg, 29 of the 33 eligible nations sent teams, but the United States was the only country with a complete contingent. Cuba’s three victories (Rolando Garbey’s gold medal to be repeated in the next two Pan Ams) set the pattern for their future dominance in boxing. In 1971 the games were held in Cali, Colombia. Cuba doubled the number of medals they won in 1967, to begin challenging U.S. supremacy. Brazil won men’s basketball—the first time in Pan Am history the United States lost.

The 1975 games were originally awarded to Santiago de Chile,but after the brutal overthrow of President Salvador Allende in 1973, Chile’s military government cancelled out. The first alternate, São Paulo, Brazil, also withdrew, and Mexico City stepped in with only 10 months to prepare. Thirty-three nations participated with over 4,000 athletes.

In 1979, Puerto Rico spent 60-million dollars on new facilities for the games. The detection of widespread drug use highlighted the 1983 Pan Ams in Caracas, Venezuela. Political conflict between the United States and both Cuba and Nicaragua was played up by the press during the 10^th games in Indianapolis in 1987.

Cuba hosted the Pan American Games in 1991, which set new records in numbers of participating countries and athletes.The United States’ economic embargo and travel restrictions made financing of the games difficult for the host.ABC had agreed on a figure of $9 million to pay for television rights,but initially the U.S.Treasury Department would not allow any payment to be made to Cuba.The dispute ended after legal wrangling, with three networks permitted to send crews and equipment, although ABC could spend only $1.2 million. Seventy-four new Pan Am records were set. For the 1995 edition, the Pan American Games returned to Argentina, in Mar del Plata. Cuban women won volleyball for the seventh consecutive time. The United States sent a record 746 athletes and won an alltime high of 424 medals (169 gold). Second in number of medals was Cuba,with 238.

The 1999 games will be held in Winnipeg, Canada, with a shortened program that will probably eliminate non-Olympic events; team size may also be limited. A few Winter Pan American Games have been planned but essentially without success.