Editor’s Note — As part of our countdown to 2025, WYDaily is revisiting its most-read and favorite stories of the year. Reporter Megan Roche said Path to Paris was a fun series where she had the opportunity to cover an international sporting event but share the local ties to the Hampton Roads community. She adds anyone who knows her personally knows she loves the Olympic Games and all they stand for. Finding local ties to the Games, while still getting the opportunity to cover the event was such a fun time, she added.
YORKTOWN — As the nation looks ahead to the Paris 2024 Summer Olympic Games, Yorktown residents can also reflect on the 1980 Winter Games, when the Olympic Torch’s journey to Lake Placid started here in the Historic Triangle.
The Olympic Torch Relay is one of the most notable traditions of the Olympic Games past and present. The Olympic Cauldron in Athens, Greece hosts a ceremony that includes lighting a torch that is run throughout the host country of the Olympic Games. During the Opening Ceremonies, that same torch is used to light the Olympic Cauldron in the host stadium, where it stays lit until the close of the Games. During the closing ceremonies, the flame is symbolically passed to the host city of the next Olympic Games.
In 1980, a flame from the Athens cauldron was flown to Langley Air Force Base. It was then placed on a naval surface craft and sent up the river 21 miles to Yorktown, where the torch run kicked off. Along the route, the torch also made a stop in nearby Colonial Williamsburg.
Suzy Mink, Virginia’s delegate to the 1980 torch run, was the first to carry the torch as the trek to Lake Placid got underway. The torch was designed by Don MacFarland of Santa Barbara, California, and weighed one and a half pounds. All torch bearers wear a uniform and in 1980, those uniforms were yellow tracksuits with a red stripe down the arm.
Mink, alongside the 25 other women and 26 men on the team were chosen based on an application process. Every state, Washington D.C., and the town of Lake Placid sent a delegate to run as part of the torch relay.
In a December 1973 interview with her alma mater, Hollins University, Mink described the application process as being an essay on how she embodies the Greek ideal of the whole man and an interview with the Director of the Torchbearing Relay and the Chief of Ceremonies, all judged by ten officials. She also had to take part in a test run. After all of that, five finalists from each state were chosen.
The relay began in Yorktown and the torch traveled almost 700 miles over the course of nine days, when it was ushered into the Olympic Stadium in Lake Placid to light the cauldron for the two-week-long 1980 Lake Placid Winter Olympic Games.
The 1980 Games were notable for the Miracle on Ice game between the U.S. Men’s Hockey Team and the Soviet Union. The U.S. team was an underdog in the competition with only a few members having minor league hockey playing experience. The game came down to the final 12 seconds of play when Mike Eruzione scored, securing the victory over the heavily favored Soviet Union. The U.S. would go on to win the gold medal against Finland.
The U.S. ended the 1980 Winter Games with 12 medals, six of them gold.
To commemorate the 1980 Olympic Torch Run, a plaque was placed alongside Riverwalk Landing, close to the base of the Coleman Bridge. It is located near the site of the official starting line for the 1980 torch run.
To learn more about the history of the 1980 Lake Placid Winter Olympics, visit olympics.com.