Looking back at the Calgary Olympics, 35 years later | Globalnews.ca

is the 35th anniversary of 1988 Winter Olympic Games In Calgary and the final torch bearer looks back with fond memories.

Robin Ainsworth, then Robin Perry, was 12 when she was cast in the role. She kept it a closely guarded secret until the big moment arrived.

“No one knew except my family and the people who organized it high up,” she says.

Ainsworth himself knew about the week leading up to the big day.

She admits that her youth meant she didn’t feel the pressure at the time: the eyes of the world were watching her every move.

“I was probably too young to recognize what was really going on,” she says.

“Plus I’ve played a pretty big part in other parts of the Olympics. I sang and danced at the medal presentations and I was skating at the closing ceremony, so it was just an extra to do that.

So how did the cauldron at McMahon Stadium feel when it was being lit?

“Just like a campfire,” she laughs.

She participated in a single run-through, which went up and down, to determine the proper height of the wok. It stopped a little higher than that, so that her “hair wouldn’t catch fire.”

“When they did that, they had to clean the entire stadium,” she said. Only a few people were left inside, so that all the details could be kept secret.

Ainsworth’s life was forever changed because of her Olympic moment.

He traveled to the Games in Seoul, South Korea as Canada’s goodwill ambassador. He held the torch for the 2010 Vancouver Games.

She also has quite an impressive collection of memorabilia which includes scrapbooks, costumes and photographs.

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She met many famous people including athletes and royalty.

“It was an amazing experience,” she says warmly, noting Calgary’s hospitality was what really put it over the top.

“It was literally a party. A really nice, happy party. Everyone pitched in and it was an experience. It was amazing.”

The volunteer spirit was also a draw for Olympian Kerin Lee-Gartner. He competed in alpine skiing in 1988, later winning a gold medal at the 1992 Games.

“I still love the volunteer jackets that come into town from time to time,” she says.

“We talk about legacy and often the legacy, it could be a building. It could be a structure. But I think the legacy that the Calgary Olympics left behind is all those volunteers who are in their 20s and 30s. decade who raised their children with that mindset.

“I think the city that Calgary has grown into is because of that.”

The CEO of Heritage Calgary agrees. Josh Trapto credits the community leaders who managed to make grassroots dialect a worldwide spectacle.

“The real city builder. Our city boosters wanted to see Calgary continue to be put on the international map,” explains Trapto.

“The people who paid to have their name on a brick in Olympic Plaza still go and find their brick. When the city talks about renovating and updating Olympic Plaza, the city and we get calls , ‘What will happen to my Olympic brick?’

“35 years later people still have that affection for what was probably a $5 brick.”

Many of the sports venues built for the Games are out of date, some out of commission or have been demolished.

Despite a failed attempt in 2018 to bid for the 2026 Winter Games, sentiment remains with some residents to host again.

“I think people want to host it. But for so many reasons, whether it’s politically, financially I think it’s a big decision,” Trapto says. “But I think it would be wonderful to see the Games return to Calgary and to see some of that ’88 magic come back.”

“I would love to see it come back. I’m not sure now if it will. But I would love to have that,” says Ainsworth.

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