What recent American Olympic games was best...and worst? (credit, dorms)

[workaholics]

Let's start from the 1980s

Lake Placid, NY 1980 Winter Games
Los Angeles, CA 1984 Summer Games
Atlanta, GA 1996 Summer Games
Salt Lake City, UT 2002 Summer Games

Which of these cities handled it the best, and which handled it the worst. What was the atmosphere like and how did the world react to the games?

[eartmoth]

Hmm, tough to decide however here is the most memorable moments of those olympics:

Lake Placid, NY 1980 Winter Games = the Gold medal in hockey
Los Angeles, CA 1984 Summer Games = boycott
Atlanta, GA 1996 Summer Games = bomber
Salt Lake City, UT 2002 Summer Games = bribery scandal

[JMT]

Originally Posted by workaholics

Let's start from the 1980s

Lake Placid, NY 1980 Winter Games
Los Angeles, CA 1984 Summer Games
Atlanta, GA 1996 Summer Games
Salt Lake City, UT 2002 Summer Games

Which of these cities handled it the best, and which handled it the worst. What was the atmosphere like and how did the world react to the games?

Salt Lake City hosted the 2002 winter games, not the summer games.

[workaholics]

My mistake, I meant winter games for SLC

[glamatomic]

I vote for the 1904 St. Louis Olympic Games! I hopped in my time portal recently and checked it out- the rowing events on Lake Creve Coeur were pretty incredible!

Jokes aside though (sorry just couldn't help but giving props to St. Louis for an event that happened 79 years before I was born)...

Atlanta to me was the most memorable of the 3 U.S. based Olympics in my life time

[Southern man]

The Winter Olympics at Squaw Valley, Calif. in 1960 were the best for me, because I was in the US Army Signal Corp at the time and we got to lay a few miles of telephone cable up and around all the ski jumps. Also we got to bunk in the athletes dormitory. We stayed a month in late 1959 and it was hard work, but fun.

[po-boy]

It is difficult for me to compare the summer games to the Olympic games b/c the summer games just so much grander in scale.

For me the Atlanta Olympics have been by far the most memorable. Mostly b/c I lived in Alabama at the time and actually got to attend a few events. Also, every time I go to Atlanta I see physical reminders of the games such as Centennial Olympic Park, Turner Field, and all the dorms they built for the athletes which are now used by Georgia State University. Muhammed Ali lighting the torch was very memorable. Plus those games really seemed to put Atlanta on the international map.

Lake Placid is probably next most memorable b/c of the Miracle on Ice.

[RaymondChandlerLives]

The '84 games were pretty the most successful in history and are credited with restoring luster to the modern Olympics. Easy call.

[JayJay718]

Atlanta handled it the worst with the bomb in backpack and every thing

[tablemtn]

Unfortunately, the defining moment of the Atlanta Olympics was the bomb attack. Like the Munich games, it's memorable - but not for the right reasons.