Greece

In keeping with tradition, the flame was lit at the Temple of Hera in the Greek city of Olympia on March 30, 1996. First Lady Hillary Clinton headed the American delegation at the lighting ceremony. Greek long jumper Kostas Koukodimos was the first torchbearer.^[15] Over 800 people carried the torch a distance of 2,141 kilometers (1,330 mi) across Greece, the most extensive in the history of the Games, to mark the 100th anniversary of the 1896 Olympics in Athens.^[14] The Greek leg of the relay culminated on April 6, when the torch arrived at Panathenaic Stadium in Athens.^[16][17] The flame was carried through Athens by representatives of every country which had hosted an Olympic Games in the past century.^[18]

More information Date, Locations ...

Date	Locations[16][19]	Map	Inset map
March 30	Olympia, Pyrgos, Kalamata	Olympia Vergina Naousa Pella Thessaloniki Athens	Olympia Pyrgos Kalamata Taygetus Sparta Tegea Tripoli Nafplio Argos Corinth Patras Missolonghi Navpaktos   Galaxidi Itea Amfissa Delphi Parnassus Thebes Marathon Athens
March 31	Kalamata, Taygetus, Sparta, Tegea
April 1	Tegea, Tripoli, Nafplio, Argos, Corinth
April 2	Corinth, Patras
April 3	Patras, Missolonghi, Navpaktos, Galaxidi, Itea, Amfissa, Delphi
April 4	Delphi, Parnassus, Thebes, Vergina
April 5	Vergina, Naousa, Pella, Thessaloniki
April 6	Thessaloniki, Marathon, Athens (Panathenaic Stadium)

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United States

After burning in Athens for three weeks, HOC president Antonios Tzikas formally handed the flame to ACOG president Billy Payne on April 26. A lantern containing the flame was loaded onto The Centennial Spirit, a specially painted Delta Air Lines McDonnell Douglas MD-11, at Athens' Ellinikon International Airport early on the morning of April 27. The flight from Athens to Los Angeles International Airport lasted 14 hours, departing Athens at 4 a.m. local time and arriving in Los Angeles by 9 a.m. local time.^[20][21]

From the airport, the flame was carried in a helicopter to Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, site of the 1984 Olympic opening and closing ceremonies, for a nationally-televised ceremony to mark the beginning of the relay. ACOG attempted to arrange for the nude statues in front of the Coliseum to be covered during the event,^[22] but the statues ultimately remained uncovered. Billy Payne lit the first torch from the lantern before passing it to Rafer Johnson, who had lit the cauldron in 1984, to run the first leg. Johnson passed the flame to Gina Hemphill Tillman, granddaughter of Jesse Owens, who had been the first torchbearer on the 1984 relay. Tillman passed it on to swimmer Janet Evans.^[23]

Leaving the Coliseum, the torch was carried through Los Angeles to Santa Monica Pier, then along the Pacific coast.^[24] At one point in Los Angeles, the torch was carried by Robert Zemeckis.^[25] The first day of the relay continued until 4:59 a.m., when the run stopped for an hour in Huntington Beach before continuing on its way to San Diego.^[26] Notable torchbearers in San Diego County included Wheel of Fortune hosts Pat Sajak and Vanna White in Oceanside^[27] and 1936 Olympic athlete Kenny Griffin in Carlsbad.^[28]

After roughly following the Mexican border to Yuma, Arizona, the torch made its first rail journey to Phoenix. Security was high, as an act of sabotage along the same tracks six months earlier had caused the deadly 1995 Palo Verde derailment.^[29] In Kingman, Arizona, the route briefly followed the famous Route 66, before exiting the state at the Hoover Dam. It was carried across the rim of the dam by Martha Watson. That morning, to mark the torch's passage, the world's largest U.S. flag was unfurled for the first time across the dam's wall, but it had to be taken down due to high winds before the torch arrived.^{[3]: 16 [30]}

The relay proceeded into Las Vegas, Nevada, where it was announced that the casinos would briefly dim their lights to create a more dramatic entrance for the torch, but did not ultimately do so.^{[3]: 16 [30]} From Las Vegas, the flame was again loaded onto a special Union Pacific train which brought it across California, with occasional stops to run through larger cities, until it reached San Jose. The torch was carried on a cable car in San Francisco and was run across the Golden Gate Bridge before dawn the next morning.^[31] After running to Sacramento, the torch made another rail journey to Eugene, Oregon. The route continued northward, on foot and by bicycle, through Portland and as far north as Seattle, Washington, where the torch crossed Puget Sound on the Seattle–Bremerton ferry, the only ferry ride along the cross-country route.^[32] Cyclist Harley Sheffield dropped and broke the torch while riding with it across the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, an incident which received so much publicity that Sheffield was featured as a guest on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.^[33] Dana Lough, a wheelchair-using torchbearer in Seattle, sustained a serious head injury when her chair was improperly secured on a shuttle bus transporting runners after the relay.^[34]

From Seattle, the flame traveled to the southeast by train. ACOG president Billy Payne joined the railway journey in Yakima, Washington.^[35] The torch then passed through Idaho on its way to Salt Lake City, Utah, which was awarded the 2002 Winter Olympics shortly before the route was announced. Bart Conner and Nadia Comăneci, Olympic gymnasts who had recently married, carried the torch in Salt Lake City.^[36] After crossing Wyoming, the relay visited Denver, Colorado and Colorado Springs, home of the United States Olympic Committee headquarters and the U.S. Olympic Training Center.

At Julesburg, the torch was picked up by riders of the National Pony Express Association, who carried it (along with a bag of commemorative letters addressed to patients at a children's hospital) on horseback to St. Joseph, Missouri. Like the original Pony Express, the riders traveled non-stop for 58 hours straight, from 9 p.m. on May 13 to 7 a.m. on May 16. While relay organizers had chosen this particular segment of the historic Pony Express route because it mostly ran alongside modern roads which could accommodate the caravan of support vehicles,^[37] road conditions forced them to separate from the torch-bearing riders for some stretches.^[38][39] At Rock Creek Station near Endicott, a horse was spooked and threw its rider, causing another torch to be broken.^[40]

The torch traveled southward from St. Joseph into Kansas City, Missouri, then across Kansas and Oklahoma. The relay route, as initially announced, included a stop in Yale, Oklahoma, which organizers described as the "birthplace" of Jim Thorpe. Thorpe was actually born in Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma, near the town of Prague, and about 50 miles away from Yale, where Thorpe lived briefly as an adult.^[1] Residents of Prague protested the decision and asked for the torch to be rerouted to their town. The relay organizers resisted these requests at first, saying that the route had already been carefully planned and could not be significantly altered,^[41][42] but ultimately agreed to visit both Yale and Prague.^[43][44]

In Oklahoma City, the torch was carried by first responders to the Oklahoma City bombing a year earlier.^[45] Between Waco and Bryan, Texas, it was flown on a 1943 Stearman biplane.^[46][47]

In Houston, the route met the Gulf Coast and continued eastward. A 310,000 US gallons (1,200,000 L; 260,000 imp gal) gasoline spillage in Gramercy, Louisiana, forced the relay to skip the town and take an unexpected 15-mile (24 km) detour along Interstate 10.^[11][48] The torch rode on the historic St. Charles Streetcar in New Orleans.^[46] Sister Helen Prejean ran with the torch in New Orleans.^[49]

From New Orleans, the torch was transported mostly by rail through Mississippi and Arkansas, passing through Memphis and roughly following the Mississippi River northward. Starting from the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, the torch was intended to board the American Queen, the recently-built river steamboat which was the largest of its kind in history, to be transported up the Mississippi to Hannibal, Missouri, best known as the boyhood home of Mark Twain.^[46] However, due to flooding on the river that prevented the American Queen from reaching St. Louis for the journey, an alternative route had to be devised that would still allow the torch and hundreds of honored guests to spend a day on the river. As a result, after reaching St. Louis, the torch was driven on a bus back down to Paducah, Kentucky, then rode on the American Queen from Paducah to Cairo, Illinois, before being bussed again to Hannibal.^[50][51]

The relay crossed Iowa and reached as far north as Minneapolis in its zig-zagging route, before making another rail journey southeastward across Wisconsin to Chicago, where it was estimated that over 500,000 spectators lined the streets.^[34] The torch proceeded through Indianapolis, Indiana and Louisville, Kentucky, where University of Kentucky basketball coach Rick Pitino carried it across the George Rogers Clark Memorial Bridge. Pitino's appearance was delayed due to a bomb threat made against the event, thought to have been made by a person angered by Pitino's recent decision to stay with the team rather than accept an offer to coach the New Jersey Nets.^[39][52]

A stop in Wilmington, Ohio marked the official halfway point of the torch's 84-day journey.^[53] Wendy's founder Dave Thomas carried the torch in the Columbus area.^[54] The American Republic, an iron ore-carrying lake freighter, ferried the flame from Philip A. Hart Plaza in Detroit, down the Detroit River and across Lake Erie to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.^[46]

The torch's planned route took it briefly through Cattaraugus Reservation land in the hamlet of Irving, New York. However, the torch's passage was controversial among members of the Seneca Nation of New York, as the tribe had not been consulted about the event, and as some were displeased by the Olympics' association with the Atlanta Braves and their "tomahawk chop" ritual. Dennis Bowen, the president of the Seneca Nation, said that when the torch runner entered the reservation, members of the tribe would throw a bucket of water on it to douse the flame, then relight the torch with a flame of their own, to draw attention to the plight of Indigenous peoples around the world. The relay organizers defused the controversy by having two young Senecas carry the torch across their land.^[39][55][56]

A mule-drawn packet boat was used to carry the torch down a short segment of the Erie Canal in Camillus, New York.^[46] After passing through Vermont and New Hampshire, the relay followed the course of the Boston Marathon in eastern Massachusetts, and the torch was carried along that stretch by experienced marathoners that included Johnny Kelley, Bill Rodgers, and Bobbi Gibb (the first woman to run the Boston Marathon, without permission, in 1966).^[57] On the steps of the Massachusetts State House, the flame was passed to Nancy Kerrigan.^[58]

In New York City, the torch was carried by Katie Couric in a live segment on The Today Show,^[59] then placed on a Circle Line ferry which passed by the Statue of Liberty on its way to Jersey City, New Jersey. On its arrival in Philadelphia, a torchbearer climbed the Rocky Steps leading to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.^[60] In Washington, D.C., the torch was met on the steps of the U.S. Capitol by Georgia's congressional delegation, including Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.^[61] After Gallaudet University president I. King Jordan handed the torch to President Bill Clinton, the flame rested for the night at the White House. It was intended to burn in a cauldron on the White House lawn overnight, but due to a thunderstorm, it was kept in a lantern on the South Portico instead.^[62]

Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter was originally slated to carry the torch in his hometown of Plains, Georgia on July 12, a controversial inclusion given that Carter had led the 1980 Summer Olympics boycott against the Soviet Union while he was president. However, Carter later canceled his participation, choosing to accept an award from Lions Clubs International in Montreal that day instead.^[63]

Opening ceremony

The end of the relay took place on July 19, 1996, at the opening ceremony in Atlanta. Four-time gold medal-winning discus thrower Al Oerter carried the torch to the stadium, passing it to Evander Holyfield. Holyfield was then joined by Voula Patoulidou and the pair passed the flame to American swimmer Janet Evans, the penultimate torchbearer, who carried it around a lap of the track and up a long ramp leading towards the northern end of the stadium.^[64][65]

The identity of the final torchbearer had been kept secret and was only revealed when Muhammad Ali appeared at the top of the ramp. Ali, who had won gold at the 1960 Games in Rome and later developed Parkinson's disease, lit a mechanical torch which then travelled along a wire, lighting the cauldron at the top of a 116-foot (35 m) tower.^[64][65] His appearance has been referred to as being one of the most inspiring, poignant, and emotional moments in Olympic history.^[64][66][67]