President of the International Olympic Committee congress. Athens was approved to host the 1896 Olympic Games, being the original home of the Olympics, and Vikelas was duly chosen as the first President of the IOC. Pierre, Baron de Coubertin, took over the IOC presidency when Demetrius Vikelas stepped down after the Olympics in his own country. Despite its initial success, the Olympic Movement faced hard times, as the 1900 Games (in de Coubertin's own Paris) and 1904 Games were both upstaged by World's Fairs—Exposition Universelle in 1900 and Louisiana Purchase Exposition in 1904—and received little attention. The 1906 Intercalated Games revived the momentum, and the Olympic
Paul Anspach Belgian, who said he was "honored and moved by this very special invitation". He contributed to the formation of the Belgian Olympic Committee in 1906. In 1913 he was one of the founders of the Fédération Internationale d'Escrime (International Fencing Association, or FIE). He served as its Secretary-General, before serving as its President from 1932 until 1939 (when it was suspended for the duration of World War II), and then from 1946 until 1950. In 1914 he sat as Secretary at the Paris Olympic Congress, where he dealt with the technical side of the Congress. In 1914, along with the