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
President of the International Olympic Committee Grandees of Spain, and he was a Spanish Marquis and Grandee since late 1991). In addition, when he traveled to conduct Olympic business, he would insist on a chauffeured limousine as well as a presidential suite in the finest hotel of whatever city he visited. The IOC put an annual rental (at a cost of US$500,000 per year) at a presidential suite for his stays in Lausanne, Switzerland, where the IOC headquarters are located. Besides his lavish accommodations, he was increasingly criticized for the judging and doping scandals and rampant corruption that occurred under his watch. A closed-door inquiry later