Lifting ‘Round the World': The Goodwill Weightlifting Tours of 1955

Abstract

In the first visit by American athletes to the Soviet Union since World War II, the U.S. weightlifting team included 340-pound Paul Anderson who startled the sports world in June of 1955 by pressing a world record 402 pounds, exceeding that of his Soviet adversary by 77 pounds. The admiration evoked by his colossal size and strength encouraged the State Department to send Anderson and other weightlifters on goodwill tours to counter Soviet expansionism in the Middle East and South Asia. The first tour evoked praise from President Dwight Eisenhower and Vice President Richard Nixon, but the second tour proved disappointing when Anderson was unable to perform as expected and Coach Bob Hoffman made disparaging remarks about local customs, thus inadvertently planting seeds of ill-will. The 1955 weightlifting tours illustrated the likelihood of unanticipated consequences and limitations of using athletics as a Cold War strategy to counter Soviet influence in non-aligned countries. Previous accounts have provided chiefly macroscopic views with only a vague notion of what transpired on the ground during goodwill tours. This study provides a closer view of how they were conducted, examples of interaction between visitors and locals, and their failure to fulfil the strategic aims of the Eisenhower Administration.