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MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Tuesday, August 24th. You’re listening to WORLD Radio and we’re so glad you are!

Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Coming next on The World and Everything in It: The Paralympics. Those games start today. They run through September 5 in Japan.

But the Olympic & Paralympic Museum is in the United States. Continuing with our summer Destinations series, WORLD correspondent Jenny Rough takes us on a tour of that museum.

JENNY ROUGH, REPORTER: Colorado Springs, Colorado. Olympic city USA. It’s home to three Olympic pillars: The Olympic and Paralympic Committee. The Olympic Training Center. And, as of July 2020, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Museum. A futuristic-looking building. Sleek. Lots of glass. And very oddly shaped.

GARY HEASTON: Elizabeth Diller herself was the lead architect, she wanted this building to look like an athlete in motion. So when you look at it, it looks twisted. It’s actually designed to resemble a discus thrower. 

[editor's note: the museum was a collaborative effort of the firm Diller Scofidio and Renfro]

Tour guide Gary Heaston tells us to put on our track shoes—today’s tour is fast-paced.

STAFF MEMBER: Have a great time, guys. Gary’s the best.

We whiz by an ice skate signed by Kristi Yamaguchi. The last wooden skies to be used in the Olympics. And the first gold medal anyone ever won in the modern Games, which is actually made of silver. We see the hockey scoreboard from the Lake Placid 1980 Winter Games where the U.S. team beat the Soviets in possibly the biggest upset in Olympic history.

AL MICHAELS: Do you believe in miracles? Yes! Unbelievable!

The stories behind the Olympic artifacts inspire. But even more so the stories behind the Paralympics. Men and women who have not only trained long and hard but have done so under life’s most challenging circumstances. Like Randy Snow.

HEASTON: He was working on the family ranch. He was 16 years old. Somebody was operating a front-end loader. And they dropped a bale of hay. It crushed Randy. The bale of hay was half a ton. But Randy started doing wheelchair racing. Then he switched over and he started doing wheelchair tennis. In 1992, Randy wins gold in singles and in doubles.

And Tatyana McFadden, from St. Petersburg, Russia. Born with spina bifida.

HEASTON: This is Tatyana’s wheelchair when she was a little girl, that red wheelchair. Her mom didn’t know how to raise her, so her mom gave her up to an orphanage. Finally, she was adopted by an American diplomat by the name of Deborah McFaddan.

Tatyana has competed in both summer and winter Olympics.

HEASTON: She has won 17 Paralympic medals, 16 of them in wheelchair racing.

The start of the Paralympic movement dates to 1948.

HEASTON: Unlike the modern Games and the Ancient Games that both started in Greece, the Paralympics started in the United Kingdom, in Great Britain. The first competitors were G.I.s who had spinal cord injuries.

A doctor at the Stoke Mandeville Hospital in England saw the value sports provided to spinal patients. He organized a competition to coincide with the opening day of the 1948 London Summer Olympics.

HEASTON: And they only had one sport. It was archery.

Today, the Paralympics sanctions 28 sports. Including goalball. A sport only found in the Paralympics.

AUDIO: [Goalball ball and whistle]

HEASTON: The athletes competing in goalball are visually impaired.

When the ball rolls toward the goal, the athletes stop the ball by listening for it.

HEASTON: You might have an 85 percent vision loss. I only have 50 percent. I’d have an advantage, right? To make it fair, all the athletes wear goggles that are blacked out.

Visual impairment is one of 10 disability classes. Others include short stature, impaired muscle power, and amputees. T.C. Carter was born without a fibula, a bone in the lower leg.

T.C. CARTER: It would’ve been impossible for me to live a normal life without either an amputation or having a metal rod put in my leg to replace that.

His parents had to make that hard decision for him when Carter was 1. They decided to amputate. Carter wore a tiny prosthesis as a toddler. His leg didn’t slow him down. He loved running around and being active. But in elementary school, he began to notice other people looked different:

CARTER: I think one day I came home, and I was like, “Hey, why does everyone have two legs? Like why are they weird? Why are they the weird ones?”

At age 8, he went to a camp for kids with physical disabilities. And fell in love with skiing.

CARTER: So freeing, so fast! It was everything I didn’t know I wanted and needed.

His first race: down the bunny hill. Technically, he made the fastest time. But placed second because he didn’t quite follow the rules.

CARTER: I didn’t want to go around any of the brushes, or gates. I just went straight down the hill. And if that wasn’t an indicator of what was coming.

Eight years later, at 16, he watched the Paralympics in Vancouver. Another dream took shape. Four years later, he competed in Sochi. Today, he wears a leg made of carbon fiber, light and durable, with a Captain America shield painted on it. He’s currently training for the giant slalom and super-G in the hopes of competing in the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympic Games.

Even in the same game year, Olympic and Paralympic medals differ. Museum archive specialist Ashton Langrick shows us the Paralympic medals from Rio 2016.

ASHTON LANGRICK: This particular year is very special in that it’s the only year that they decided to make medals that make sound.

Bronze has a light, airy metallic sound with 16 ball bearings.

AUDIO: [Rio 2016 bronze Paralympic medal]

Silver a bit louder with 20 and gold 28.

LANGRICK: The silver makes a more deep, gritty metallic sound, while the gold makes a more full true ringing metallic sound.

AUDIO: [Rio 2016 silver and gold Paralympic medal]

T.C. Carter says the most memorable moment of the Paralympics isn’t the race, or crossing the finish line, or even placing in the top 20, as he did in the PyeongChang 2018 Games. It’s the parade of nations during opening ceremonies. He remembers standing in back of the stadium with Team USA, waiting.

CARTER: Then eventually we’re at this doorway where you can’t see much through the tunnel but light shining in.

Then marching out to a sea of people from all around the world, cheering.

CARTER: And it didn’t matter what country you’re from, who you were before that. The Olympics and Paralympics, they’re about more than yourself, more than your country, and more than the sport you’re doing. Because it really is a time when the entire world comes together for the spirit and sport of competition. The fact that everyone can come together and put aside their differences is a really special thing.

Let the games begin.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Jenny Rough in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

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