Cambridge exhibition on 1924 Olympics throws spotlight on pioneering black athlete

Letter by William DeHart Hubbard, first black athlete to win an individual gold medal at tournament, is arriving in UK for first time ever

For many people, the 1924 Paris Olympics will – thanks to the 1981 film Chariots of Fire – always be associated with slow-motion images of British runners beating the Americans against the odds, while Vangelis’s haunting score plays in the background.

But an exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, timed to coincide with the event’s return to the French capital, aims to show that the Parisian games a century ago were a turning point, not just for British athletics, but also for race, politics and the rise of celebrity.