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Fifty Years Fit: At age 71, Gandyra-Bechtold still fits into the waitress uniform she wore at the 1960 Olympics. Photo by Gordon Sundberg |
CommentsOlympic Waitress Returns 1960 Memorabilia
By Olivia DwyerPublished: January 16, 2010
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At the end of the 1960 Winter Olympics at Squaw Valley, Elizabeth Gandyra-Bechtold convinced her boyfriend to scale the roof of the Olympic Village Lodge and steal an official welcome flag to keep as a souvenir. On January 4 this year, she returned to the scene of the crime to return the flag.
The flag is the only one to be returned to Squaw Valley, and will be featured at an Olympic Heritage display at the Reno-Tahoe airport before taking up permanent residence in the Olympic Museum, located at Squaw Valley’s High Camp.
Gandyra-Bechtold worked as a waitress at the Olympic Valley Lodge in the athletes’ dining hall during the 1960 Olympics when she was 20 years old. She had come at the suggestion of Bev Anderson, a member of the U.S. Alpine Ski Team, whom she had befriended the previous summer while working at Timberline Lodge at Mount Hood. Gandyra-Bechtold stayed at Heidelmann Lodge on Donner Summit during the Games, hitching a ride from highway patrol each morning to catch the shuttle from Truckee to Squaw.
The 1960 Olympics were “just electrifying,” Gandyra-Bechtold recalled. She collected over 100 pins representing the athletes from different countries that she got to know, and made time to see plenty of the jumping and skating events. Friends among the professional photographers helped Gandyra-Bechtold gain entrance to the Opening Ceremonies, where she sat four seats away from Vice President Richard Nixon.
“Elizabeth’s just a hoot,” said Carolyn Wallace Dee, manager of business administration at Squaw and mayor of Truckee. “She just exudes an enthusiasm about this [Olympic] experience. A lot of us were saying these are stories that we need to capture because we’re going to lose them. It’s a heritage that needs to be preserved.”
The excitement of the 1960 Olympics led to many more adventures for Gandyra-Bechtold, as she and Anderson traveled through Europe in a 1939 Opal the following summer. All these years later, she still fits into her Olympic uniform and continues to travel the world and even attends Burning Man. Gandyra-Bechtold is looking forward to recapturing the magic of the Olympic spirit when she travels to Vancouver to attend the 2010 Olympics this February.
“Vancouver will be amazing; it will be a wonderful experience,” she said. “I’m planning to stay healthy so I can go to many, many more.”
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