Serbian Olympic Club

Officially, the Olympism in today’s Serbia came into being on 10 February (23 February, according to the Gregorian calendar) 1910 when the Serbian Olympic Club was established.
The Serbian Olympic Club was founded on the initiative of a group of young France-educated army officers, headed by Svetomir S. Đukić, in the newsroom of “Novo vreme” on the fourth floor of the “Moskva” Hotel in Belgrade, as the first Olympic organisation of the South Slavs.
Captain Svetomir S. Đukić was elected director; lieutenant-colonel Miloš Ilić and student Aleksandar Bodi were elected secretaries; apothecary Milosav Jovanović and captain Milorad Petrović were elected treasurers; and retired general Nikodije Stevanović was elected honorary president.
The Serbian Olympic Club was initially financially aided by “Novo vreme” and Tramcar Society, then by the Ministry of Commerce, the Management of Topčider Farming Estate and Correctional Institution, the Ministry of Defence, Belgrade Military Authorities, Belgrade Municipality, Constabulary, Shipping Society, Military Academy, Serbian National Theatre, charity organisation “Kolo srpskih sestara” and the Court. King Petar often attended various competitions, and designated a workout area in Belgrade's recreation resort, Košutnjak, and prince Đorđe was a member of the Serbian Olympic Club.
In 1911, the Serbian Olympic Club changed its name into the Central Federal Management or the Central Olympic Club and, as Svetomir Đukić himself admitted later, only then, one year after the foundation, did they become aware of the existence of the International Olympic Committee… Nor can it be inferred from the Club’s Statute that the Olympic Games were the incentive for the foundation of the Serbian Olympic Club.
The Statute reads:

• a) the SOC is to facilitate the foundation of the sports associations and sports clubs, morally as well as financially, partially even advisory, and to aid the existing sports associations and clubs;
• b) the SOC is to organise home and international Olympic matches and competitions;
• c) the SOC is to organise trips and trekking excursions of different groups in the country and abroad, and
• d) the SOC is to take measures that would ensure awakening and inciting the sportsmanship in people.

“Inciting” the sportsmanship and organising the competitions that ranged from walking to cycling (on 9 January 1911 the SOC organised the flight of Edvard Rusijan which resulted in the death of the Slovenian pilot under the battlements of Kalemegdan), the Serbian Olympic Club, at first not recognised by the Sokol Association, the Shooting Association, the Equestrian Association, the National Health Society, nor by the majority of the papers, availed itself of the non-Olympic means – giving prize money to the winners and to those who brought most participants to a competition (“private initiative of the Committee exhausted absolutely all the available resources having spent nearly 25,000 dinars for prizes in two and a half years”, reads a letter of the Serbian Olympic Committee to the Minister of Education and Religious Affairs written after the Stockholm Games). It was, clearly, the violation of the fundamental Olympic principle – amateurism, but no one in the Serbia of the day was aware of it.
The Serbian Olympic Club, most probably by the end of 1911, having learned about the existence of the IOC and, as Svetomir Đukić wrote, “connected with them”, launched an initiative for the participation of the Serbian athletes in the 1912 Games in Stockholm and the admittance to the International Olympic Committee. The Olympic qualifications were held in Košutnjak in May 1912, and the 100m winner Dušan Milošević and the marathon winner (the marathon route was Košutnjak – Umka – Košutnjak) Dragutin Tomašević were chosen to represent Serbia at the Stockholm Games.
With the Cabinet’s aid of 4,000 dinars (the payment order was signed by the minister Nikola Pašić), headed by the Serbian Olympic Club’s director, infantry captain Svetomir Đukić, its secretary, cavalry lieutenant Dragutin Vojnović and the team leader, engineer Andra Jović, they left for Stockholm by train on 12 June, seen off from Belgrade’s Central Train Station with shooting.
Svetomir Đukić, who commenced his friendship with Pierre de Coubertin in Stockholm, in the official report on the Games, writes: “After some lobbying among the IOC members, and in connection with the favourable achievement of our runners, the Serbian Olympic Club was admitted to the International Olympic Committee at the last session”.
The IOC Congress in Stockholm was held from 4 to 17 July. On the first day, Serbia’s request for admission was announced, and Đukić’s report indicates that the admission took place on the last day (“at the last session”, Đukić wrote). The IOC documentation does not give us any more details either. Svetomir Đukić became a member of the International Olympic Committee in Stockholm (he held this position until 1948 when, at his own request, he was relieved of his duty at the IOC Congress in London).
With the foundation of the new state in 1919, the Serbian Olympic Committee (according to its seal the Olympic Committee of Serbia) first became The Yugoslav Olympic Board, then the Yugoslav Olympic Committee, retaining the name until 3 April 2003 when it was consolidated as the Olympic Committee of Serbia and Montenegro.
The last alternation of its name into the Olympic Committee of Serbia occurred on 8 June 2006 and was effected by the dissolution of the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. Thereby, following 87 years of successful organisation and representation of sport in federal states, the Serbian national committee became again the representative of the Olympic movement and sport of Serbia, keeping the continuity of the IOC membership initiated by the Serbian Olympic Club.