The United States hasn’t hosted any Olympic Games since 2002, when Salt Lake City welcomed the world to the Winter Olympics, but man, there have certainly been some cities that have tried.
Los Angeles will host the Summer Olympics in 2028, but it’s kind of cool to think about what might have been, say, if Chicago had hosted a Summer Games.
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So, let’s see what countries were this close to being the host city for an Olympics.
Detroit
How cool would it have been if the Motor City got to host the Olympics? Detroit had bids to host multiple times over the past few decades, but the closest the city came was in 1968. Detroit lost the bid to Mexico City.
Chicago
The city of Chicago made a pretty big push to host the 2016 Olympics, but it didn’t advance beyond the first round of voting, getting beat out by Tokyo, Madrid and the eventual host, Rio de Janeiro.
New York City
The Big Apple made it a little bit further than Chicago did in the voting rounds for the 2012 Olympics, but the bid eventually went to London.
Denver
Isn’t it kind of weird that there has never been a Winter Olympics in Colorado? Well, there almost was. Denver won the bid to host the 1976 Olympics, but withdrew in 1972 and the hosting honor went to Innsbruck, Austria.
The city of Denver decided it would be too much of a financial burden to host the Games, so they gave up hosting it.
Anchorage
OK, how cool would it have been if the Winter Olympics were in Alaska?
Back in the ‘90s, the city in Alaska made two separate bids to host the Winter Games, but never won.
