About Us

International Sports Hall of Fame and Olympic Museum

THIS MUSEUM IS NOW AVAILABLE! FOR DETAILS SEE OUR HOME PAGE

ABOUT US AND THE INTERNATIONAL SPORTS

HALL OF FAME AND OLYMPIC MUSEUM

Eric Nash, Executive Director

THIS YEAR IN 2012, WE CELEBRATE OUR 32nd ANNIVERSARY

Eric Nash opened the International Sports Hall of Fame and Olympic Museum in January 1980, one month before the 1980 Winter Olympics of Lake Placid in in upstate New York started, in Orange County, California, when the LAOOC was getting ready for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. Having one of the largest collections of Olympic pins and memorabilia in this country, ISHFOM was chosen by the Organizing Committee LAOOC and the official pin licensee Oh La LA. to sell their pins in their museum and in other gift stores in the greater Los Angeles and San Francisco area and distribute their pins and pin sets throughout California. We carried the pins and sets in our gift store in Disneyland and promoted the LA Olympics for four years until the games began. After the Olympics we decided to purchase all leftover pins and pin sets from the licensee and became the only source that sold pins and sets and we still have a few left, which we sell below the original prices.

In 1990 after 10 years in Orange County and the Olympic craze over, and the museum being visited much less than during the Olympics, we decided not to renew the expensive lease, and move the museum to our three story property on the Oregon Central Coast, a 6,700 square foot building facing the beautiful Pacific Ocean and a constant view of Grey Whales and occasional Orcas, living on the third floor with a fantastic view, with the museum occupying half of the building, we decided not to charge for admission, other than in summer, when the town is full with tourists, which is OK, since we are retired anyway. The reason I got involved in all this is simply because I lived in the kind of sport and Olympic atmosphere, and being involved since childhood.

Brought up in a family of Austrian Olympians, my Mother a first league football player for Austria, I was active in sports at a very early age and attended my first Olympics at age ten, through my dad's cousin Edgar Fried, in his youth a top sprinter and later high Sports Official and member of the Austrian Olympic Committee since 1920 and Secretary General for 26 years. He was Chef de Mission for the Austrian Olympic team from 1946 1972 and the President of the modern pentathlon Federation and holder of the IOC's "Prix de la Reconaisance Olympique" He was an official Austrian Representative and Supporter of the International Olympic Academy in Olympia, Greece, from its beginning and invited me to attend first the 1936 Winter Olympics, and then the first Torch Lighting Ceremony for the 1936 Olympic Games in Olympia, Greece, and the Berlin Lustgarten at noon, on the same day of the Opening Ceremony for the 1936 Summer Olympics in the big Berlin Olympia Stadium, and staying with the Austrian Olympic team in the Olympic Athlete's Village after the torch ceremony in Vienna

Attending my first two Olympics and the four Olympic Flame Ceremonies in 1936 at age ten, as well as being at most Olympics since, as a participant twice and volunteer or visitor with Argentine Accreditation collecting for my collection, which has about 20,000 items dating from 1896 to the present and by being a distributor of the 1984 LAOOC pin licensee the museum now has a complete collection of 1984 Los Angeles and Sarajevo pins, and pin sets, as well as any other memorabilia and rare artifacts. And it has also a lot of nice and rare items from the CIO or IOC, obtained by trading with them. When we opened the museum to display the collection and share it with the public. We also sold the 1984 pins and pin sets there and in our gift store, and when one spent a certain amount, admission was free. We specialized in the 1984 Olympics and purchased all remaining pins and pin sets from the licensee after the Olympics, and are the only source left in the United States that still sells the original pins and pin sets in mint condition at less than original prices, which make beautiful gifts.

Since our children did not grow up in a country where football is the main sport, and in the schools mostly see American football and baseball and at home have television and computers only a few youngsters stand out and make sports a career unless one is a natural, or seven foot tall guy, making millions. Conditions when I was in sport were different, as there were no computers and television, and sport was not a source for making money, but to be proud to have succeeded to be an Olympian. Most young people today don't have the same feeling or inclination for sports as I had when growing up and even after, when I put all my money and effort in the museum as long as I was able. But now I am getting too old and ill to go on and we would like to find some organization that would like to get involved in Sports and Olympics, and would buy and take over the museum, which would do very well in a larger city, where it can be enjoyed by more people, especially young people of the USA and move it to a more populated area. If interested, please contact us by email or phone. Thank you.

Our three email addresses: enash327@yahoo.com ( checked daily, but it is not a very secure email address) olynash327@hotmail.com or: ericnash327@olympicsource.org (checked weekly, but are secure addresses) (Some emails sent through Yahoo have been stolen by internet criminals who send false messages to some contacts. Do not believe anything they are saying in them! They are just trying to get money from anybody!)

Our Mailing Address in Summer: P.O.Box 166, Depoe Bay, Oregon 97341

Our Mailing Address in Winter: 692 Pinnacle Court, Mesquite, Nevada 89027

Telephone: Summer 541-765-2923 or Winter: 702-346-1776 (Only one telephone will work at one time)