Scarce cloth torchbearer men’s uniform tank top from the torch relay of the Tokyo 1964 Summer Olympics. Made by Mizuno, the soft white t-shirt features a central patch that bears the emblem of the XVIII Olympiad. In fine condition, with a small stain to the back.
The Olympic flame was carried for 51 days by 870 runners for a total of 26,065 kilometers. Designed on the principle of the coal-mine safety lamp, the Tokyo Olympic torch was filled with priming powder and fumigant, a two-component ignition material that needed to be wind and rain-resistant, and which could both easily ignite and extinguish. Its effect was similar to that of a flare, and it proved a safe and reliable instrument throughout its hemisphere-trotting relay. Although a typhoon and various plane issues caused a one-day delay late in the schedule, the triumphant final relay by Yoshinori Sakai through Tokyo's National Olympic Stadium on October 10, 1964, served as a defining moment for a still-healing postwar Japan.
