story by: JASON KEYSER

As a child in the 1950s, Ernie Peterson remembers watching the Olympics on TV. ​“I sat there absolutely fascinated and thought, ‘You know, it would be nice to ​attend one day.’”

This summer in Paris, Peterson is attending his sixth Olympic Games as a ​volunteer.

He’s part of a select group of devotees who volunteer at the Games over and ​over to do everything from taking tickets to helping spectators find their seats.

Since 2002, Peterson, a retired property appraiser from DeLand, Florida, has ​helped at the Games in Salt Lake City, Torino, Vancouver, Sochi, and Rio, mostly ​as a media assistant accompanying athletes to post-event interviews. He’s met ​gold medallists including skier Lindsey Vonn, swimmer Michael Phelps, and ​snowboarder Shaun White, marvelling at “their focus, their intensity.”

One of his most memorable moments, though, was seeing two skiers in Sochi, ​Russia, embrace their mothers after downhill runs, one finishing with a gold ​medal and the other coming in fourth or fifth, their parents equally proud. “You ​could not tell from the reaction of the parent which one won gold,” he says. “It ​was just incredibly moving.”

This year, Peterson has what might be his sweetest gig yet: working the opening ​ceremony and at the outdoor beach volleyball matches beside the Eiffel Tower. ​Another bit of luck — when he couldn’t find a place to stay, a fellow Rotarian ​offered to host him. And this isn’t the first time; he’s stayed with Rotarians at ​other Olympics and, in return, has hosted them in Florida.

The Olympics and Rotary, Peterson says, have a lot in common: cultural ​exchange, internationality, and a “desire to do something good for the world.”

Ernie Peterson is a member of Rotary Club of Deland (Breakfast), Florida.

This story originally appeared in Rotary Magazine, August 2024.