Gold Rush at Lake Placid

For the 13th Winter Olympics, the U.S. has dazzling athletes, high hopes

Amid the crumbling columns and pediments in the ancient city of Olympia, a shaft of sunlight glanced off a reflector one day last week and set fire to a slender torch. Next week, after a 5,000-mile flight from the Peloponnesian Peninsula to Athens to the U.S., and a 780-mile relay run from the Virginia Tidewater to the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York, the Olympic flame will ignite a huge torch on a pedestal at...