 We discuss the world's largest sports events for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, the Special Olympics. Unlike the Paralympic Games, the Special Olympics, world games, are not held in the same year, nor in conjunction with the Olympic Games, but alternate between summer and winter games in two-year cycles, recurring every fourth year. The first games were held on the 20th of July 1968 in Chicago, Illinois, with about 1,000 athletes from the U.S. and Canada. But how does it all start? In June 1963, Unice Shriver started a day camp called Camp Shriver for children with intellectual disabilities at our home in Maryland. The camp aimed to give disabled children the opportunity to participate in organized athletic events. It became an annual event and various communities began to hold similar camps. Unice Shriver also wrote an article in the Saturday Evening Post revealing that her sister Rosemary had intellectual disabilities. Her frank article was seen as a timing point in changing public attitudes towards people with intellectual disabilities. Why? Because there was a high-profile case, Rosemary and Eunice were both the sisters of President Kennedy. At the same time, others also began to focus on disabled athletes. For example, Canadian physical education professor Frank Hayden demonstrated that the intellectually disabled people benefit greatly from participation in physical exercise. Hayden developed an idea for national games and his work brought him to the attention of Unice Shriver. Their work resulted in the formation of an international Special Olympics that would be held every two years. And so the first Special Olympic Games were held in 1968 in Chicago with about 1,000 athletes taking part. In the most recent Special Olympics held in Abu Dhabi, 7,500 athletes from 200 countries competed in over 24 disciplines. Rosemary's disability provided Unice Shriver with an overall vision that people with intellectual disabilities could compete and at the same time, unified together in public. The Special Olympic Games dramatically changed the perceptions and attitudes of international societies regarding the abilities and limitations of people with intellectual disabilities.