World Wheelchair Games
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The World Wheelchair Games, formally known as the Stoke Mandeville Wheelchair Games and the Stoke Mandeville Games, gave birth to the Paralympics. The World Wheelchair Games is an event that is held in Stoke Mandeville anually (the only exception was in 1999; the year when the Summer Paralympics were held in New Zealand). The Games started in 1948 by Sir Ludwig Guttmann who organized a sporting competition involving World War II veterans with spinal cord injurys. In 1952, the Netherlands joined in the games creating the first international competition for the disabled.