Usain Bolt, Yelena Isinbaeva, Cathy Freeman, Michael Phelps, Nadia Comaneci, Abebe Bikila, Misha the Bear… yes, Misha the Bear. With his tearful farewell at the closing ceremony, the Moscow 1980 Games mascot earned his place alongside the sporting icons who have marked Olympic history.

Misha may be one of the most affectionately remembered Olympic mascots, but he was not the first. That honour goes to Waldi, the multi-coloured dog that was created to promote the Munich 1972 Games. He was a dachshund, a popular breed in Germany’s Bavaria region, known for their endurance, tenacity and agility.

Waldi was created by the organising committee staff at their 1969 Christmas party, when they were given crayons and modelling clay with which to develop ideas. He was so popular that the 1972 marathon circuit was even designed in his shape.

Waldi set a trend, with the first mascots being based on animals that were emblematic of the host nation. Montreal 1976 had Amik the beaver, an animal known for its patience and hard work, and with a long-standing place in Canadian culture.

Then came Misha the Russian bear (below), whose full name was apparently Mikhail Potapych Toptygin. Some 45,000 Russians wrote letters with suggestions after a nature television programme and a sports newspaper requested input for the choice of the mascot. In 1978, Misha visited the Salyut 6 space station on a rocket and, after his tearful farewell at the closing ceremony, he returned to the stratosphere, floating away on a bunch of balloons.

Meanwhile, in the Netherlands, also in 1980, the first Paralympic mascots appeared – a unnamed pair of squirrels who represented the Arnhem Games. They were the result of a radio competition in which listeners were asked to send in hand-made models.

Los Angeles 1984 eventually settled on that most emblematic of American animals, an Eagle, called Sam (below). The original idea had been a bear, the emblem of California, but it was dropped so as not to replicate Moscow’s Misha. Created by the Walt Disney company, Sam even had his own cartoon series, in which he was a detective who solved mysteries using the magic of the Olympic rings on his hat.

Hodori, the Seoul 1988 mascot was tiger – an animal that appears frequently in Korean art and legends, often associated with humour, bravery and nobility. He beat off stiff competition from a rabbit, a squirrel and a pair of mandarin ducks.

Then along came Cobi (below), the avant-garde Barcelona 1992 mascot that broke the mould. He was Pyrenean mountain dog with a sideways-pointing nose, designed in the cubist style by Javier Mariscal. Like most ground-breaking works, Cobi received a mixed reaction at first, before growing on the public to become a popular figure.

After Cobi, anything went. Izzy, the Atlanta 1996 mascot, was not an animal or a human, nor an object, but a product of information technology. The goggle-eyed, big-footed blue blob was redesigned after a mixed reception at the Barcelona 1992 hand-over ceremony. Then Sydney 2000 had three mascots – Syd, Olly and Millie – a duck-billed platypus, a kookaburra and an anteater, symbolising water, air and earth.

Athens 2004 had Phevos and Athena, a brother and sister whose names referenced two gods of Olympus, and whose strange shapes were based on seventh century BC terracotta dolls. Beijing 2008 set a new Olympic record with five mascots, one for each of the Olympic rings, called Beibei, Jingjing, Huanhuan, Yingying, Nini. Each name rhymed by repeating the same syllable: a traditional Chinese way of showing affection to children.   

London 2012 had a one-eyed duo called Wenlock, the Olympic mascot named after the small English town of Much Wenlock whose multi-sport event was an inspiration for the modern Olympic Games, and Mandeville (below), the Paralympic mascot named after the small English town of Stoke Mandeville, the birthplace of the Paralympic Games.

So, what will the Rio 2016 mascots be like? You will not have to wait long to find out…

Find out more about the Olympic mascots in the International Olympic Committee video below and this photo gallery, also by the IOC.