Hans Halberstadt

Hans Halberstadt
Personal information
Birth name Hans Ignaz Halberstadt
Nationality German-born American
Born (1885-06-10)10 June 1885
Offenbach am Main, Germany
Died 22 September 1966(1966-09-22) (aged 81)
San Francisco, California, United States
Residence San Francisco, California, United States
Sport
Country Germany; USA
Sport Fencing
Event(s) Epee and sabre

Hans Ignaz Halberstadt (10 June 1885 – 22 September 1966) was a German-born American Olympic fencer.

Early and personal life

Halberstadt was born and raised in Offenbach am Main, Germany, and was Jewish.[1][2][3] He was trained at the Offenbach am Main Fechtclub.[1][4]

Fencing career

Halberstadt was German National Champion in epee in 1922 and 1930.[1] He was also German team sabre champion with Fechtclub Offenbach in 1924 and 1925.[5]

He competed for Germany in the individual and team épée and team sabre (coming in fourth) events at the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam at the age of 42.[5]

After the Nazis came to power, after Kristallnacht his family's business was seized by the Nazis and Halberstadt was interred in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp by the Nazis because he was Jewish.[2][4][6] He then fled Germany at the age of 56 with what he could carry, first to London, and then San Francisco in 1940.[2][4]

Halberstadt then became 1940 US Sabre Champion, both in individual saber and team saber.[5]

In San Francisco he taught fencing in the 1940s at the San Francisco Olympic Club and then at his own club which he opened, and ran a fencing supply company.[2][4] Among his students in San Francisco were Helene Mayer and Tommy Angell. His name lives on through a San Francisco fencing club founded by his students after his 1966 death.[7][8]

Halberstadt was inducted into the U.S. Fencing Hall of Fame, in its Class of 2013.[9]

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Hans Halberstadt at the 1928 Olympics," West Coast Fencing Archive.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Bernard Postal, Jesse Silver, Roy Silver. Encyclopedia of Jews in Sports.
  3. ↑ Paul Yogi Mayer. Jews and the Olympic Games: sport: a springboard for minorities
  4. 1 2 3 4 "Hans Halberstadt and the Thomson Twins," West Coast Fencing Archive.
  5. 1 2 3 "Hans Halberstadt Olympic Results". sports-reference.com. Retrieved 2010-04-25.
  6. ↑ "Halberstadt, Hans," US Fencing Hall of Fame.
  7. ↑ "U.S. Fencing Hall of Fame". Archived from the original on 2013-06-18. Retrieved 2013-06-16.
  8. ↑ "Halberstadt Fencers' Club". Retrieved 2013-06-17.
  9. ↑ "Two Fencers With Penn Ties Headed to Hall of Fame," University of Pennsylvania.
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