Käthe Krauss

Katharina "Käthe" Anna Krauß (sometimes spelled Krauss; 29 November 1906 – 9 January 1970) was a German track and field athlete, who won three gold medals at the 1934 Women's World Games in London and a bronze medal in the 100 metres at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, where she was also on the German 4 × 100 m relay team. She won several German championships in various events and 2 silver medals and a gold medal in the 4 × 100 m relay at the 1938 European Athletics Championships in Vienna.

Käthe Krauss
Krauß at the 1936 Olympics
Personal information
Born29 November 1906
Dresden, German Empire
Died9 January 1970 (aged 63)
Mannheim, West Germany
Height5 ft 9+1⁄4 in (176 cm)
Weight72 kg (159 lb)
Sport
SportAthletics
Event(s)100 m, 200 m, 80 m hurdles, high jump, long jump, shot put, discus throw, javelin throw
ClubDresdner SC
Achievements and titles
Personal best(s)100 m – 11.8 (1935)
200 m – 24.4 (1938)
80 mH – 12.2 (1936)
HJ – 1.51 m (1933)
LJ – 5.85 m (1937)
SP – 11.99 m (1933)
DT – 41.65 m (1935)
JT – 37.91 m (1931)[1][2]
Medal record
Representing  Germany
Women's World Games
Gold medal – first place 1934 London 100 metres
Gold medal – first place 1934 London 200 metres
Gold medal – first place 1934 London 4 x 100 m relay
Bronze medal – third place 1934 London Discus throw
Olympic Games
Bronze medal – third place 1936 Berlin 100 metres
European Championships
Gold medal – first place1938 Vienna4×100 m relay
Silver medal – second place1938 Vienna100 m
Silver medal – second place1938 Vienna200 m

Athletics career

Born in Dresden, Krauß was a member of Dresdner SC, where she was discovered and trained by the influential coach Woldemar Gerschler.[3] She won the national women's title in the 100 metres from 1934 through 1938,[4][5][6] in the 200 metres in 1932, 1934, and 1938 (in 1931 and 1933 she took second),[7][8] and in the long jump[9] and the pentathlon in 1937,[10] and was on the national champion Dresdner SC 4 × 100 metre relay teams in 1932 and 1936.[11][12]

At the 1934 Women's World Games in London, she won gold medals in the 100 metres (11.9 s), the 200 metres (24.9 s), and the 4 × 100 metre relay (48.6 s), and the bronze medal in discus (39.875 m).[13]

At the women's 1938 European Athletics Championships in Vienna, she won silver medals in the 100 metres (12.0 s) and 200 metres (24.4 s)[14] and a gold medal as part of the German 4 × 100 metre relay team (46.8 s).[15][16]

At the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, at that time holding the German women's record for the 100 metres,[17] Krauß won the bronze medal in that event with a time of 11.9 s.[18][19] She was one of three Olympic medalists that year from Dresdner SC, the others being Rudolf Harbig and Luise Krüger.[20] She was also on the German women's 4 × 100 m relay team that was in the lead but lost due to a dropped baton on the final leg;[21][22][23] in the heats the German team had been faster than the Americans, the eventual winners, and beaten the world record with a time of 46.4 s;[24][25] the American winning time in the final was half a second slower.[26][27][28] As national 100-metre champion, Krauß was the fastest runner on the German team,[29] but had run dead heats with Marie Dollinger.[30]

Postwar

After World War II, Krauß moved to Landau, where she coached[31] and was active in senior athletics; there she was also known as a pianist and the owner of a sporting goods shop. In 1952 she published a book on sprint running titled Der Kurzstreckenlauf.[1][32] The local athletics club awards a prize named for her.[33] She died in Mannheim on 9 January 1970.

Controversy

Along with the gold and silver medalists in the 1936 Olympic women's 100 metre event, Helen Stephens and Stanisława Walasiewicz, Krauß has been suspected of being intersex.[34][35]

References
  1. Käthe Krauß. sports-reference.com
  2. Käthe Krauss. trackfield.brinkster.net
  3. Egon Meyer-Venecia, Hoffnung aber läßt nichts zu Schanden werden, self-published, Denzlingen, 2003, ISBN 9783833008481, p. 25 (in German)
  4. Fritz Steinmetz, 75 Jahre Deutsche Leichtathletik-Meisterschaften 1898–1972, Berlin: Bartels & Wernitz, 1973, ISBN 9783870399566, p. 191 (in German)
  5. Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (100m-Damen), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  6. Steinmetz, p. 192
  7. Steinmetz, p. 196.
  8. Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (200m – Damen), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  9. Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (Weitsprung – Damen), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  10. Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (Mehrkampf – Damen), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  11. Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (Staffeln – Damen – Teil 1), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  12. Steinmetz, p. 261.
  13. FSFI Women's World Games, GBRAthletics.com, Athletics Weekly, 2005, retrieved 17 July 2012.
  14. Leichtathletik-EM (Damen Teil 1), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  15. Leichtathletik-EM (Damen Teil 3), Historie, Sport-komplett.de (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  16. European Championships (Women), GBRAthletics.com, Athletics Weekly, 2005, retrieved 17 July 2012.
  17. Gudrun Angelis and Marianne Pitzen, eds., Frauen bei Olympia: Kunst – Sport – Wissenschaft; Olympische und Paralympische Spiele 1896–2008; eine Ausstellung im Frauenmuseum vom 17. August bis 9. November 2008, Bonn: Frauenmuseum, 2008, ISBN 9783940482129, p. 112 (in German)
  18. Guy Walters, Berlin Games: How Hitler Stole the Olympic Dream, London: Hodder-John Murray, ISBN 978-0-7195-6783-4, p. 211.
  19. Fritz Steinmetz and Dieter Huhn, Erfolge der deutschen Leichtathletik seit 1896: Weltmeisterschaften, Europameisterschaften, Olympische Spiele, Agon Sportverlag-Statistics 8, Kassel: Agon, 1994, ISBN 9783928562386, p. 117 (in German)
  20. Auszug aus der Vereinsgeschichte, Dresdner Sportclub 1898 e.V., April 2011, retrieved 17 July 2012 (in German)
  21. Bud Greenspan, 100 Greatest Moments in Olympic History, Los Angeles: General Publication Group, 1995, ISBN 9781881649663, p. 33.
  22. Reinhard Rürup, ed., 1936, die Olympischen Spiele und der Nationalsozialismus: eine Dokumentation, Berlin: Argon, 1996, ISBN 9783870243500, p. 144 (in German)
  23. Birgit Jochens and Sonja Miltenberger, eds., Zwischen Rebellion und Reform: Frauen in Berliner Westen, Berlin: Jaron, 1999, p. 220 (in German)
  24. Walters, pp. 268–69
  25. Report: Games of the Olympiad, New York: United States Olympic Committee, 1936, OCLC 17760969, p. 159.
  26. Duff Hart-Davis, Hitler's Games: The 1936 Olympics, New York: Harper, 1986, ISBN 9780060155544, p. 200.
  27. Louise Mead Tricard, American Women's Track and Field: A History, 1895 through 1980, Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 1996, ISBN 9780786402199, p. 227.
  28. Walters states in error, p. 269, that the American time in the final, 46.9 s, was faster.
  29. Walters, p. 270.
  30. "Frauleins Will Bolster Nazi Team", Lawrence Journal-World, 17 June 1936, p. 6.
  31. August Schimpf, Vereinschronik Archived 15 December 2010 at the Wayback Machine, Leichtathletik-Club Oberhaardt 1954, Edenkoben (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  32. Eberhard Vollmer, "Neuauflage der 'ewigen' Senioren-Bestenliste", Leichtathletik.de, 30 November 2010 (in German)
  33. jwe, Leichtathletik: Oleg Zernickel neuer Käthe-Krauß-Preisträger, Leichtathletik, Turnverein 1981 e.V., ASV Landau, (in German), retrieved 17 July 2012.
  34. Walters, p. 211, comments on Marie Dollinger telling Elfriede Kaun in 1968, "You know, I was the only woman in that race!": "[I]t is easy to see in photographs why Dollinger should have suspected Krauss of being a man."; photo caption between pages 272 and 273: "The gender of all three women would be subject to many doubts."
  35. Michael Krüger, ed., Olympische Spiele: Bilanz und Perspektiven im 21. Jahrhundert, Sport 1, Münster: Lit, 2001, ISBN 9783825856151, note 97, p. 132 (in German)
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