Ilona Elek Explained

Ilona Elek
Birth Name:Ilona Elek
Fullname:Ilona Elek-Schacherer
Birth Date:17 May 1907
Birth Place:Budapest, Hungary
Death Place:Budapest, Hungary
Sport:Fencing
Event:Foil
Show-Medals:yes

Ilona Elek, known also as Ilona Elek-Schacherer (née “Elek"; 17 May 1907 – 24 July 1988) was a Hungarian Olympic fencer.[1] Elek won more international fencing titles than any other woman.[2]

Early and personal life

Elek was born on 17 May 1907, in Budapest, Kingdom of Hungary to a Hungarian-Jewish father born Eisler who 1939 converted to lutheranism and a Roman-Catholic mother.[3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] She had seven siblings, including two-time Olympic fencer Margit Elek, and her mother died when she was 11 years old.[10] [11] She graduated from a music school.[12] When Hungary entered World War II on the side of Nazi Germany, Hungarian Jews were forbidden from entering fencing competitions, and so Elek and her sister, who was also half-Jewish, were unable to compete until after the war ended.[13]

Fencing career

Elek competed for Hungary in three Olympiads, winning three medals. She is considered to be one of the greatest female fencers in the history of the sport.[14]

Hungarian National Championships

Elek won the Hungarian foil championship in 1946–47, 1949–50, and 1952.

World Championships

Elek won the gold medal in women's foil at the World Championships in 1934, 1935, and 1951.[15] She won silver in 1937 and 1954, and bronze in 1955.[16]

Olympics

Elek was the first woman to win two Olympic gold medals in the individual foil competition.[2]

Elek's first Olympic competition was at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany, at the age of 29. She won the gold medal in the foil event, the first Hungarian woman to win a gold medal at the Olympics. In the process, Elek, who was Jewish,[17] defeated a German with a Jewish father, Helene Mayer. The bronze medal went to Ellen Preis, an Austrian Jew.

The Games were cancelled in 1940 and 1944. When the Games resumed after World War II, at age 41 she repeated her performance as Olympic champion by winning a gold medal in the 1948 Summer Olympics in London, England. Ellen Preis again won the bronze medal.[18]

Elek won the silver medal at the 1952 Helsinki Games. After winning her first five matches in the final pool, she was in contention for the gold medal, but she lost to American Maxine Mitchell, and Italian Irene Camber, who won the gold.

Awards

She was later awarded the Robert Feyerick Cup and the Olympic Order.

International Fencing Federation

In 1983, she was the International Fencing Federation honorary President.[19]

Later years and death

Elek later was a director of a trade company. She died in Budapest at the age of 81.

See also

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Ilona Elek Olympic Results . 3 June 2010 . sports-reference.com . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20130923130321/http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/athletes/el/ilona-elek-schacherer-1.html . 23 September 2013 .
  2. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9002621/Ilona-Elek Ilona Elek
  3. Web site: Duels in the Sunshine. 19 October 2000. Eisen. George. The New York Review. 29 July 2022.
  4. Web site: FamilySearch: Oauth2 Request Error.
  5. https://archive.org/details/foiledhitlersjew00mill/page/157 Foiled: Hitler's Jewish Olympian: the Helene Mayer Story - Milly Mogulof
  6. https://books.google.com/books?id=d6YzDwAAQBAJ&dq=Ilona+Elek&pg=PA27 Memories After My Death: The Story of My Father, Joseph "Tommy" Lapid - Yair Lapid
  7. https://books.google.com/books?id=3sQpDwAAQBAJ&dq=Ilona+Elek&pg=PA99 The Forgotten Legacy of Stella Walsh: The Greatest Female Athlete of Her Time - Sheldon Anderson
  8. https://books.google.com/books?id=OU-2BgAAQBAJ&dq=Ilona+Elek&pg=PT165 The Encyclopedia of Amazons: Women Warriors from Antiquity to the Modern Era - Jessica Amanda Salmonson
  9. https://books.google.com/books?id=Tzp4O3gsJKwC&dq=Ilona+Elek&pg=PA60 Nazis, Women and Molecular Biologie: Memoirs of a Lucky Self-hater - Gunther Siegmund Stent
  10. https://web.archive.org/web/20200417230927/https://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/athletes/el/ilona-elek-schacherer-1.html Ilona Elek-Schacherer Bio, Stats, and Results | Olympics at Sports-Reference.com
  11. https://books.google.com/books?id=xIG2AAAAIAAJ&q=Ilona+Elek Changing Lives: Women in European History Since 1700 - Bonnie G. Smith
  12. https://books.google.com/books?id=xQ6MDgAAQBAJ&dq=Ilona+Elek&pg=PA53 Век фехтования - Валерий Штейнбах
  13. https://books.google.com/books?id=A3-BAAAAMAAJ&q=Ilona+Elek Jews and the Olympic Games: the clash between sport and politics: with a ... - Paul Taylor
  14. Book: The Big Book of Jewish Sports Heroes: An Illustrated Compendium of Sports History and The 150 Greatest Jewish Sports Stars . Peter S. Horvitz . SP Books. 2007 . 9781561719075 . 19 November 2010.
  15. https://books.google.com/books?id=aNjtAAAAMAAJ&q=Ilona+Elek For the record: women in sports - Robert Markel, Nancy Brooks, Susan Markel
  16. Web site: Scharerer-Elek, Ilona. Jews in Sports. 18 February 2014.
  17. Book: Jews and the Olympic Games: The Clash Between Sport and Politics . Paul Taylor . 2004 . 9781903900871 . 20 October 2011.
  18. http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/olympics/zcd068.htm Jewish Athletes
  19. https://books.google.com/books?id=OMzOCwAAQBAJ&dq=Ilona+Elek&pg=PA91 Sport and the Emancipation of European Women: The Struggle for Self-fulfilment

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