Käthe Krauss Explained

Birth Date:29 November 1906
Birth Place:Dresden, German Empire
Death Date:9 January 1970 (aged 63)
Death Place:Mannheim, West Germany
Height:5feet
Weight:72 kg
Sport:Athletics
Event:100 m, 200 m, 80 m hurdles, high jump, long jump, shot put, discus throw, javelin throw
Club:Dresdner SC
Pb: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)
Show-Medals:yes

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.

Athletics career

Born in Dresden, Krauß was a member of Dresdner SC, where she was discovered and trained by the influential coach Woldemar Gerschler.[1] She won the national women's title in the 100 metres from 1934 through 1938,[2] [3] [4] in the 200 metres in 1932, 1934, and 1938 (in 1931 and 1933 she took second),[5] [6] and in the long jump[7] and the pentathlon in 1937,[8] and was on the national champion Dresdner SC 4 × 100 metre relay teams in 1932 and 1936.[9] [10]

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).[11]

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)[12] and a gold medal as part of the German 4 × 100 metre relay team (46.8 s).[13] [14]

At the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, at that time holding the German women's record for the 100 metres,[15] Krauß won the bronze medal in that event with a time of 11.9 s.[16] [17] She was one of three Olympic medalists that year from Dresdner SC, the others being Rudolf Harbig and Luise Krüger.[18] 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;[19] [20] [21] 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;[22] [23] the American winning time in the final was half a second slower.[24] [25] [26] As national 100-metre champion, Krauß was the fastest runner on the German team,[27] but had run dead heats with Marie Dollinger.[28]

Postwar

After World War II, Krauß moved to Landau, where she coached[29] 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.[30] The local athletics club awards a prize named for her.[31] 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.[32] [33]

Notes and References

  1. Egon Meyer-Venecia, Hoffnung aber läßt nichts zu Schanden werden, self-published, Denzlingen, 2003,, p. 25
  2. Fritz Steinmetz, 75 Jahre Deutsche Leichtathletik-Meisterschaften 1898–1972, Berlin: Bartels & Wernitz, 1973,, p. 191
  3. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/72.html Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (100m-Damen)
  4. Steinmetz, p. 192
  5. Steinmetz, p. 196.
  6. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/77.html Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (200m – Damen)
  7. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/111.html Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (Weitsprung – Damen)
  8. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/106.html Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (Mehrkampf – Damen)
  9. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/66.html Leichtathletik – Deutsche Meisterschaften (Staffeln – Damen – Teil 1)
  10. Steinmetz, p. 261.
  11. http://www.gbrathletics.com/ic/fsfi.htm FSFI Women's World Games
  12. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/3_1.html Leichtathletik-EM (Damen Teil 1)
  13. http://www.sport-komplett.de/sport-komplett/sportarten/l/leichtathletik/hst/3_3.html Leichtathletik-EM (Damen Teil 3)
  14. http://www.gbrathletics.com/ic/ecw.htm European Championships (Women)
  15. 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,, p. 112
  16. Guy Walters, Berlin Games: How Hitler Stole the Olympic Dream, London: Hodder-John Murray,, p. 211.
  17. Fritz Steinmetz and Dieter Huhn, Erfolge der deutschen Leichtathletik seit 1896: Weltmeisterschaften, Europameisterschaften, Olympische Spiele, Agon Sportverlag-Statistics 8, Kassel: Agon, 1994,, p. 117
  18. http://www.dsc1898.de/index.php?area=1&p=static&page=verein Auszug aus der Vereinsgeschichte
  19. Bud Greenspan, 100 Greatest Moments in Olympic History, Los Angeles: General Publication Group, 1995,, p. 33.
  20. Reinhard Rürup, ed., 1936, die Olympischen Spiele und der Nationalsozialismus: eine Dokumentation, Berlin: Argon, 1996,, p. 144
  21. Birgit Jochens and Sonja Miltenberger, eds., Zwischen Rebellion und Reform: Frauen in Berliner Westen, Berlin: Jaron, 1999, p. 220
  22. Walters, pp. 268–69
  23. Report: Games of the Olympiad, New York: United States Olympic Committee, 1936,, p. 159.
  24. Duff Hart-Davis, Hitler's Games: The 1936 Olympics, New York: Harper, 1986,, p. 200.
  25. Louise Mead Tricard, American Women's Track and Field: A History, 1895 through 1980, Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 1996,, p. 227.
  26. Walters states in error, p. 269, that the American time in the final, 46.9 s, was faster.
  27. Walters, p. 270.
  28. https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=cI9SAAAAIBAJ&sjid=Lr4MAAAAIBAJ&pg=5782,5959550&dq=k%C3%A4the+krau%C3%9F+-aids&hl=en "Frauleins Will Bolster Nazi Team"
  29. August Schimpf, Vereinschronik, Leichtathletik-Club Oberhaardt 1954,Edenkoben, retrieved 17 July 2012.
  30. Eberhard Vollmer, "Neuauflage der 'ewigen' Senioren-Bestenliste", Leichtathletik.de, 30 November 2010
  31. jwe, Leichtathletik: Oleg Zernickel neuer Käthe-Krauß-Preisträger, Leichtathletik, Turnverein 1981 e.V., ASV Landau,, retrieved 17 July 2012.
  32. 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."
  33. Michael Krüger, ed., Olympische Spiele: Bilanz und Perspektiven im 21. Jahrhundert, Sport 1, Münster: Lit, 2001,, note 97, p. 132

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