Today on Oldest Olympians, we wanted to take a quick look at an Olympian whom we are missing just a little bit of information on: Mexican basketball player Fernando Rojas. Rojas, along with his brother José, was a member of Mexico’s basketball squads at the 1948 and 1952 Summer Olympics, with his country losing the bronze medal match in the former tournament and being eliminated in round one in the latter tournament. The duo also won gold medals at the 1946 and 1950 Central American and Caribbean Games.
We originally listed Fernando with a date of birth of August 2, 1923, but this seemed likely to be an error, as José is listed with a date of birth of November 9, 1923. Research by Connor Mah demonstrated that José had the correct date of birth, with Fernando having been born 1921 instead. For the most part, however, this is where the trail on both Olympians ends.
Mah was, however, able to locate a Facebook post demonstrating the Fernando was still alive in 2012 but, since then, we have not seen any updates. Normally, 2012 would still be within the realm (barely) of when we list someone as alive, but since Rojas would be almost 102 now, and we have seen no mention of his 100th birthday, we have not added him to our lists. Thus, it is possible that he is still alive and over the age of 100, but we do not know for certain.
Finally, in an update from a previous post, we were able to confirm that Mexican water polo player Juan Trejo, born May 12, 1927, coincidentally in the same city as the Rojas brothers, did die on November 6, 2012 in Mexico City.
Today on Oldest Olympians, we wanted to continue our examination into the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics by looking into Japan’s rowing delegation to those Games. While we know a fair bit about the team as a whole that attended this edition, the rowers are mysterious to the point that, aside from their affiliation, we do not know anything about any of them! As you might suspect, therefore, this will be a relatively short blog entry.
All but one of the six Japanese rowers at the Games competed in the coxed fours. The lone exception was Kinichiro Ishii of the Tokyo Rowing Club. He competed in the single sculls, but was unable to complete his round one heat and was therefore eliminated from the competition.
The coxed fours squad fared little better, losing its round one heat to upcoming bronze medalist Poland and its repêchage to the United States. Of the five members, all we know is that Isamu Takashima of Waseda University is definitely deceased and the other four almost certainly are. All were affiliated with Universities: Makoto Tsushida and Tsukasa Sonobe with the University of Tokyo, Hachiro Sato with Nihon University, and Kazuo Nose with Meiji University. There were also two alternates with the team, Yioshiaki Hamada of Tokyo Higher Normal School and H. Sugawara of Tokyo Tech. Sugawara’s full name in Japanese is 菅原 兵衞, but we are uncertain as to the proper transliteration.
(Geoff Heskett)
We would be remiss not to mention one more rower from the 1928 coxed fours tournament that is somewhat of a mystery: Monaco’s Louis Giobergia. While we know all the biographical data for the rest of his squad, his has eluded us. Finally, we wanted to thank David Clark, who forwarded us confirmation that Australian basketball player Geoff Heskett, born August 3, 1929, whom we had last heard from in 2011, is still alive.
Today on Oldest Olympians we wanted to return to the subject of British Olympic mysteries. Once again, thanks to the help of Connor Mah and Rob Gilmore, we have some good information on those Britons who competed at the 1924 Paris Games. There are, however, a few cases to highlight where we are uncertain as to the precise identity of the athlete.
Walter Wilson – Member of Great Britain’s wrestling delegations to the 1920 and 1924 Summer Olympics
Walter Wilson, born in 1884, represented Great Britain in the light-heavyweight, freestyle wrestling events at the 1920 and 1924 Summer Olympics, being eliminated in the quarterfinals and round one respectively. He began his career as a middleweight, but went on to capture national titles in 1922 and 1923 as a light-heavyweight. Although he is typically known as Walter G. Wilson, he was sometimes referred to during his career as G. Wilson or G. W. Wilson. Given that the only well-known amateur/professional Walter Wilson wrestler of the era can be ruled out as the Olympian, even this competitor’s name is uncertain.
John Davis – Member of Great Britain’s wrestling delegation to the 1924 Paris Olympics
John Davis, born in 1893, represented Great Britain in the welterweight, freestyle wrestling event at the 1924 Paris Games, where he was eliminated in the quarterfinals. Davis had won the national middleweight, freestyle title in 1921, before switching to welterweight and capturing the British crown in 1922 and 1923. Due to the common nature of his name, however, we have been unable to learn more about him.
Sonny Darby – Member of Great Britain’s wrestling delegation to the 1924 Paris Olympics
Harry “Sonny: Darby, born in 1902, represented Great Britain in the bantamweight, freestyle wrestling event at the 1924 Paris Games, where he was eliminated in the quarterfinals. He won one national title in 1925, but remained active in the sport for many years. We suspect that he may have been Henry Darby, a cable layer from Bolton who was born September 22, 1902 and died in Q3 1971, but we have been unable to confirm this with certainty.
(A photograph of the 1924 British Olympic cycling delegation, which presumably includes Thomas Harvey)
Thomas Harvey – Member of Great Britain’s cycling delegation to the 1920 and 1924 Summer Olympics
Thomas Harvey, born in 1888, represented Great Britain in three track cycling events across two editions of the Games – 1920 and 1924 – but did not reach the podium. A World War I veteran, he was the British national tandem winner in 1921 and 1922 but unfortunately, due to his common name, we have been unable to identify him any further. One possibility is Thomas Henry Harvey, born July 3, 1888 in St. Martins, London and died March 20, 1965, but this is primarily a guess.
Joe Williams – Member of Great Britain’s track and field delegation to the 1924 Paris Olympics
Joe Williams, born in 1897, represented Great Britain in the cross-country running event at the 1924 Paris Games, but dropped out less than halfway through due to the heat. A member of the Hallhamshire Harriers of Sheffield, he became a coach with the club in the 1940s and served as its president from 1968 through 1975. While his common name makes him difficult to identity, he is possibly the Joseph Edward Williams who was born December 15, 1897 in Sheffield and died in Q2 1976 in the same city.
Finally, we wanted to end with some updates, beginning with a thank you to the contributor who pointed out that the date of death suggested for Mexican wrestler David Pimentel in our last post was likely an error, as it was the same date of death for Portuguese bishop David Dias Pimentel, who died on the same day. They also provided evidence that Imre Holényi did in fact die at some point in 2020, as noted in that same post.
Also from our last post, Horacio Macchiavello was able to confirm that Juan Martín Merbilháa did in fact die on May 28, 1972 and was born December 11, 1925. He also sent us news of two more recent Argentinian deaths among the oldest Olympians: Juan Caviglia, born November 28, 1929, who took part in the Olympic gymnastics tournaments in 1952 and 1960, died January 17, while León Genuth, born August 5, 1931, who represented Argentina in the middleweight, freestyle wrestling event at the 1952 Helsinki Games, died March 10. Finally, from a much older blog post, Diego Rossetti was able to prove that Italian wrestler Pietro Marascalchi did indeed die on April 16, 2019.
Today on Oldest Olympians we wanted to raise the cases of some Olympic missing links that we have found since the beginning of the year. Unlike our last entry on this topic, these individuals were not born in 1932, but have come up as a result of recent research.
Lyuben Gurgushinov – Member of Bulgaria’s track and field athletics delegation to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics
Lyuben Gurgushinov, born November 2, 1931, represented Bulgaria in the triple jump at the 1964 Tokyo Games, where he finished 27th in the qualifying round and did not advance. He was also selected for the 1960 Rome Olympics, but did not start the event. Outside of this, we do not know much about him, but someone added a date of death of March 17, 2008 and a place of death of Sofia to English Wikipedia page. Unfortunately, we have been unable to verify this information.
David Pimentel – Member of Mexico’s weightlifting delegation to the 1952 Helsinki Olympics
David Pimentel, born December 2, 1927, represented Mexico in the middleweight weightlifting event at the 1952 Helsinki Games, where he failed to record a mark in the clean and jerk portion and thus did not place in the competition. He had better luck at the Central American and Caribbean Games, where he won a bronze medal in that category. Someone added a date of death of March 16, 2021 to his English Wikipedia page, but we have not seen an obituary that would support this.
Juan Martín Merbilháa – Member of Argentina’s equestrian delegation to the 1956 Stockholm Equestrian Olympics
Juan Martín Merbilháa, born in 1925, represented Argentina in equestrian eventing at the 1956 Stockholm Equestrian Games, placing eighth individual and sixth with the team. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Merbilháa was a career military man, and an individual of the same name and roughly the correct age, 46, died May 30, 1972 in La Plata. Without more information, however, we cannot make a definite connection to the Olympian.
Imre Holényi – Member of Hungary’s sailing delegation to the 1960 Rome Olympics
Imre Holényi, born January 15, 1926, represented Hungary in Flying Dutchman class sailing at the at the 1960 Rome Games, where he placed 13th in a field of 31 entrants. He won several national championships and, by career, was a chemical engineer with a lengthy and distinguished tenure. We were able to confirm that he was living as of June 2020, at the age of 94, but an anonymous edit on the English Wikipedia claimed that he died later that year in Spain, where he was known to have retired. Despite being fairly well-known, we have yet to see an indication elsewhere that this is the case.
José Ferreira – Member of Portugal’s fencing delegations to the 1952 and 1960 Summer Olympics
José Ferreira, born May 7, 1923, represented Portugal in five fencing events across two editions of the Summer Games, 1952 and 1960, but only advanced beyond the first round once, in the individual épée in 1960. His name is fairly common, but an infantry colonel with his full name –José da Silva Pinto Ferreira – died July 1, 2013. While this seems to be a likely occupation for a fencer, the obituary does not contain an age, and thus we cannot confirm a connection to the Olympian.
Finally, we wanted to share some updates on previous cases. Patrick Secchi was able to find sufficient evidence that the main subject of last week’s post, M. Chapuis, was indeed Marcel Chapuis, who was born January 15, 1901 and died June 15, 1952. Connor Mah, meanwhile, was able to confirm that American wrestler Bill Borders did die on January 27 in Tulsa, per an estate notice. Finally, Diego Rossetti was able to confirm an Olympic medal mystery that we posted a long time ago: Italian water polo bronze medalist Renato Traiola died January 18, 1988.
Today on Oldest Olympians, we wanted to share a brief mystery that seems pretty clear, but is missing a final piece of the puzzle. It concerns the French boxing delegation to the 1928 Amsterdam Games, a group for whom we have fairly uneven information. In particular, however, we wanted to focus on a reserve with the team that is listed as “M. Chapuis”.
M. Chapuis was France’s reserve boxer in the bantamweight tournament in Amsterdam. The nation’s starter in that category was Ernest Mignard, who received a bye in round one and then lost to Jack Garland of Great Britain in his first bout. Mignard turned professional before the year was out and had a career that lasted through 1937, when he retired with a record of 18-27-5.
So who was M. Chapuis and would he have fared any better? We believe that he was actually Marcel Chapuis, who embarked on his own professional bantamweight career beginning in September 1929. His career lasted until the beginning of 1935, and he retired with a 20-7-1 record. Even if we could make the connection for certain, however, he would still remain an Olympic mystery, as we have no birth and death information for Marcel, or even an age that could help guide our research.
As we mentioned, the information we have on the 1928 French boxing delegation is somewhat uneven. For example, we know that light-heavyweight Robert Forquet, who also competed in 1924, was born May 6, 1905, but we lack a date for his death. For his compatriots who also never turned professional, featherweight Georges Boireau and Michel Langlet (also a 1924 non-starter), we lack a date of birth or even an approximate age. Welterweight Robert Galataud, who lost the bronze medal match, did turn professional in 1929 and had a 13-12-5 career through 1932, although we do not have any information about his personal life either.
For the remaining reserves, with the exception of 1924 Olympic bronze medalist Jean Ces, we know even less, and have only two full names. Heavyweight Marcel Moret, possibly born c. 1909, had a 19-17-1 professional career that ended in a loss for the French heavyweight title in 1933. Lightweight Robert Frédéric, meanwhile, had no professional career that we know of. Flyweight A. Hummel might have been the professional boxer Hummele, whose 3-2-2 career lasted from 1929 through 1932, but we cannot say for certain. Of middleweight G. Genet and light-heavyweight G. Guillotin, we know nothing at all.
Finally, we wanted to thank Horacio Hernan Macchiavello, who confirmed that Argentine rower Juan Carlos Gómez, born May 9, 1932, who we thought may have died in 1982, actually died rather recently, on March 22, 2021, at the age of 88.
Today on Oldest Olympians we wanted to engage a topic that we have not discussed for a while: Olympic missing links. In particular, we want to look at those individuals who were born in 1932 and for whom we think we have found information on their date of death, but cannot make the connection for certain. We have six such Olympians on our list.
Konstantinos Papadimas – Member of Greek’s basketball squad at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics
Konstantinos “Kostas” Papadimas, born in 1932, represented Greece in the basketball tournament at the 1952 Helsinki Games, where his nation was eliminated in the qualification round. The team had better luck at the 1955 Mediterranean Games, where it won a bronze medal, and it also competed at the 1951 edition. Domestically, Papadimas played for Panellinios B.C. and won national championships in 1953, 1955, and 1957. The Greek Wikipedia lists him as having died in May 2021, at the age of 89, but we have not seen any reports to confirm this.
Simon Tait – Member of Great Britain’s sailing delegation to the 1972 Munich Olympics
Simon Tait, born October 31, 1932, represented Great Britain in Dragon class sailing at the 1972 Munich Games and placed 12th. A member of the Oxford & Cambridge Sailing Society, he was prolific domestically and internationally, competing at the European Championships in the 1960s. The death of a Simon Tait, born October 31, 1931, was registered at Kensington & Chelsea, London, England in February 1997, but we have thus far been unable to confirm that this is the Olympian.
(Sadegh Ali Akbarzadeh Khoi, pictured at the top left at Boxing Iran)
Sadegh Ali Akbarzadeh Khoi – Member of Iran’s boxing delegations to the 1960 and 1964 Summer Olympics
Sadegh Ali Akbarzadeh Khoi, born September 3, 1932, represented Iran in two editions of the Olympic bantamweight boxing tournament, being eliminated in his first bout in both 1960 and 1964. A member of the national team from 1957 through 1964, he was a featherweight at the 1958 Asian Games, before moving up to bantamweight. He is definitely deceased, and English Wikipedia has a year of death of 2007, but we have not been able to confirm that for certain.
Juan Carlos Gómez – Member of Argentina’s rowing delegations to the 1964 and 1968 Summer Olympics
Juan Carlos Gómez, born May 9, 1932, represented Argentina in two editions of the Olympic rowing tournament, coming in 12th in the double sculls in 1964 and 8th in the coxed fours in 1968. He had much more success at the Pan American Games, winning the coxless fours in 1951 and 1955 and coming in second in the coxed fours in 1967. An individual of this name and the correct age died December 17, 1982 in La Plata but, because his name is fairly common, we cannot say for certain that this is the Olympian.
Camilo Pedro – Member of Hong Kong’s sport shooting delegation to the 1976 Montreal Olympics
Camilo Pedro, born August 3, 1932, represented Hong Kong in the free pistol, 50 meters shooting event at the 1976 Montreal Games, where he placed 46th. Unlike most of the names on this list, we do not know much about him, although an individual with this name and date of birth died in Millbrae, San Mateo, California on September 12, 2004. Unfortunately, since we know of no connection between Pedro and the United States, we cannot confirm that this record is for the Olympian.
Fritz Vogelsang – Member of Switzerland’s athletics delegation to the 1960 Rome Olympics
Fritz Vogelsang, born November 17, 1932, represented Switzerland in the decathlon at the 1960 Rome Games, where he placed 11th. He was also selected for the 100 meters dash at 1956 Melbourne Olympics, but did not actually compete. He did, however, take part in the 1954 European Championships decathlon, placing 9th among 19 entrants. We located the grave of a Fritz Vogelsang, born 1932, who died in 2000 in Bottmingen, Switzerland, but we are unsure if this is the Olympian.
Today on Oldest Olympians we wanted to return to a more traditional type of post by looking at more competitors from the 1928 Olympics, both winter and summer. In particular, we wanted to raise the case of four representatives of Great Britain whom research has thus far been unable to identify with much certainty.
Thomas Skinner – Member of Great Britain’s sailing delegation to the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics
Thomas Skinner was a crew member of the ship Feo, which competed in the 8 metres sailing class at the 1928 Amsterdam Games and placed seventh out of the eight teams in the regatta. All we know for certain is that he was a ship owner, and thus we suspect he may have been Sir Thomas Gordon Skinner, born December 29, 1899 in London and died November 22, 1972 in Cape Town, South Africa. Unfortunately, we have been unable to connect this individual to the Olympics for certain.
John Rogers – Member of Great Britain’s ice hockey team at the 1928 St. Moritz Olympics
Goalkeeper John Rogers, born August 22, 1910, represented Great Britain in the ice hockey tournament at the 1928 St. Moritz Games, where the nation placed fourth. He also played with the national team at the 1929 World Championships and was probably a reserve on the 1930 and 1931 squads as well. Domestically, he played with the University of Oxford and the London Lions. We know more about him than the other three, as he was the son of a Liverpool cotton-broker who lived in South Africa. He married Mary Bailey, daughter of diamond tycoon Abe Bailey, and settled in South Africa. The couple’s divorce in 1958 is the last trace we have of Rogers, and thus his subsequent fate is unknown.
(C. D. Griffiths, with his head turned, in a 1927 photograph)
David Griffiths – Member of Great Britain’s bobsled delegation to the 1928 St. Moritz Olympics
David Griffiths was a member of the Great Britain I bobsled team that placed 10th among 23 starters in the four/five man bobsled event at the 1928 St. Moritz Games. Newspapers occasionally listed him as C. D. Griffiths, which may mean that he was Charles David Griffiths, who was born March 29, 1898 and died January 16, 1963. Without further information, however, we cannot be sure.
John Gee – Member of Great Britain’s bobsled delegation to the 1928 St. Moritz Olympics
John Gee was a member of the other British bobsled team at the 1928 St. Moritz Games, which placed slightly higher in ninth. The most mysterious competitor of the four, it seems that newspaper clippings about the event do not even mention him, and thus we have no clues to his possible identity.
On the subject of the 1928 St. Moritz Olympics, there are a few more mystery competitors that we have not yet covered on this blog, primarily because we know almost nothing about them. Rafael and Horacio Iglesias represented Argentina with the bobsled teams that placed fourth and fifth respectively in the four/five man. In that same event, Frenchman Michel Baur was on the 14th-placed French team and Ferdinand Langer was disqualified with the Austria 1 squad for having an incomplete team at a finish line. Finally, Frenchman Marcel Beraud competed in the Nordic combined event, but did not complete the 18 kilometer course.
That is all that we have for today, although we did want to share a link from Bill Shander, who used data from Olympedia to demonstrate some interesting results about age and the Olympics. You can check out his article here: https://billshander.com/dataviz/oldlympics
Today on Oldest Olympians we wanted to celebrate the birthday of Růžena Košťálová of Czechoslovakia, who we believed to be turning 98 as the oldest living Olympic canoeist. There is, however, some discrepancy as to whether or not that is the case.
First, a brief biography. Košťálová was one half of the silver medal-winning Czechoslovakian team in the Kayak Doubles, 500 metres event at the 1948 World Championships, which led to her selection to represent the country at that year’s Olympic Games in the Kayak Singles, 500 metres. Although she won her heat in the opening round, she finished fifth in the final. Having already won 12 national titles in the sport, she retired from active competition shortly thereafter and eventually moved to Switzerland with her family in 1968.
We based our belief that she is still alive on this 2020 document from the Czech Olympic Committee. A comprehensive 2021 work by František Kolář, however, Encyklopedie olympioniků. Čeští a českoslovenští sportovci na olympijských hrác, lists her, on page 178, as having died in January 2013. Both sources seem very reliable, and thus it is plausible that either are mistaken, so we have continued to list her as alive, although we cannot be entirely certain. Were Košťálová deceased, however, then Belgium’s Anna Van Marcke, born April 18, 1924, would be the oldest living Olympic canoeist.
(José Pérez)
There are several other Olympians on our living list that have had dates of death posted for them on Wikipedia. Dutch gymnast Klara Post, born July 5, 1926, is alleged to have died on January 12 of this year in Alkmaar. American wrestler Bill Borders, born March 3, 1930, is claimed to have died on January 27 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Mexican modern pentathlete José Pérez, born October 10, 1928, is said to have died at some point before the 18th of January. Finally, Romanian athlete Emma Konrad, born November 21, 1929, purportedly died May 16, 2021. In none of these cases have we been able to verify this information, and we do not trust additions to Wikipedia out of hand, so if anyone has any confirmation one way or the other, it would be greatly appreciated.
Finally, we wanted to thank the contributor who located an obituary for Swiss rower Kurt Schmid, born February 11, 1932, who we discussed in our last post, and was able to confirm that he did die on December 2, 2000.
Today on Oldest Olympians, we wanted to briefly cover the recent deaths of two Olympic nonagenarians who were not on our main lists, but require a little more explanation as to why they were not. Thus we wanted to ensure that we had sufficient space to expand upon their circumstances.
Mirza Khan, born December 15, 1924, was a soldier in the Pakistan Army when he represented his country at the 1952 Helsinki Games. He was eliminated in the opening round of both the 400 metres hurdles and the 4×400 metres relay, but had more success at the 1954 Asian Games, where he won gold in the 400 metres hurdles.
In 2013, someone edited Wikipedia to claim that he was still alive in living in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada as Akram Baig Mirza. While this was not the most reliable of sources, we listed him among as the oldest living Olympian from Pakistan, because we believe that the editor was acting in good faith. At the end of 2020, however, we were forwarded information that Akram Baig Mirza may have died in 2014, so we removed him for our list.
As it turned out, however, earlier this month an announcement was made that Khan died January 26 at the age of 97. As this is the most official news we have heard, we assume that our earlier information was incorrect and that he remained the oldest living Olympian from Pakistan until his death.
Edward Shaske, born December 20, 1927, represented Canada in the trap shooting event at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, where he placed 16th. He also competed at the World Championships in 1969 and 1979 and helped organize them in 1983 when they came to Edmonton. He also worked as a coach for the national team, first at the boycotted 1980 Moscow Olympics, then officially in 1984, 1988, and 1992. By career, he was in real estate.
Shaske died December 28, 2021, at the age of 94, but he was never on our lists because he was originally in the Olympedia database with a date of death in 1982. We were able to clarify this error as stemming from his son, Edward Shaske, Jr., also a sport shooter, who was on the Olympic team of 1980 that did not travel and was a much-touted prospect for the 1984 edition, but died unexpectedly of a heart attack in 1982.
Finally, while we are on the topic of Olympic mysteries, we wanted to raise the case of Swiss rower Kurt Schmid, born February 11, 1932, who would have turned 90 recently if still alive. Schmid represented his country in the coxless pairs at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics, winning a bronze medal, and also competed in the coxless fours in 1960, placing sixth. German Wikipedia lists him as dying on December 2, 2000, but sourced to his rowing club, and thus we have been unable to verify the accuracy of this information.
One month into 2022 and with the Beijing Winter Olympics now upon us, we wanted to share our yearly fast facts about the Oldest Olympians in the world, partially to continue our commitment to transparency in our research but mostly just for fun and to share some statistics!
As of today our full list contains 2387 participants, non-starters, demonstration athletes, and art competitors born between 1912 and 1931 that could be living, 635 of which we believe to be living for certain. The former number is down from 2453 and the latter from 641 from the beginning of last year.
(Austrian middleweight weightlifter Franz Nitterl, who competed at the 1928 Amsterdam Games and about whom we know nothing)
We also have 373 Olympians (down from 422 last year) who competed in the 1928, 1932, or 1936 Games, Winter and Summer, who have no date of birth but could be still living. It is worth reminding everyone that the vast majority of athletes that could be living are likely deceased.
We had 13 living Olympic centenarians at the end of 2021, as we know of only two who died last year. We also know of two survivors from the oldest editions of the Olympics with living participants, the 1936 Berlin Games. If you have any suggestions of statistics or information that you would like to see added, please send us a message and we will be happy to include it in the next round!
