Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. As we mentioned in the last post, today we are going to start looking at Swiss Olympians who fall into this category, and we are going to begin with those who took part in team sports.

(Karl Vogt)

Three of them, Pierre Pasche, Karl Vogt, and Fritz Kehrer, played on the field hockey team that did not advance beyond the preliminary round. Pasche had been a player and coach with the Black Boys of Geneva since the 1930s and later worked as a referee. There are at least two candidates for his identity, neither of which we have been able to confirm. Vogt’s career with HC Olten began in the mid-1940s and continued until 1952, when he lost one of his eyes. Thereafter he served as a coach and administrator in the sport, and he may have been the Karl Vogt of Olten born July 10, 1917 and died September 2, 2005, although we cannot be certain. Finally, Fritz Kehrer of the Red Sox Zürich had been active since the mid-1930s and may have been related to the Hans Kehrer who played with that team in the 1950s. Aside from this, however, we have no concrete biographical information.

(Robert Geiser)

Another two, Robert Geiser and Bernard Dutoit, were members of the basketball squad that ultimately placed 21^st after being eliminated in the preliminary round. Geiser was a member of Urania Genève Sport in the 1930s and 1940s and was also part of the Swiss team at the 1946 European Championships, where his country was fifth. He may have been Robert Jean Geiser, born in 1919 and died December 17, 1981 in Collonge-Bellerive, but we have not been able to prove this. Dutoit, meanwhile, played with Club Athlétique de Genève and got his start on the national team in 1947. He also took part in the European Championships, but in 1951, when Switzerland was 13^th. Unfortunately, we have no clues as to his identity or evidence that he is still alive.

Finally, one member of the water polo team, Georges Hauser, remains a complete mystery to us. Switzerland was eliminated after the first round of the tournament and two of its members, Georges and Edouard Hauser, competed domestically for Schwimmclub Horgen. We do not how, or even if, they are related, but we do know that Edouard was born in 1911. It seems likely that Georges was born within a few years of that, but we do not know for certain.

This seems like enough names for today, but next time we intend to cover the rest of our 1948 Swiss mystery Olympians. We hope that you will join us!

Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Today, we want to cover most of the last of the Europeans who fall into this category as, aside from Switzerland, there are only a handful that we have not yet touched upon.

France is a country that we have covered often in this context, but there are still two canoeists that we have not yet discussed. The first is Raymond Richez, listed previously as René Richez, who competed in the K-2 1000, where he was eliminated in round one. Domestically, he won 10 national titles across various disciplines between 1945 and 1950. There are several candidates for his identity but, without a clear connection to his canoeing career, we cannot prove or disprove any of them.

The other, René Flèche, listed previously as Richard Flèche, took part in the K-2 10,000, where he placed 12^th. His only national titles came in 1949, when he won the K-1 10,000 and the K-2 500. Like Richez, there are several potential candidates, but none that we have been able to identify as the canoeist definitively. We do know that he was born c. 1922 and was alive in 2017, thus we suspect that he may be René Gustave Flèche, born August 15, 1922 and died April 12, 2020 at the age of 97, but we cannot prove it.

(Hans Schachinger)

From Austria we have three Olympians, two of whom are sailors who competed in the same event. Hans Schachinger and Horst Obermüller, along with Horst’s brother Georg, competed in the Star class, where they finished 13^th overall. Schachinger was architect, but otherwise we know nothing about him. Georg was born April 15, 1915, and we know that he is deceased, but nothing else. For Horst, we have no biographical details at all.

(Josef Schmidt)

The final Austrian is Josef Schmidt, who competed in the welterweight, Greco-Roman wrestling tournament and was eliminated in round four. Due to his common name, we have been unable to learn more about him. With this, we are left with only a sizeable collection of Swiss Olympic mysteries left to cover for 1948. Among these is Fritz Frey, our last remaining Olympic canoeist, who finished just ahead of Flèche in the K-2 10,000. He had been third-placed at the 1947 national championships, but otherwise we know nothing about him. Thus we begin our look into Swiss mystery Olympians, which we will continue in our next blog post.

Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. As we mentioned in our last post, today we have decided to look at the mystery Greek Olympians who took part in the London Games.

(Filas Paraskevaidis)

Two of these competitors, Filas Paraskevaidis and Nikos Filippidis, competed in the coxed fours rowing events, where Greece was eliminated in the round one repêchage. We know a fair bit about the squad as a whole, including that another rower, Nikos Nikolaou, was born June 23, 1925 and is among our “possibly living” Olympians. We also know that Paraskevaidis is deceased, but with no other biographical details, and for Filippidis we have been unable to find anything due to his popular name.

(Nikolaos Melanofeidis)

Continuing the aquatic theme, sailor Georgios Kalampokidis took part in the Star class competition, where he placed 10^th. Despite having carried the flag for the Greek delegation at the London Games, we know nothing about him, although he is likely deceased, as all of his crewmates were born in the 1900s decade. Nikolaos Melanofeidis, meanwhile, competed in both the 100 metres backstroke swimming event, as well as the water polo tournament, but we also have no biographical details for him.

(Alexandros Monastiriotis)

There are three more members of the water polo team that remain Olympic mysteries: Alexandros Monastiriotis, Emmanouil Papadopoulos, and Ioannis Papastefanou. Monastiriotis is sometimes connected to the FIFA referee of the same name who was born in the first half of the 1920s. According to Greek Wikipedia, he died on April 28, 2020, but we have not been able to verify any of this information, or even the connection. Papastefanou was a three-time Greek champion (1945, 1946, 1950) and was still alive in 1999, but we do not know if that is still the case. About Papadopoulos, we have no information at all.

(João Barrento)

The last mystery Greek is Petros Leonidis, who took part in the cycling road race but failed to finish either individually or as a member of the team. He was the Panhellenic champion in 1947 and 1950, but aside from this we have been unable to uncover anything about him. We want to end this entry, however, by thanking the reader who discovered that Portuguese equestrian João Barrento, who we covered in our last blog entry, died in 1988.

Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Since we looked at two Portuguese Olympians in the last post, today we have decided to look at the remainder who took part in the London Games.

The first is fencer Manuel Pinheiro Chagas, who competed in the individual and team épée events, but was eliminated in the first round of both. While we known a lot about his teammates, information on Chagas has eluded us, possibly because results for the much more famous writer of the same name dominate search results.

(António Serôdio, pictured at Amigos da Reprise da Escola de Mafra)

The other two are equestrians, the first of whom, João Barrento, took part in the jumping event, where the team failed to place but he finished 22^nd individually. Four years later, he was head of the Portuguese equestrian delegation to the Helsinki Olympics, although he did not compete. We know that he went on have a military career for many decades, but we could not locate any specific biographical details. The other, António Serôdio, took part in eventing and failed to finish individually or with the team and, again, we know of no biographical details for him.

In our last post, we also covered one of the Greek mystery Olympians, which we intend to be the subject of our next blog post. Since there are so many who fall into that category, however, we want to mention one of them in this entry: fencer Andreas Skotidas. Skotidas competed in the team events for both the épée and saber, but was eliminated in the first round of both. In the individual épée, however, he made it to the quarter-finals before being eliminated. Andreas was the son of Evangelos Skotidas, born in 1895, who fenced at the 1920 and 1924 Summer Olympics, but aside from this we have no biographical details for either of them.

Some time ago, we began covering Iranian Olympic mysteries from the 1948 London Games, but we never concluded this series. Today, therefore, we are going to finish by looking at the remaining two athletes, both of whom are sport shooters.

The shooters, Farhang Khosro Panah and Molla Zal, both competed in the free rifle, three positions, 300 metres and small-bore rifle, prone, 50 metres events. In the former, Iranians occupied the last three spots, with Mahmoud Sakhaie separating Zal and last-placed Khosro Panah. In the latter, Panah finished ahead of someone who is a Lebanese Olympic mystery, Salem Salam, with Zal placing last. We were unable to find any additional information about these Iranian competitors.

(José da Silva)

The third Iranian, Sakhaie, placed better than his compatriots, as well as Monegasque shooter Roger Abel, but behind another mysterious participant, José da Silva of Portugal. Because Silva’s name is so common, we have not been able to learn more about him. One of Silva’s compatriots, Abílio Brandão, placed 57^th and also remains a mystery. That leaves only one remaining mystery shooting Olympian from 1948: Nikolaos Tzovlas of Greece. He placed 33^rd in the free pistol, 50 metres event, but aside from that we know of no concrete biographical details.

(Abbas Hariri, pictured in an article from 2014)

Additionally, we have one related mystery. It regards wrestler Abbas Hariri, who took part in the middleweight, freestyle event and withdrew after round one. He had a lengthy wrestling career that was documented in a 2014 Persian-language article with many recent pictures. He noted his birth year as being the 1303 on the Persian calendar, which means that he was born in either 1924 or 1925 on the Gregorian calendar. A 2015 article, however, lists someone else as being the sole survivor of Iran’s 1948 Olympic wrestling delegation, implying that Hariri is deceased. We are uncertain, however, if this is an error, as we were unable to locate any obituary for Hariri.

In order to catch up on our backlog of blogging, today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Today we wanted to touch upon nations who have only one such mystery competitor remaining.

The only European country on this list is Lichtenstein, as we know little about one of its 1948 decathletes, Josef Seger. At the Games, Seger retired after the discus throw, at which point he was nearly in last place. This still made him more successful than his compatriot Gebhard Büchel, born June 21, 1921, who retired earlier, and whom we last knew as living in 2013 but never located a 100^th birthday announcement. Seger, meanwhile, was in London during the Games studying language when he was selected. If he was a student, then this suggests that he might have been among the younger competitors, but we have been unable to locate any concrete biographical data.

Next we have Syria’s lone competitor at the 1948 London Olympics, Zouheir Shourbagi, who was 10^th in the platform diving event and was also entered into the springboard, but did not start. Shourbagi later helped train swimmers and lifesavers in his home country, but unfortunately we do not have any additional biographical information on him.

From Pakistan we have Nazar Muhammad Khan Malik, who competed in the shot put and the discus throw but was eliminated in the first round of both. He often went by just Nazar Muhammad (or Mohammed) and was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Armed forces but, aside from this, we do not know anything about him.

Finally, while on the subject of Pakistan, it seems to be relevant to talk about India, which has only two mystery competitors from 1948 that we have not covered. Sadhu Singh took part in both the 10 and 50 kilometer walks in London, being eliminated in round one and failing to complete the race respectively. Aside from the fact that he was born in Malaysia, we know nothing about him. Prahtip Mitra, meanwhile, was eliminated in round one of the 100 metres backstroke swimming event, and we have been unable to uncover any additional information about him either.

Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Since we looked at one Czechoslovakian Olympian in the last post, today we have decided to look at the rest from the London Games.

First, we want to mention two members from the 1948 Czechoslovakian rowing delegation, Josef Kalaš and Karel Vaněk. Both were members of the coxless fours squad that was eliminated in the round one repêchage, which consisted of members of ČVK Praha. Both were also members of the Czechoslovakian crew that won a silver medal in the eights at the 1949 European Championships but, aside from that, we know nothing about either.

There are also two members of Czechoslovakia’s wrestling delegation that remain unknown to us. Jan Stehlík took part in the featherweight, Greco-Roman tournament and withdrew after losing his round one match. Václav Tuhý, meanwhile, competed in the lightweight, Greco-Roman competition, and also withdrew after round one. Tuhý was the Czech champion in this event in 1945, 1946, and 1949, while Stehlík’s only featherweight, Greco-Roman title came in 1952.

Finally, Svatopluk Skýva represented Czechoslovakia in sabre fencing as both an individual and with the team. In both events, he was eliminated in the quarter-finals. We know a fair amount about Skýva, as he was a national sabre champion, a professor at the Prague Conservatory, a theatre producer, and an author. Despite this, we do not have any information about his birth or death, or whether he is still alive.

(Milan Blaće, pictured at “Hrvatski olimpijci i odličnici“)

Thanks to a reader of this blog, we were able to solve most of the mystery behind the Yugoslavian reserve rower Milan Blaće, who was born October 14, 1912 and died September 16 of either 1964 or 1984 (two sources list different years). We feel, therefore, that this is a good segue into looking at the mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. To begin, therefore, we will look into two competitors from Yugoslavia who fit this description.

The first is Serbian rower Slobodan Jovanović, who represented Yugoslavia in the coxed eights rowing event, where his country was eliminated in the round one repêchage. He was a member of Red Star Beograde but, because he shares his name with a famous writer, we have been unable to uncover more information about him.

(Ruža Vojsk)

The other is Serbian gymnast Draginja Đipalović, whose name is also seen as Dragana/Draga Djipalovic/Dzipalovic, and who is the only woman on this list. She competed in the team all-around event in London, where her nation placed seventh. At least one of her teammates, Slovenian Ruža Vojsk, born March 31, 1930, is still alive, which means that it is possible that Đipalović is as well.

While we are on the topic, we also want to mention the sole mystery Olympian from the 1948 St. Moritz Winter Olympics, bobsledder Ivan Šipajlo of Czechoslovakia. Originally a spectator, he was pulled from the crowd as a replacement in the four-man, with the team finishing 14^th among 15 entrants. He was a student at the time of the Games and thus was likely one of the younger competitors, leaving open the possibility that he may still be alive.

(Shmuel Laviv-Lubin, pictured at The National Library of Israel)

Finally, we wanted to provide two updates from previous blog posts. First, we discovered that Israeli sport shooter Shmuel Laviv-Lubin, born July 13, 1923, whom we had last heard from as living in 2010, died July 17, 2012. Also, Hernan Macchiavello was able to confirm that Salvadoran sport shooter Andrés Amador, born November 22, 1924, died September 12, 2013. We will continue our look into Olympic mysteries from the 1948 London Games in the near future, and we hope that you will join us!

Today on Oldest Olympians, we wanted to provide an update to titleholders among the oldest Olympians. What brought on this blog post was the death of rower Tirso del Junco, who was the oldest living Cuban Olympian.

Del Junco, born April 20, 1925, represented his country in the coxed fours rowing event at the 1948 London Olympics, where his boat was eliminated in the quarterfinals. The following year he moved to the United States and eventually participated in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, before moving to California to work as a surgeon. He was heavily active in Republican Party politics in the state and was a delegate to the national convention from 1968 through 2004. He died September 4 at the age of 98.

We then believed that basketball player Ramón Wiltz, born December 12, 1926, had taken the title of oldest Cuban Olympian. Wiltz represented his country in the tournaments at the 1948 and 1952 Games, placing 13^th both times. He had better luck at the Central American and Caribbean Games, winning silver in 1946 and bronze in 1950. He later moved to Florida, where we believed him to still be living; we learned from a family tree, however, that he died May 27, 2022 in Miami.

The next oldest Cuban Olympian on our lists was swimmer Raúl García, born April 9, 1930. García represented his country in the 100 metres freestyle event at the 1948 London Games, where he was eliminated in round one. He had had better luck at the 1946 Central American and Caribbean Games, where he had won a bronze medal with the 4×200 metres freestyle relay. García later worked as a lawyer in Florida, and while several sources suggested that he was still alive recently, the Florida Bar now lists him as deceased. Connor Mah was then able to locate a post from his niece, showing that he died in August 2020.

We believe, therefore, that sport shooter Enrique Guedes, born July 17, 1932, is now the oldest living Cuban Olympian. Guedes represented his country in the small-bore rifle, prone, 50 metres event at the 1968 Mexico City Games, where he placed 61^st. He had better luck at the 1970 Central American and Caribbean Games, where he took silver with the team and bronze individually in the 50 m small-bore rifle prone English match. He was also a silver medalist with the Cuban team at the 1971 Pan American Games in the small-bore rifle 3 positions.

Finally, earlier this month we covered Swedish athlete Bo Åhlen, born March 18, 1931, who was a reserve in the 100 metres and the 4×400 metres relay at the 1952 Helsinki Games. We were informed subsequently by Carl-Johan Johansson that Åhlen died August 23, 2023 in Älvsjö.

Today on Oldest Olympians, we wanted to finish wrapping up our coverage of eisstockschießen, or “ice stock sport” at the 1936 Garmisch-Partenkirchen Olympics. We have covered this tournament haphazardly, but we wanted be a little more organized and touch upon the remaining mystery competitors that we have not yet mentioned. Today, we are going to finish looking at all those that we have not discussed previously.

In the event for Germans only, we have not mentioned that the team from Eissportverein Weilheim also included Xaver Bauer, Anton Kranner, and Roman Ostermeier, none of whom we know anything about. The same can be said of the remaining members of eighth-placed Eisstock-Club Mittenwald – Johann Fichtl, Georg Müller, and Franz Wörndl – and the ninth-placed team of Eis- und Rollschuhsportverein Passau: Hans Bauer, Alois Haider, and Heinrich Wurst.

For the tenth-placed Eissport-Club Oberstdorf, we missed only one individual: Franz Dürr. Just as with the two remaining members of 11^th-placed Gießener Eisverein, Willi Mohr and Walter Schonebohm, we have been unable to uncover any concrete information about him. From 12^th-placed Altonaer Schlittschuhläuferverein, from Hamburg, we have not covered Herrmann Jeddicke and Otto Kolzen. There are two Otto Kolzens buried in Hamburg, but we do not know if either were the Olympian: one was born January 3, 1880 and died November 17, 1954, while the other was born November 9, 1913 and died June 13, 1979. Given the wide range of ages in the tournament, either could be the player, but for Jeddicke we have no leads.

The final two players, Wilhelm Kadel and Karl Möser, were members of the Frankfurter Tennis-Club 1914 club that finished 14^th and last, and we again have no information on either. They do, however, wrap up our coverage of mystery competitors for the 1936 Garmisch-Partenkirchen Olympics, although for completeness on pre-war Olympians without dates of birth or death, we need to mention two rowers from the Berlin Games: Milan Blace and Branko Karadjole. Both were reserves with the Yugoslavian coxed fours squad, but neither saw any playing time and we have no biographical details on either of them.

That is what we have for today, but we hope to soon move to the 1948 St. Moritz and London Olympics There are many Olympians who took part in the Games for whom we lack information on their dates of birth. Now that most, if not all, of those individuals would be over the age of 90, we are hoping to delve into these Games in more detail in the hopes of bringing their contributions to global sport to a greater audience and maybe even solving a few Olympic mysteries. We hope that you will join us!