Robert Fein (9 December 1907 – 2 January 1975) was an Austrian

Olympic Champion This article includes lists of all Olympic medalists since 1896, organized by each Olympic sport or discipline, and also by Olympiad. Medalist with most medals by sport Summer Olympic sports Winter Olympic sports A. Including military patrol e ...

weightlifter Olympic weightlifting, or Olympic-style weightlifting (officially named Weightlifting), is a sport in which athletes compete in lifting a barbell loaded with weight plates from the ground to overhead, with each athlete trying to successfully lift ...

, winning the

gold medal A gold medal is a medal awarded for highest achievement in a non-military field. Its name derives from the use of at least a fraction of gold in form of plating or alloying in its manufacture. Since the eighteenth century, gold medals have bee ...

in the lightweight class at the

1936 Summer Olympics The 1936 Summer Olympics (German: ''Olympische Sommerspiele 1936''), officially known as the Games of the XI Olympiad (German: ''Spiele der XI. Olympiade'') and commonly known as Berlin 1936 or the Nazi Olympics, were an international multi-sp ...

. The following year, he won the

silver medal A silver medal in sports and other similar areas involving competition is a medal made of, or plated with, silver awarded to the second-place finisher, or runner-up, of contests or competitions such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, etc ...

at the 1937 World Weightlifting Championships, and set his 23rd world record that year. One year later, he was barred from competing in weightlifting, because he was Jewish, and he never competed again.

Biography

Fein was born in

Vienna, Austria en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

on December 9, 1907, and was Jewish. He broke world

weightlifting Weightlifting generally refers to activities in which people lift Weight training#Equipment, weights, often in the form of dumbbells or barbells. People lift various kinds of weights for a variety of different reasons. These may include various t ...

records 23 times in total, from 1931 to 1937, when his weightlifting career was abruptly ended by the Austrian authorities."Robert Fein,"
olympics.com. At the 1929 European weightlifting championships in Vienna, Fein won the

. At the 1930 European weightlifting championships in Munich, he won a

bronze medal A bronze medal in sports and other similar areas involving competition is a medal made of bronze awarded to the third-place finisher of contests or competitions such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, etc. The outright winner receive ...

. At the 1934 European weightlifting championships in Genoa Fein again won a gold medal, which he shared with 1932 Olympic champion

René Duverger René Duverger (30 January 1911 – 16 August 1983) was a French weightlifter who won a gold medal in the 67.5 kg category at the 1932 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to ...

. At the 1935 European weightlifting championships in Paris, he won a

1936 Olympic gold medal

In the event for which he was likely best known, Fein competed in weightlifting at the

in Berlin, Germany. He won the gold medal in the lightweight class with a world record lift of 342.5 kilograms (755 pounds), with splits of 105+100+137.5, sharing the win with Anwar Mesbah, with whom his match had ended in a tie. Sixteen weightlifters from twelve nations competed. Fein became one of only thirteen Jewish Olympians to medal in the games which were held during Adolph Hitler's Nazi government, and following the imposition of the Nuremberg laws the previous Fall, which stripped Jews of German citizenship, access to many professions, and a public education.

Taking Silver in World Championship

The Weightlifting World Championships were restored with the 1937 World Weightlifting Championships in Paris, France, the first time they were held since 1923. Fein won a silver medal behind Tony Terlazzo, lifting 355 kilograms (with splits of 107.5+107.5+140), 2.5 kilograms behind Terlazzo. In 1937, Fein set a world record of 360 kilograms, his last world record before the Austrians banned him from competing. In 1937 Fein was decorated with the Gold Medal for Service to the Republic of Austria.

Barred from competition

With the Austrian ''

Anschluß The (, or , ), also known as the (, en, Annexation of Austria), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into the German Reich on 13 March 1938. The idea of an (a united Austria and Germany that would form a "Greater Germany") ...

'' in 1938, Fein was barred from further competition because he was Jewish. He was persecuted during the Austrian Nazi regime. Dr. George Eisen of Nazareth College included Fein on his list of Jewish Olympic Medalists, and an account of Fein's overcoming an early deficit to earn a tie for the gold medal with Egyptian weightlifter Mesbah is included in ''Jews and the Olympic Games: the clash between sport and politics: with a complete review of Jewish Olympic medallists''. Fein died at 67 years of age in Vienna, Austria, after a long illness.''Olympic Review''
Issues 89-96 (1975).

Notes and references

External links