SPORTS LEGEND: A German man was ordered to pretend to a woman to win a medal for Germany in the 1936 Summer Olympics.

As we’ve discussed in the past, Adolf Hitler was really into the idea of Germany hosting the Olympics in 1936. He looked at the Olympics as a perfect way to show the world that Germany was made of the finest stock in the world.

A problem for Hitler was that in the 1932 Summer Olympics, held in Los Angeles, the United States took home 102 medals (41 gold) while Germany only won 20 medals (3 gold).

Hitler began a grand undertaking to ensure that Germany would be the leading medal winners when Germany hosted the Games in 1936, and Hitler was successful, as Germany took home 89 medals to the United States’ second place finish of 56 (33 golds to 24 in favor of Germany).

However, one such attempt to bring home a medal was a bit…peculiar, to say the least.

An eighteen year old German male named Hermann Ratjen was asked by the Nazi Youth movement to compete in the 1936 Summer Olympics in the Women’s High Jump.

He did so, and competed in the Games as Dora Ratjen.

According to fellow German high jumper Gretel Bergmann:

I never suspected anything. I just said, ‘She’s kind of weird’ but she was a nice kid. We got along very well.

I never looked when she undressed or most likely she never got undressed in front of me completely. We had this huge shower room and we all took showers in there and she never came in, always went into this little room which had a bath. That was supposed to be off-limits, but she went in there.

All the girls thought she was a little unusual – pretty deep voice – and they made fun of her.

Amazingly enough, the ploy did not even work, as Ratjen came in fourth in the competition!

Ratjen continued to compete as a woman, but coming back from the European Championships in 1938 (where he set a new World’s Record in the Women’s High Jump) he was discovered, due to two women noticing he had five o’clock shadow.

He was barred from the sport (naturally).

Crazy stuff.

Thanks to Christopher Hilton’s piece in The Independent for the Bergmann quotes!

STATUS: True

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