Berlin Games (24 page)

Holm was disconsolate. ‘I'll never touch another drop again if I'm given another chance,' she sobbed. A rumour reached her that if she apologised, then there was a chance that she might be reinstated. ‘Of course, all the newspapermen grabbed me right away and said “Don't you do that; whatever you do, don't do it.” And I said, “Don't worry. I won't.” ' Holm didn't apologise, and neither did Brundage back down–as far as he was concerned she had not shown sufficient team–or indeed Olympic–spirit. Two hundred and twenty members of the team disagreed with him, and signed a petition calling for Holm to be reinstated. The petition was ignored. Nevertheless, many of the athletes thought it right that Holm had been thrown off. ‘I agreed with the decision,' said Adolph Kiefer. ‘Her behaviour interrupted the whole proceedings, and it lacked discipline. Without discipline, you don't have a team.' Charles Leonard concurred. ‘I thought it was fair enough,' he said. ‘I don't think any person should raise himself or herself above the average.' Velma Dunn thought differently. ‘Her friends were up on first class,' she said. ‘What would you do?' Dunn was fond of Holm, who would spend time helping her fellow athletes rather than getting on with her own training. ‘She was
really
a nice girl,' said Dunn. ‘I think she should have stayed on the team.' Others, such as Lou Zamperini, thought Brundage's decision revealed a double standard. ‘What killed me was that most of these athletes, after sweating all day, liked to have a glass of beer,' he recalled. ‘On the deck there was a little opening where you'd go and buy [one]. I'd say most of the athletes that I saw would just take a workout, and then while walking the deck they'd stop and have a glass of beer.' Zamperini felt that Holm was dismissed because of a combination of factors. ‘I think the Olympic committee probably just tied the first class, the dancing, the champagne and her association with Hearst together.'

But Brundage got his way. In order to add insult to injury, he even ordered her to go back home as soon as she arrived in Germany. Holm's antics on A deck had won her several friends, however, including Allan Gould of the Associated Press, who offered her a column in which she could report on the Games. It was clear that Holm was not hired for her writing talents, but rather for her notoriety. She had no objections. ‘I had some mighty fine writers doing it for me–writers like Paul Gallico, Allan Gould and Tom Walsh. I had the best time ever doing my column.' Brundage was furious that Holm was still around, but for once there was nothing he could do.

The
Manhattan
arrived in Hamburg late in the evening of 24 July, after cruising sedately up the Elbe. The athletes looked out over the low, flat countryside, admiring the gently pastoral scene of cattle, windmills and quaint old buildings. George F. Kennan recalled how the stillness of the summer evening was broken by the athletes, who, ‘oblivious of linguistic differences, hurled wisecracks and frivolities at the bewildered Germans along the riverbank'. Before the team disembarked the following morning, Avery Brundage made a speech, or rather gave a lecture. ‘I understand that stories have been printed in various papers that there have been wild parties–high jinks on the high seas. It is an outrage that this team should be so slandered […] Some people will believe these sensational stories, so when you write home, I want you to correct them.'

There was no doubt that Brundage was worried about negative press publicity before the Games had even started. He may have been an arrogant man, but he was not so pig headed that he thought that he would get the better of the glamorous Eleanor Holm in a scrap in the public prints. Then, with the disgraced backstroker in mind, he continued his lecture.

The Olympic Stadium viewed from the north, the swimming stadium in the foreground. The Marathon Gate, through which Hitler ente red for the opening ceremony, is on the western edge of the stadium.

 

Theodor Lewald (left) president of the German Organising Committee, and its secretary, Carl Diem. Both men's Jewish connections would allow them to be manipulated by the Nazis.

 

Baron Pierre de Coubertin (left) the founder of the Modern Olympic Games, and Count Henri de Baillet-Latour, the president of the International Olympic Committee. The two men would prove both incapable and unwilling to stop the Nazis making the Olympics their own.

 

Karl Ritter von Halt, one of the German members of the IOC, and a friend of Avery Brundage.

 

Hans von Tschammer und Osten, the
Reichssportfuehrer
. Although well-liked abroad, he was one of Hitler's oldest allies.

 

Avery Brundage (left), head of the American Olympic Committee, meeting the pro-boycott head of the American Athletic Union, Jeremiah T. Mahoney. Never was a handshake more insincere.

 

Avery Brundage (left) being escorted by Karl von Halt during his inspection of Germany in 1934. Brundage was to claim to have seen no signs of anti-Semitism during his visit.

 

Sir Robert Vansittart (left), the permanent under-secretary at the British Foreign Office with his brother-in-law Sir Eric Phipps. Both men were virulent anti-appeasers.

 

‘How extraordinarily interesting': Britain's ambassador to Berlin, Sir Eric Phipps (right) talking to the German ambassador-designate to Great Britain, Joachim von Ribbentrop. He is wearing the uniform of an SS General.

 

Jews–Admission Forbidden! The sign at the Winter Olympics that proved to the world that the Games had done nothing to stop the persecution of Jews.

 

Adolf Hitler signing autographs at the Winter Olympics in February 1936. His minister of propaganda, Josef Goebbels, is to his right.

 

Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the Bavarian village that hosted the Winter Olympics, struggled to cope with the volume of visitors.