A 95-year-old woman who has lived in New York for more than 70 years has a new home: Germany’s track and field record book.
Germany has restored the high jump record to Gretel Bergmann, who on June 30, 1936 matched the country’s record with a jump of 5 feet, 3 inches in Stuttgart, Germany. Two weeks later, the Nazis kicked her off the Olympic team and banned her from the 1936 Berlin Olympics because she was Jewish.
Now, Germany’s track and field association has restored the mark, calling the decision an “act of justice and a symbolic gesture” while acknowledging it “can in no way make up” for the past. It also requested that she be included in Germany’s sports hall of fame.
This was all a pleasant surprise for Bergmann, a strong-willed woman who later changed her name to Margaret Lambert after immigrating to the United States in 1937 and getting married.
“That’s very nice and I appreciate it. I couldn’t repeat the jump today. Believe me,” said Lambert, who lives in Queens, N.Y.
Lambert said she was on the German Olympic team from 1934 to 1936 but had gone to England at the age of 19 in search of schooling. She won the 1934 British high jump championship and had hoped to compete for Britain. But the Nazis learned of her success.
She said they forced her to jump for Germany, threatening her family even though Lambert figured the Nazis would never let her take part in the Olympics. It was a political stunt meant to appease the Americans, she said.
“Even though I was a member of the German Olympic women’s team, I was not allowed in a stadium,” she said. “I couldn’t practice.”
After tying the German record in a pre-Olympic qualifier, she was booted from the squad and replaced by a jumper named Dora Ratjen. Later, it was discovered that Ratjen was actually a man named Horst Ratjen, who was kicked off the team in 1938 after a doctor saw his genitals.
Lambert, who has been married for 71 years, made a living as a cleaning woman for $10 a week before becoming a physical therapist, later giving up working to raise her two sons. She still has pictures, medals and other memorabilia from her days as a star athlete. — ap