An Unlikely Hero: Max Schmeling
Just a note that a boxing legend, Max Schmeling, has died at the age of 99 (link).
While some of you may recognize him as Joe Louis’s opponent at the 1936 Munich games, you might think that Joe was a tool of the Nazis. Well, if you do think that, you’d be wrong. I was.
Check this out:
Despite the portrayal of him in the United States as a tool of the Nazis, Schmeling had run-ins with the regime even before the first fight with Louis.Although he had lunched with Hitler and had long discussions with propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, Schmeling angered the Nazi bosses in 1935 by refusing to join the Nazi party, fire his Jewish American manager, Joe Jacobs, and divorce his Czech-born wife, Anny Ondra, a film star.
During the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Schmeling extracted a promise from Hitler that all U.S. athletes would be protected.
He hid two Jewish boys in his Berlin apartment during the 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom, when the Nazis burned books in a central square and rampaged through the city, setting synagogues on fire.
Reportedly, Schmeling also used his influence to save Jewish friends from concentration camps.
After the war, Schmeling was nearly destitute and fought five more times for the money. He retired after a 10-round loss to Walter Neusel in 1948 at age 43 with a record of 56-10-4 with 39 knockouts.
Schmeling used the money from the bouts to buy the license to the Coca-Cola franchise in Germany and grew wealthy in the postwar era. He also marketed his name, retaining his huge popularity with his countrymen despite his problems with the Nazis.
Schmeling remained married to Anny Ondra for 54 years until she died in 1987. The two, who met on the set of a film Schmeling appeared in, married in 1932.
“I had a happy marriage and a nice wife. I accomplished everything you can. What more can you want?” Schmeling said in 1985.
Schmeling also support Joe Lewis when he was down and out, and paid for his funeral in 1981.
So we have here a man villified by the press in the 1930’s as a Nazi superman who in fact stood up to the Nazis, saved Jews, supported his one time opponent, and remained married to the same woman for 54 years.
Here’s to Max Schmeling – a true mensch.
