Gottfried von Cramm

Gottfried von Cramm
Gottfried von Cramm (left) and George Lyttleton Rogers of Ireland in 1932
Full nameGottfried Alexander Maximilian Walter Kurt Freiherr von Cramm
Country (sports) Weimar Republic (until 1933)
 Nazi Germany (1933-1945)
 West Germany (from 1949)
Born(1909-07-07)7 July 1909
Nettlingen, German Empire
Died8 November 1976(1976-11-08) (aged 67)
Cairo, Egypt
Height1.83 m (6 ft 0 in)
Turned pro1931 (amateur tour)
Retired1952
PlaysRight-handed (one-handed backhand)
Int. Tennis HoF1977 (member page)
Singles
Career record390–82 (82.6%)[1]
Career titles45[1]
Highest rankingNo. 1 (1937, ITHF)[2][3]
Grand Slam singles results
Australian OpenSF (1938)
French OpenW (1934, 1936)
WimbledonF (1935, 1936, 1937)
US OpenF (1937)
Doubles
Grand Slam doubles results
Australian OpenF (1938)
French OpenW (1937)
WimbledonSF (1933, 1937)
US OpenW (1937)
Grand Slam mixed doubles results
WimbledonW (1933)

Gottfried Alexander Maximilian Walter Kurt Freiherr[A][4] von Cramm (German: [ˈɡɔtfʁiːt fɔn ˈkʁam] ; 7 July 1909 – 8 November 1976) was a German tennis player who won the French Championships twice and reached the final of a Grand Slam singles tournament on five other occasions. He was ranked number 2 in the world in 1934 and 1936, and number 1 in the world in 1937.[2][5][6] He was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1977, which states that he is "most remembered for a gallant effort in defeat against Don Budge in the 1937 Interzone Final at Wimbledon".[3]

Von Cramm had difficulties with the Nazi regime, which attempted to exploit his appearance and skill as a symbol of Aryan supremacy, but he refused to identify with Nazism. Subsequently he was persecuted as a homosexual by the German government and was jailed briefly in 1938.

Von Cramm figured briefly in the gossip columns as the sixth husband of Barbara Hutton, the Woolworth heiress.

  1. ^ a b Garcia, Gabriel. "Gottfried Von Cramm: Career match record". thetennisbase.com. Tennismem SL. Retrieved 7 November 2017.
  2. ^ a b "Budge Seeded First in All-England", Daytona Beach Morning Journal, 17 June 1937.
  3. ^ a b "Baron Gottfried von Cramm". www.tennisfame.com. International Tennis Hall of Fame.
  4. ^ Ron Fimrite (5 July 1993). "Baron of the Court". Sports Illustrated. Vol. 79, no. 1. pp. 56–69.
  5. ^ J. Brooks Fenno, Jr. (20 October 1934). "Ten at the Top in Tennis". The Literary Digest. New York City, United States: Funk & Wagnalls: 36.
  6. ^ "Wallis Myers' Rankings". The Age. 24 September 1936. p. 6 – via Google News Archive.