Abstracts

Hugh Dauncey, Cycling Sociability and Sport in Belle Époque France: the Véloce-club bordelais (1878–92)
Stadion, Bd. 44, 2/2020, S. 231–254, DOI: 10.5771/0172-4029-2020-2-231
The short-lived Véloce-club bordelais (1878–92) was one of France’s leading Belle époque cycling clubs. Although provincial, it was influential in developing cyclesport nationally, including creating Bordeaux-Paris (1891), one of the founding races of cycling as a developing sport. Study of the internal life of the club shows how its social and sporting identity negotiated centrifugual and centripital forces within the institutional framework of associationism. Searching for the best organisational model for cycling sport and associativity in a period of rapid change in French sport and society, the club was refounded on a number of occasions but, despite many achievements, ultimately collapsed. As an early pioneer club, the Véloce-club bordelais (VCB) was partly a victim of its own success: having struggled to create a new ecosystem of cycling as sport and sociability, changing interests of Bordeaux’s social elite in new, motorised pursuits, or to cycle-touring rather than racing, removed the raison d’être of the club. The club’s demise subsequently created space in the sports-scape for new cycling clubs and other sports associations. Detailed analysis of club activities, internal organisation and management, membership and finances is enabled by its symbiotic relationship with the Veloce-Sport newspaper, which published and discussed much of the club’s sporting, social and administrative life. Close interpretation of the VCB’s brief but intense history shows how sporting sociability intersected with local government, politics and society and how the internal functioning of sports associations in France’s Belle époque demonstrates the significance of sports clubs as part of civil society. – Keywords: France; Bordeaux; associationism; sports clubs; cycling; Veloce-Sport.

André Bialk & Erik Eggers, Die „Affäre Eidinger“. Zur Premiere des Profifußballs auf dem europäischen Kontinent 1920
Stadion, Bd. 44, 2/2020, S. 255–299, DOI: 10.5771/0172-4029-2020-2-255
The first attempt at installing professional football on the European continent has so far been handled in a surprisingly cursory manner by German sports historiography – even though it has been hotly debated for years why the German Football Association (Deutscher Fußball-Bund, DFB) only officially introduced professional football in 1972. Who were Otto and Ernst Eidinger, who, together with their brother-in-law Josef Rosenblüth, acted as “directors” in organising the first professional football game in Germany on August 21st, 1920, in (Berlin-)Lichtenberg between the “1st German Professional Football Club” (1. Deutscher Berufs-Fußball-Club) and a selection of Hungarian professional players? Just as unknown as the economic background of this pioneering project is the fact that the three managers were Jewish. The strong hostility towards them was therefore influenced by anti-Semitic resentment – along with their youthful recklessness. Below, it is argued that leading representatives of the DFB – such as second DFB chairman Felix Linnemann – were under such pressure during the events of summer 1920 that they initially supported the organisation of professional football under the umbrella of the DFB. This utilitarianism sheds new light on the debate amongst German football historians about why the DFB defended its amateur status for so long after the supposed Rosenblüth’sche Fußball G.m.b.H. failed. At the heart of this article, however, is the historical reconstruction of the eventful days of the “Eidinger Affair” and the fate of its protagonists. – Keywords: First professional football match in continental Europe; Weimar Republic; Amateurism vs. Professionalism; Germany, Hungary; anti-Semitism; Jewish football-pioneers.

Andreas Luh, Großunternehmen und Betriebssport in Deutschland vom Kaiserreich bis in die Gegenwart. Ein (zu) wenig beachtetes sozial- und sporthistorisches Phänomen
Stadion, Bd. 44, 2/2020, S. 300–337, DOI: 10.5771/0172-4029-2020-2-300
Since the end of the 19th century, company sports appeared as a part of company’s social welfare policy. Large companies in Germany still offer company sport activities as a part of voluntary social benefits today, but their scope, kind and function have changed enormously. The present study focuses on the development of company sports during the German Empire, its expansion and institutionalization as a part of company’s social welfare policy in the Weimar Republic as well as its restructuring in the context of the efforts of the German Labour Front in NS Germany. Furthermore, the study examines the reorganization of company sports based on social partnership concepts and corporate identity – and corporate social responsibility strategies in the Federal Republic of Germany. It asks, what kind of changes took place in company sports in Germany under the conditions of a structural changing economic and capitalist system from the 19th to the 21st century, in four political epochs of German history, from the German Empire to the Federal Republic of Germany? – Keywords: Company sport activities; German Empire; Weimar Republic; National Socialism; Federal Republic of Germany; corporate social responsibility; corporate identity.

Stephan Krause & Dirk Suckow, Der Mitropa-Pokal und die Legende mit den roten Schlafwagen. Fußball, Raumkonstruktion und europäische Eisenbahnverkehrsgeschichte in den 1920er/1930er Jahren
Stadion, Bd. 44, 2/2020, S. 338–365, DOI: 10.5771/0172-4029-2020-2-338
The Mitropa Cup founded in 1927 was the most important professional football tournament of the interwar period. It was organized by the international Mitropa Cup committee, which was formed of leading protagonists from Central Europe such as Hugo Meisl. This Central European Cup was played out between different combinations of the leading clubs from the participating countries: Austria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Italy, Romania, Yugoslavia, and Switzerland. German teams did not take part in the Mitropa Cup, because the DFB did not accept professional football teams at that time. With this sport historical background, the study shows in which way the Mitropa Cup (as well as other tournaments) profoundly influenced the construction of economic and social space, and how it influenced the perception of the German Mitropa company. While it has been claimed that Meisl and his comrades could build on the sponsorship of the German restaurant and sleeping car company Mitropa, the parallel investigation of railway history through primary sources and sport history proves that no such relationship has existed, and furthermore, because of an international treaty the Mitropa was not allowed to provide services beyond Germany and several defined destinations. Thus, the discursive and spacial significance of both the Mitropa Cup’s football-based definition of Central Europe, and the Mitropa company as one of the two European players in sleeping and restaurant car services (the other being the French-Belgian CIWL/ISG), forms a historical coincidence. – Keywords: football; Central Europe; interwar period; railway history; construction of space; Mitropa Cup.

Lise Cardin, Daphné Bolz & Jean Saint-Martin, Nelson Paillou et la transformation du handball en France (1942–1982): Entre discours et réalités
Stadion, Bd. 44, 2/2020, S. 366–389, DOI: 10.5771/0172-4029-2020-2-366
Nelson Paillou can be considered a major sports leader of the second half of 20th century France. He was president of the French Handball Federation from 1964 to 1982, vice-president and eventually president of the French National Olympic and Sports Committee (CNOSF) from 1971 to 1993, and a key person in the foundation of the French association for violence-free sport and fair play. Based on printed sources and on personal as well as institutional archives, this article questions the role Paillou played in the development of French sport. First, Paillou worked to introduce and disseminate handball in France, and he developed a policy to enable masses of people to learn to play handball across the country. As such, he targeted the French youth and founded a national executive for handball technique in order to structure the supervision of players of all levels, from initiation up to the elite level. Second, Nelson Paillou also contributed to the recognition and visibility of handball in France and at European and international levels. He developed a significant communication policy and assured a remarkable presence at all handball events in order to reinforce his choices in terms of management and diffusion of the game. Finally, it appears that during the second half of the 20th century, Paillou, who strongly supported the ideals of Pierre de Coubertin, emerged as a promotor of humanist values in sport and in handball. His position against sponsors and some kind of professionalism was overcome with difficulties but it was necessary to open French handball to the international field. Paillou presented himself as an ambiguous French sports leader who sometimes took contradictory decisions. However, Paillou’s resolutions reflected the choices of an opportunistic leader in front of the transformation of sport in a period marked by the arrival of show business and professionalism. – Keywords: Nelson Paillou; handball; career path; politics of sport; human values in sport; sports professionalism.

Reviews

Hans Woller, Gerd Müller oder wie das große Geld in den Fußball kam. Eine Biografie, München: C.H. Beck, 2019 (Erik Eggers)

Veronika Springmann, Gunst und Gewalt. Sport in nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslagern, Berlin: Metropol, 2019 (Thomas Urban)

Thomas M. Robinson, The Other Olympians. Philosophers and Poets at the Ancient Greek Games, St. Augustin: Academia, 2017 (Gottfried Heinemann)