A ski course in 1911 in Bad Tölz. This is by no means the only story behind this photo auctioned off on Ebay, Italy. The Tölz local historian Martin Hake has also researched the highly exciting background on the basis of the inscription (number 1 = Nelly Schrön, 2 = her husband Walter, 3 = Dr. Fritz Rigele). © private
What an old photo can tell is shown by a find made by Martin Hake from Tölz. There are many historical details behind a picture of a ski course in 1911.
Bad Tölz – What do you see at first glance when you look at the photo you bought on Ebay, Italy? It is very old, shows a group of skiers, men and women, fashion as it was 100 years ago, some still use the single-pole technique. In the background on the right, a church and a hill. A second, closer look: It is the Franciscan church in Tölz. The hill is the Calvary. On the left of the house is undoubtedly the villa of Gabriel von Seidl on the Wackersberger Leiten.
In Bad Tölz there were ski courses long before the founding of the ski club
Sure, it's a nice photo, but why the local historian Martin Hake from Tölz noticed it among hundreds of pictures and why he immediately had to think of the Nazi great Hermann Göring has to do with the inscription on the back. In addition to the photographer's note (Franz Beilhack, Bad Tölz), it is handwritten: "Part of the course on the 1st day. 1. Nelly, 2. me, 3. Dr. Riegele, leader of the course". If you can't do anything with it, there's no shame in that. You have to have a very in-depth knowledge of winter sports, Tölz and its history to be able to tell the remarkable story behind this photo.
Hermann Göring as a young flight lieutenant together with his mother in 1917 probably in the "Isarlust". The mother went on holiday to Tölz several times. © "Hermann Göring In The First World War (Volume 1)", 2014 Fonthill-Media
It all starts with the fact that Hake knew from studying the old Tölzer-Kurier volumes that skiing was common in Tölz long before the ski club was founded in 1923. There was a Tölz winter sports club that booked the best skiers in the Alpine region for courses at that time. In 1911, for example, Friedrich ("Fritz") Rigele, who had founded the Salzburg Ski Club the year before and had made a name for himself as a first-class alpinist.
Olga Göring married the ski instructor Fritz Rigele
The name was immediately noticed by Hake on the back of the card, even if it was spelled incorrectly, namely with "ie". It is correctly noted in the Tölzer Kurier of 21 January 1911, which reports in detail about the multi-day ski course on the Galgenleite, on the Kogel and on the Wackersberger Leite. In the course of the article, a name is also mentioned that makes you sit up and take notice: Course instructor Rigele was "particularly supported by Fräulein von Göring von Burg Veldenstein".
Martin Hake, local historian in Bad Tölz. © .cs
This is not a coincidental similarity of name and "Fräulein von Göring" is also not noble, as the newspaper writes. Olga Göring is the sister of the later Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring, who was three years older. His family lived for a time in Burg Veldenstein near Nuremberg. In Bad Tölz, as the newspaper writes, Olga Goering supported a man whom she was to marry in May 1912.
Was Hermann Göring also in Bad Tölz?
The ski course instructor of Tölz, Fritz Rigele, was a dazzling figure and an enthusiastic alpinist as well as a National Socialist and anti-Semite. In 1933, the notary and president of the Austrian Ski Association was to move to Berlin, where his brother-in-law Hermann Göring gave him the Berlin Reichstag President's Palace as his family residence. When Rigele died in a mountain accident near Reichenhall in 1937, he received a pompous funeral in the Reich capital. There are photos in which Goering marches in uniform next to his sister Olga behind the coffin carried by a military formation of honor. On the Tölz skier's picture, Hake also thinks he can spot Olga Göring, namely the woman next to Rigele (number 3) with the full face.
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This leads to the question: Was Hermann Göring also in Tölz? With a very high probability, even several times. The historian Harald Sandner has published an itinerary about Adolf Hitler, a meticulously accurate record of his stay from 1889 to 1945. He wants to present a biography of Goering shortly, in which Bad Tölz also appears. Because in the old spa lists of the city, in addition to 1915 in July 1917, "Mrs. Prime Minister Dr. Göring with 2 daughters and waitress from Munich" is also registered. According to the newspaper, the family stayed in the "Isarlust", which later became the "Fährhaus". There is even a photograph that is kept in the Library of Congress in Washington with the place name Tölz. In 2014, the English publisher Foothill used this photo in the book "Hermann Goering in the First World War" and also shows pictures of "Goering skiing in Tölz". In fact, says Hake, the skiing pictures were probably taken on the Wendelstein. But the Tölz picture is probably true. It was probably created in 1917 in the "Isarlust" and shows Goering with his mother. The young ladies cannot be assigned with certainty.
The "Nelly" from the old photo was a guest of the Manns
The story behind the historic skier's picture is not quite told. On the back are also a "Nelly" and "I" called. According to the course list in the Tölzer Kurier, it is Nelly Schrön and her husband Walter. In 1911, Hake knows, they lived at Heißstraße 3 in what is now Villa Vivendi. In August of that year, the couple was invited to coffee at the famous neighbor Thomas Mann's. His mother-in-law, Hedwig Pringsheim, wrote in her diary: "Nice people, especially the Dutch woman."
You can find even more up-to-date news from the region at Merkur.de/Bad Tölz.
By Christoph Schnitzer
