| Ludwig Guttmann | |
|---|---|
| Born | 3 July 1899 Tost, Silesia, Germany |
| Died | 18 March 1980 (aged 80) |
| Known for | Founding the Paralympic Games |
| Profession | Neurologist |
Sir Ludwig "Poppa" Guttmann CBE, FRS (3 July 1899 – 18 March 1980) was a German neurologist who founded the Paralympic Games while living in England, and is considered one of the founding fathers of organized physical activities for people with a disability.[1]
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Ludwig was born into an Orthodox Jewish family in Tost, Silesia, Germany (now Toszek in Poland), the eldest child in the family. He joined the Accident Hospital in Konigshutte in 1917, where he would meet his first spinal cord injured patient. In April 1918, he began his studies in the Medical Faculty of the University of Breslau. He left in Spring 1919 to study at the University of Freiburg, and received his MD in 1924.
He worked in Nazi Germany at the Jewish Hospital in Breslau, later becoming Director of the Hospital. However, when life in Germany became impossible, he and his family emigrated to Oxford, England, in 1939. He began research work there at the Nuffield Department of Neurosurgery.
In 1944, Guttmann was asked by the British government to found the National Spinal Injuries Centre at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Buckinghamshire. He was appointed to the position of director at the Centre, a position he held until 1946. As director, he believed sport was a method of therapy, using it to help build physical strength and self-respect. By 1952, Guttmann's Stoke Mandeville Games for the disabled had grown to over 130 international competitors, and it continued to grow, impressing Olympics officials and the international community. In 1956, Guttmann was awarded the Fearnley Cup, an award for outstanding contribution to the Olympic ideal.
Ludwig Guttmann's vision of an international games the equivalent of the Olympics was realized in 1960 when the International Stoke Mandeville Games were held in Rome alongside the official IOC 1960 Summer Olympics. Known at the time as the 9th Annual International Stoke Mandeville Games, the Rome games are now recognized as the first Paralympic Games. (The term "Paralympic Games" was retrospectively applied by the International Olympic Committee in 1984.)[2]
In 1961 Guttmann also founded the British Sports Association for the Disabled, later known as the Disability Sport Events.
In 1961 he was the inaugural President of the International Medical Society of Paraplegia (now the International Spinal Cord Society (ISCoS))[3] and was the first Editor of the journal of the Society, Paraplegia (now named Spinal Cord).[4]
Stoke Mandeville Stadium, the National Centre for Disability Sport in the United Kingdom, was developed by him alongside the hospital.[5]
Guttmann received Great Britain's OBE and CBE and was honoured worldwide. In 1966 he was knighted by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and thus became a KBE (Knight of the Order of the British Empire).
He died of heart failure in 1980 following a heart attack a few months earlier.
Institut Guttmann, a neurorehabilitation hospital in Barcelona, is named in his honour.[6]