Alberto Bonacossa

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Count Alberto Bonacossa (born  August 24, 1883 in Vigevano , †  December 31, 1953 in Milan ) was an Italian tennis player , figure skater and high-ranking sports official. From 1912 he was a member of the National Olympic Committee of Italy (CONI) and from 1925 he was also a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). His most important merit for Italian sport, in addition to leading various national sports associations, was coordinating the successful application of the city of Cortina d'Ampezzo to host the 1956 Winter Olympics . In addition, he acted from 1932 as editor of the sports newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport .

Life

A notice board with a portrait of Alberto Bonacossa on the mountain trail named after him in the Dolomites

Alberto Bonacossa was born in Vigevano in 1883 . After the turn of the century he studied in Zurich and at the Technical University of Karlsruhe . At times he played at the time as a football player for the Grasshopper Club Zurich and in 1904/05 the Karlsruhe FV . He was a chemical engineer by profession and an avid tennis player , and in 1914 he published an Italian tennis manual. At the age of 36 he took part in the individual tennis competition at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp , from which, however, he was eliminated in the first round. In 1930, in his function as President of the Milan Tennis Club, he founded the Open Italian Championships, which later became the Rome Masters , which as part of the ATP Masters Series is one of the most important tournaments in men's tennis. He won the Italian Championships in doubles in 1937 and 1939 and was also the captain of the Italian Davis Cup team . In addition to his activities in tennis, he won ten Italian individual championships in figure skating and three times in the pair competition together with his wife, who was also seven times Italian individual champion.

In 1926 he founded the Italian Ice Sports Federation, for which he also served as President in 1926/1927, as the umbrella organization of the country's national ice skating , ice hockey and bobsleigh associations , which he headed in personal union . The other sports in which he worked in administrative functions in Italy included motorsport and alpine skiing . In addition, from 1932 he was the owner and editor of the sports newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport . In 1912 Alberto Bonacossa became a member of the National Olympic Committee of Italy (CONI), for which he served as provisional president from the end of July to the end of September 1943. From 1925 until his death he was also a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), on whose executive committee he was active from 1935 to 1952.

Alberto Bonacossa was personally close to Benito Mussolini , campaigned for the goals of Italian fascism with his sports newspapers and also ensured continuity in the CONI between the fascist and post-fascist times. In addition, he coordinated the long-term efforts to host the Olympic Winter Games in Italy, which finally led to the Winter Games in Cortina d'Ampezzo in 1956 , after the city had already been scheduled for the 1944 Winter Games, which had been canceled as a result of the Second World War . He did not live to see the games hosted because he died in Milan in 1953 .

Remembrance and appreciation

After the death of Count Alberto Bonacossa, the National Olympic Committee of Italy donated the Alberto Bonacossa Trophy named after him , which was awarded by the IOC to National Olympic Committees until 1971 , which in the year before the award was in a special way around the Olympic movement and deserved the spread of the Olympic ideals. The street Via A. Bonacossa , on which the Olympic ice stadium in Cortina d'Ampezzo is located, bears his name in his honor. There is a memorial plaque on the stadium itself, honoring his role in the awarding of the 1956 Winter Olympics. The Bonacossaweg ( Sentiero A. Bonacossa ), a high-altitude trail in the Sexten Dolomites , was named after him.

literature

  • Thierry-Maulnier: Count Alberto Bonacossa (Member of the IOC for Italy since 1925). Obituary in: Olympic Review. 1953. Bulletin of the International Olympic Committee, p. 7.
  • Speech Delivered by Count Thaon di Revel of the Occasion of the Unveiling of the Memorial Tablet Dedicated to Alberto Bonacossa in Cortina. In: Olympic Review. 1956. Bulletin of the International Olympic Committee, pp. 51/52.

Web links

Commons : Alberto Bonacossa  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Karlsruher FV: " 1889 - 1918: Top players and football pioneers from the beginnings to the end of World War I "
  2. ↑ Arnd Krüger : The Influence of the Fascist Sports Model of Italy on National Socialist Sports. In: Morgen A. Olsen (Ed.): Sport and Politics. 1918-1939 / 40. Universitetsforlaget, Oslo 1986, pp. 226-232
  3. ^ Arnd Krüger: Sport in Fascist Italy (1922-1933). In: Giselher Spitzer, Dieter Schmidt (Hrsg.): Sport between independence and external determination. Festschrift for Prof. Dr. Hajo Bernett . P. Wegener, Bonn 1986, pp. 213-226
  4. ↑ Felice Fabrizio: Sport e fascismo. La politica sportiva del regime, 1924–1936. Guaraldi, Rimini 1976
personal data
SURNAME Bonacossa, Alberto
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bonacossa, Count Alberto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian sports official and member of the International Olympic Committee
DATE OF BIRTH August 24, 1883
PLACE OF BIRTH Vigevano
DATE OF DEATH December 31, 1953
Place of death Milan