George Worth

George Worth medal table
fencing
United States
Olympic Summer Games
bronze	London 1948	Saber crew
Pan American Games
silver	Buenos Aires 1951	saber
gold	Buenos Aires 1951	Saber crew
silver	Mexico City 1955	Foil team
gold	Mexico City 1955	Saber crew
gold	Chicago 1959	Saber crew

George Worth (born April 1, 1915 in Budapest , Austria-Hungary as György Woittitz , † January 15, 2006 in Orangetown ) was an American fencer .

Life

George Worth, originally born as György Woittitz, grew up in Budapest, where he learned fencing under Italo Santelli . Due to the political situation in Hungary, he planned to emigrate to the United States in 1937, but due to his Jewish background had to take a detour via Cuba , where he spent two years. There he trained with Ramón Fonst , the Olympic champion of 1900 and 1904, and also won the Cuban championships with the saber. He immigrated to the United States via Miami in 1940 and became a US citizen in 1944. He changed his name to George Worth. He then served directly in the US Army for the remainder of World War II and received several Bronze Stars for his activities during the Battle of the Bulge .

Worth took part in four Olympic Games : at the Olympic Games in London in 1948 , he finished third with the team and thus received the bronze medal with Miguel de Capriles , James Flynn , Norman Cohn-Armitage , Dean Cetrulo and Tibor Nyilas . In the singles he was fifth. In 1952 in Helsinki and in 1960 in Rome , he just missed another medal win with the team in fourth. In 1952 he was eliminated in the individual competition in the preliminary round. In between he was at the Olympic Games in Melbourne in 1956 with the US team fifth, while in the individual again he did not get beyond the preliminary round. He won the US individual title with the saber in 1954 and 14 national titles with the team. He was also successful at the Pan American Games . He won gold medals with the saber team in 1951 in Buenos Aires , 1955 in Mexico City and 1959 in Chicago . In addition, Worth secured two silver medals in 1951 in the saber singles and in 1955 with the foil team.

After his active career he was also active as a functionary in American fencing. Worth was also Captain of the Medical Corps in Orangetown and later Chief Commissioner of the Fire Department .

Web links

• George Worth in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• George Worth in the Hall of Fame of the United States Fencing Association (English)