KSK-Kultus Kaunas

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KSK-Kultus Kaunas was a sports club of the German minority in Lithuania . The club was based in Kaunas (Russian and Polish: Kowno; German (outdated): Kauen), which was the provisional capital of Lithuania in the interwar period. It was created in 1929 after the two clubs Kownoer Sport Klub and Kultus Kaunas merged.

history

'Kownoer Sport Klub (KSK)'

After the founding of the first Lithuanian football club LFLS Kaunas , the sport in Kaunas received further impetus through the establishment of the "Kownoer Sport Klubs" (KSK) - an association of the German minority - on October 2, 1921. Together with LFLS, the KSK played in Kaunas for a long time Time in football and in athletics plays a decisive role. About half of the Lithuanian soccer team at the 1924 Olympics came from the Kovno Sports Club. In 1923 the KSK became Lithuanian runner-up.

The success also had an impact on the number of members: from 50 members in 1924 the number rose to around 250 by 1926. These included not only students from the German Gymnasium in Kaunas, the association's traditional reservoir for young talent, but also numerous Lithuanians, Poles and Russians who wanted to learn sport under good guidance at the renowned club. Sport not only meant football and athletics, but also ice hockey and figure skating, for example.

"Cult" Kaunas'

One year after the founding of the KSK, on ​​October 2, 1922, the “Lithuanian-German Association for Art, Education and Sport”, which from 1924 assumed the name “Kultus”, got “German society” in Kaunas. The “Kultus” members were almost exclusively Germans from the Schanzen district, who were employed as clerks and workers in the factories of the brothers Schmidt and Tillmanns. That was also the intended target group, because the club was founded with the intention of “arousing interest in an association in which German working youth can find social entertainment for their leisure time as well as physical and mental training through all-round care for sport should". Football also played an important role in “Kultus”: in 1928 the club reached the top division in the Kaunas region.

'KSK-Kultus Kaunas'

At the end of the 1920s, the heyday of both German clubs was drawing to a close. Youth problems and emigration of the Reich Germans due to political developments ensured that both clubs became smaller and smaller. On April 6, 1929, they merged to form the "KSK-Kultus". The merger set new forces free and in the same year they became runner-up in the Kaunas group. But it was just a flash in the pan, because as early as 1930, people were relegated from the highest class and never returned.

The fact that the number of members decreased more and more in the period that followed, that sporting activity had to be restricted, also had political reasons. On the one hand, the quarrels about the Memelland affected the German minority in Lithuania as a whole; on the other hand, the NSDAP, which had come to power in Germany, also ruled the sports club, and non-Germans among the club members resigned or were forced out. Harassment and bureaucratic obstacles by the Lithuanian authorities also ensured that the KSK cult did not really get off the ground.

German sports club Olympia Kaunas

In 1937 the KSK cult was to be dissolved at the instigation of the Lithuanian government. The club was able to prevent this at the beginning of March by renaming it to "German Sports Club Olympia". In the same year, students were banned from joining sports clubs that existed outside of school.

What became of the club is unknown. It probably went out with the invasion of the Soviet Union in Lithuania.

swell

  • Algird Fugalewitsch: A comparative representation of the German sports clubs of the Memel area and the sports clubs of the German minority in Lithuania from 1918 to 1945 , written term paper to obtain the degree of Magister Artium (MA) of the Philosophical Faculty of the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel 1995
  • Final tables of the Lithuanian league on rsssf.com