Early Life
Stampfl was born in the capital of then Austro-Hungarian Empire. He was the son of an Austrian general. He studied writing and painting in school. After high school he attended the Vienna Academy of Art and had some success as a skier and javelin thrower. He represented his country at the 1932 Olympic Games in Los Angeles in the Javelin.
In 1937 sensing the rise of Adolf Hitler, he left Austria for England to study at the Chelsea School of Art. When Hitler marched into Austria in 1938, the British government demanded that he leave the country unless he showed a unique and necessary skill. Having taught skiing back in his homeland, Stampl pitched AAA officials to coach their athletes, earning him a job in Northern Ireland. This was in part due to assistance by Olympic legend Harold Abrahams.
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Famous quotes related to early life:
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)