Flight From East Germany
After a disappointing fourth place finish at the 1980 Olympics and missing the 1981 World Championships in Rome due to a second place finish in the East German Championships, Wolfgang Schmidt decided to pursue athletic success in the West. He was constantly under surveillance by the Volkspolizei and they uncovered a plan for his escape (aided by discus colleague Ricky Bruch). In the fall of 1982, Schmidt was condemned to one and a half years prison. However, one year later it was adjusted and he was ordered to become a coach with SC Dynamo Adlershof, a sports team of the Felix Dzerzhinsky Watch Regiment. Wolfgang Schmidt filed a departure request so that he could continue his athletic career in the West. At the end of 1987, he was allowed to move to West Germany, though it was already too late to be considered for the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul. After the first track competition between East and West Germany, Jürgen Schult, having won the discus throw, refused to shake hands with Schmidt.
Read more about this topic: Wolfgang Schmidt
Famous quotes containing the words flight from, flight, east and/or germany:
“flight from tyranny does not of itself insure a safe asylum, far less a happy home.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“No Raven’s wing can stretch the flight so far
As the torn bandrols of Napoleon’s war.
Choose then your climate, fix your best abode,
He’ll make you deserts and he’ll bring you blood.
How could you fear a dearth? have not mankind,
Tho slain by millions, millions left behind?
Has not conscription still the power to weild
Her annual faulchion o’er the human field?
A faithful harvester!”
—Joel Barlow (1754–1812)
“My angel,—his name is Freedom,—
Choose him to be your king;
He shall cut pathways east and west,
And fend you with his wing.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The tears I have cried over Germany have dried. I have washed my face.”
—Marlene Dietrich (1904–1992)