Ágnes Keleti, the oldest living Olympic medal winner and a Holocaust survivor, has passed away at the age of 103 in Budapest. The Hungarian state news agency reported that Keleti died on Thursday morning after being hospitalized with pneumonia on December 25.
Keleti, born Ágnes Klein in 1921 in Budapest, had a remarkable career in gymnastics, winning a total of 10 Olympic medals, including five golds, for Hungary at the 1952 Helsinki Games and the 1956 Melbourne Games. Despite facing the loss of her father and several relatives in the Holocaust, Keleti emerged as one of the most successful Jewish Olympic athletes.
Her journey to Olympic success was marked by adversity, as she was forced off her gymnastics team in 1941 due to her Jewish ancestry. During World War II, Keleti went into hiding in the Hungarian countryside, surviving the Holocaust by assuming a false identity and working as a maid. While her mother and sister were saved with the help of Raoul Wallenberg, her father and other relatives tragically perished at Auschwitz.
After the war, Keleti resumed her gymnastics career and made her Olympic debut at the age of 31 at the 1952 Helsinki Games, where she won a gold medal in the floor exercise along with a silver and two bronzes. In 1956, she achieved further success at the Melbourne Olympics, winning four gold and two silver medals.
Notably, Keleti became the oldest gold medalist in gymnastics history at the age of 35 in Melbourne. However, her triumph was overshadowed by the Soviet Union's invasion of Hungary following an anti-Soviet uprising. Keleti sought political asylum in Australia and later immigrated to Israel, where she worked as a trainer and coached the Israeli Olympic gymnastics team until the 1990s.
Reflecting on her life, Keleti once said, 'These 100 years felt to me like 60. I live well. And I love life. It’s great that I’m still healthy.' Her legacy as a resilient athlete and Holocaust survivor will continue to inspire generations to come.
