Viktor Barna

Category:Use dmy dates from December 2021 Category:Use British English from August 2012Category:All Wikipedia articles written in British English

Viktor Barna
Personal information
NationalityHungarian, English
BornGyőző Braun
(1911-08-24)24 August 1911
Died27 February 1972(1972-02-27) (aged 60)
Lima, Peru
Sport
SportTable tennis

Viktor Győző Barna (born Győző Braun; 24 August 1911 – 27 February 1972) was a Hungarian and British champion table tennis player as well as a record five times singles World Champion.[1]

He won 41 World Championship medals (including 22 gold medals) and also won 20 English Open titles.

Personal life

Barna's birth name was Győző Braun, but because of anti-Semitism in Hungary at the time, he changed his name to a Hungarian-sounding name. In September 1939, during the outbreak of the Second World War, he and his wife were in America. Barna returned to Europe, in order to fight against the Nazis. He joined the British Army as a parachutist, and fought in Yugoslavia. After the British withdrew from Yugoslavia, Barna remained in England. After the war he settled with his wife in London. He became a British national in 1952. Later he became a representative for the Dunlop Sports Company and continued travelling the world in this capacity. It was during one of these tours in 1972 that he succumbed to a heart attack in Lima, Peru.

His brother Tibor Barna was the 1940 Hungarian table tennis national champion.[2]

Writing

In 1957, he published the book How to Win at Table Tennis (London: Pitman) ISBN 978-0-273-41699-9.[3] Then, in 1962, he published the book Table Tennis Today (London: Arthur Barker) and in 1971 Your Book of Table Tennis ISBN 978-0-571-09345-8.

Legacy

Barna, who was Jewish, was inducted into the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 1981.

Barna was inducted into the International Table Tennis Foundation Hall of Fame in 1993.[4]

See also

References

Category:1911 births Category:1972 deaths Category:Hungarian male table tennis players Category:English male table tennis players Category:Hungarian emigrants to England Category:Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom Category:Jewish Hungarian sportspeople Category:Table tennis players from Budapest Category:World Table Tennis Championships medalists Category:British Army personnel of World War II Category:Jewish British sportspeople Category:20th-century English sportsmen Category:20th-century Hungarian sportsmen
Category:1911 births Category:1972 deaths Category:20th-century English sportsmen Category:20th-century Hungarian sportsmen Category:All Wikipedia articles written in British English Category:Articles with short description Category:British Army personnel of World War II Category:CS1 maint: archived copy as title Category:English male table tennis players Category:Hungarian emigrants to England Category:Hungarian male table tennis players Category:Jewish British sportspeople Category:Jewish Hungarian sportspeople Category:Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom Category:Short description is different from Wikidata Category:Table tennis players from Budapest Category:Use British English from August 2012 Category:Use dmy dates from December 2021 Category:Webarchive template wayback links Category:World Table Tennis Championships medalists