She's A Lady?

With the 2008 summer Olympics fastly approaching (the opening ceremonies are awake from today) it seems like everyday in the news there is a yet another story talking about human rights issues in China or what they are doing to stop reduce pollution during the games. Normally I turn somewhat of a deaf ear to these types of reports but the other day when I listening to All Things Considered (on our local NPR affiliate WCPN) they had a report about how some female athletes will have to undergo testing to determine they are the appropriate sex for competing. This in of itself is rather humorous and when I was talking to my dad about this he said did you know there was a polish woman from Cleveland who was in the Olympics who was later found to be a man (insert bad joke here).


This I did not know, so I had to do some research and then I discovered how Stanislawa Walasiewiczowna (a.k.a. Stella Walsh) who was born in Poland and later emigrated to Cleveland won a gold medal @ the 1932 Olympics in the 100 meter dash and a silver medal @ 1936 Olympics. She was elected to the track and field hall of fame in 1975. She was murdered in 1980 during a robbery it was then discovered during her autopsy that she had male genitals and female hormones. Seeing as how the local media loves to find a tie they can to any national or international story I am surprised I have not seen this mentioned locally.