Daniel Prenn, a young Jew who was born in Poland and is a naturalised German citizen, has distinguished himself in the Davis Cup Tennis Tournament, which is now being played in Berlin by winning every game and enabling the German team to win against Ireland, thus bringing Germany into the semi-final.
Great Britain is meeting Germany in the semi-final for the Davis Cup in Berlin on July 8th., 9th., and 10th.
Over five thousand people watched the game, and gave Prenn an ovation. Among those present were the Prime Minister, Herr von Papen, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Baron von Neurath, the Lord Mayor of Berlin, Dr. Sahm, the British and American Ambassadors, and many foreign Ministers.
The press is enthusiastic over Prenn’s play and acclaim him as Germany’s greatest champion. Prenn is a tower of strength and a master of strategy, Reznicek, the tennis writer of the “Berliner Zeitung am Mittag” says in his paper. It is due to him that Germany has won this victory, and it will be due to him if Germany wins the cup.
Daniel Prenn is a building engineer, and about a year ago, as the result of an allegation made against him in the antisemitic press that he had forfeited his amateur status by asking a Munich firm of racket-makers to pay him for using its rackets exclusively, he was suspended by the German Lawn
Tennis Association. He was therefore unable to play in the Davis Cup games last year, which Germany, deprived of its strongest player, lost. Afterwards, the charge was disproved and the suspension was removed.
Prenn defeated the British crack-player, H. W. Austin, in the European Final of the Davis Cup in 1929, and he played at Wimbledon in 1930.
He was naturalised as a German citizen only in February 1931, because for a long time the then representative of Thuringia in the Reichsrat, the former Hitlerist Minister of the Interior, Dr. Frick, by voting against was able to prevent the naturalisation of any Jew. This veto was finally removed by the Reichsrat, which decided that a simple majority would be sufficient, and Prenn was one of a batch of East European Jews who were thereupon given naturalisation.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
