Ed Hennig
Posted on Tuesday, October 3rd, 2017 by John Wood
Ed Hennig, from Cleveland, Ohio, is a rather amazing figure in Indian Club lore — first up, he won the very first Olympic Gold medal in Indian Club Swinging at the 1904 Olympic Games in St. Louis Missouri. In this event (contested for the first time), each athlete was allowed five minutes for the performance with a pair of three-pound clubs. Three judges then scored each competitor a maximum of five points each, thus an overall maximum of 15 points. Hennig’s score of 13 points netted him the Gold. (Emil Voight scored 9 points and Ralph Wilson scored 5, both from the US, took Silver and Bronze respectively.)
As far as Indian clubs, Hennig was just getting warmed up, he would win the AAU national title in club swinging in 1904, 1911, 1933, 1936-37, 1939-40, 1942, 1945-47, and 1950-51 — 13 times overall, the last time when he was 71 years of age! Hennig competed as an AAU athlete for over 6o years, likely a record in itself.