(I now know that it's a photo from the heats of the 100 m at the Amsterdam, 1928, Olympics). It was telling the story of how Hitomi failed to qualify for the 100 m final and decided, on the spur of the moment, to participate in the 800 m. This led to myself digging deeper and I ended up writing the story of the women's 800 m at the 1928 Olympics and how dishonest reporting almost sounded the death knell for women's athletics.
But let us start at the beginning. Kinue Hitomi was born in 1907. From the outset her parents were pushing her to excel, never telling her that she had to work less because she was a girl. She was most active already in elementary school and even more so in high school where she joined the tennis team. (The anecdote here is that her father did not approve of this activity and, while her mother gave her money for the racquet, Hitomi-san had to hide the latter from her father. Only when he saw that she was obtaining top marks in arithmetic did he reluctantly approve of her tennis activities).
In 1923, while participating in a sports tournament with her high school, noticing that there were no girls from her school enrolled in athletics events she decided to participate. And she won the long jump with 4.67 m, a national record. From this moment onwards Hitomi dedicated herself exclusively to athletics.
In 1924 she joined the Nikaido college for Physical Education. In the same year, participating in an athletics meeting she jumped 10.33 m in the triple jump. (This performance is reported, erroneously, as an unofficial world record. However A. Kaenel had already jumped 10.50 m the year before. No problem! Hitomi would break the world record one year later with a 11.45 m jump and push it to 11.62 m in 1926). She graduated in 1925, and became a gymnastics teacher. She continued training, adding more and more events to her repertoire: long and triple jump (and also standing long jump), javelin and discus throw, and sprint events from 50 to 400 m.
The press started paying attention to her and in 1926 she was offered a journalists's job in the Osaka Mainichi Shimbun. Hitomi was also a talented writer and she excelled in tanka poetry. (A tanka,“short poem” is a free verse, 31-syllable poem, initially japanese but now existing in many languages). So Hitomi joined the sports section as the first female journalist in the newspaper's history. She worked during the day and trained in the evening.
Her international career started in 1926 when she participated in the 2nd International Women's World Games, held in Göteborg. I have written about these Games organised by A. Milliat in the main articles of the series. Hitomi could make the trip sponsored by her employer and with the support of Women's Physical Education Fund. She travelled through China and Russia by train. On her stopover in Russia she trained with members of a local club and noticed that her large physique (she was 1.69 m tall), quite exceptional in Japan, seemed to be similar to that of the russian female athletes. When she arrived in Sweden she was received by the japanese ambassador in Stockholm, before proceeding to Göteborg. At that moment Hitomi realised that she was representing her whole country. Instead of buckling under the pressure, Hitomi surpassed herself. She won the long jump with a world record leap of 5.50 m, won also the standing long jump with 2.47 m (she would establish a world record with 2.61 m in 1927), was second in the discus and third in the 100 yards. She ended up being the best overall athlete of the Games and received the prize from the hands of A. Milliat herself.
After this resounding success the japanese newspapers started interesting themselves in Hitomi-san. However a part of the articles had to do more with her impressive physique than her performances. They were spreading a suspicion concerning the femininity of this woman who had in a few years become the best athlete in the world. R. Kietlinski in his book on "Japanese Women and Sport" cites an article which appeared in Asahi Shimbun and which treats Hitomi as a giantess, remarking that she would have been a tall athlete even if she were competing in men's events. And the situation became worse after the success of Hitomi-san in the 1928 Olympics.
I have written about the fateful women's 800 m in Amsterdam. But it is interesting to look at the race from Hitomi's perspective. She arrived in Amsterdam having established world records in the long jump with 5.98 m, the 100 m with 12.2 s and the 400 m with 59.0 s. Unfortunately for her neither the long jump nor the 400 m were in the olympic program. High jump was the only jump for women. (Curiously, the japanese Wikipedia states that Hitomi participated in the high jump but failed to qualify. However there is no mention of her in the official results, and in fact this participation after her having won a medal in the 800 m would have been absurd: she was a so-so high jumper and had no chance whatsoever for a place on the podium). Hitomi opted for the 100 m and after passing the qualifiers easily she exited in the semis finishing 4th with 12.8 s. That was a major blow for her, who saw her olympic dreams shattered. And in a desperate decision she opted for the 800 m. At that time it was possible to enter an event even at the last moment. Hitomi had never run a 800 m before and in fact did not know anything about tactics. She qualified easily just behind the future winner L. Radke-Batschauer in a reasonable time of 2:26.4. In the final Hitomi started too fast but was soon passed by several competitors. The first lap was covered in 64.2 s with Hitomi at the 5th place. But with a little over 200 m to go Hitomi changed gear. She started pushing on her arms, passing Gentzel and chasing Radke all the way to the finish. The latter broke the world record with 2:16.8 and Hitomi dipped also under the previous record with 2:17.6. It was the first olympic medal for a japanese woman (and in the same Olympics M. Oda would win the first gold for Japan, prevailing in the triple jump, an event where he had placed 6th four years before in Paris). The japanese press initially celebrated Hitomi's success but soon turned to the question of the gender of the athlete.
Hitomi was met with distrust by the japanese media throughout her career. (In fact, not only the japanese. While competing in Sweden, she was asked by a female reporter: "Are you really a woman?"). In his book R. Kietlinski gives an excerpt of an article titled "Miss Hitomi Kinue and the question of womanhood". It's an interview which by today's standards would have been not only unacceptable but would probably end by the (male) reporter being fired by the newspaper's editor-in-chief. At a certain point the reporter remarks: "wouldn't that be funny if you were really a man". To which Hitomi-san replies just "I'm embarrassed".
The question of Kinue Hitomi's femininity is not (and cannot be) settled. Given her physique and her outstanding performances, the idea that she could have been hyperandrogenic cannot be discarded. The regular readers of the blog know that I do not hesitate to make searing remarks against the participation of hyperandrogenic athletes in women's events. Still, I will make an exception in the case of Hitomi-san. She was the pioneer. She brought the japanese women athletics to the limelight. And while she dominated the competition in her country, she also served as an example showing to the other female athletes what could be done.
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