Carl Alfred Erhardt was an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 ice hockey

Ice hockey

Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take...

 player who captained the British national team to numerous international championships in the 1930s, including Olympic

Olympic Games

The Olympic Games is a major international event featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the world’s foremost sports competition where more than 200 nations participate...

 gold at the 1936 Winter Olympics

1936 Winter Olympics

The 1936 Winter Olympics, officially known as the IV Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event which was celebrated in 1936 in the market town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria, Germany. Germany also hosted the Summer Olympics the same year in Berlin...

 in Garmisch-Partenkirchen

Garmisch-Partenkirchen

Garmisch-Partenkirchen is a mountain resort town in Bavaria, southern Germany. It is the administrative centre of the district of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, in the Oberbayern region, and the district is on the border with Austria...

.

Early years

Unlike most British hockey players of the era, Erhardt did not grow up in Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. Rather, he learned the game of hockey while attending school in Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 and Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

 as a boy. Erhardt was a passionate defenseman, sometimes playing in excess of 40 minutes each game. http://www.bihwa.co.uk/hall_of_fame/erhardt.htm An excellent athlete, Erhardt also excelled at tennis

Tennis

Tennis is a sport usually played between two players or between two teams of two players each . Each player uses a racket that is strung to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over a net into the opponent's court. Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society at all...

, skiing

Skiing

Skiing is a recreational activity using skis as equipment for traveling over snow. Skis are used in conjunction with boots that connect to the ski with use of a binding....

 and water-skiing. (He founded the British Water Ski Federation.) http://www.azhockey.com/Er.htm

National team success

Erhardt was a member of the European and World Championship teams in 1931, the World Championship team in 1934 and 1935, and the captain of the team which won the European and World Championships, along with Olympic gold, in 1936. Of the twelve members of the 1936 team, Erhardt was one of only two that had not either been born or learned the game in Canada. Thirty-nine years old at the time, Erhardt is the oldest man ever to win an Olympic gold in ice hockey.http://www.azhockey.com/Er.htm The British defeated the prohibitive favourites, the Canadians, in capturing Great Britain's first and only gold medal in ice hockey.

Retirement

After his Olympic success, Erhardt retired from hockey. He wrote a book in 1937 titled Ice Hockey, became a referee, and joined the Council of the British Ice Hockey Association

British Ice Hockey Association

The British Ice Hockey Association was founded in 1913 and was the governing body of ice hockey in the United Kingdom during the 1913–14 season and between 1923 and 1999 when it was replaced by Ice Hockey UK....

, of which he became a lifetime Vice-President. Erhardt was elected to the British Ice Hockey Hall of Fame in 1950, and was post-humously elected to the International Ice Hockey Federation

International Ice Hockey Federation

The International Ice Hockey Federation is the worldwide governing body for ice hockey and in-line hockey. It is based in Zurich, Switzerland, and has 70 members...

Hall of Fame in 1998.