Holger Louis Nielsen (December 18, 1866, Copenhagen

Copenhagen

Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...

 – January 26, 1955, Hellerup

Hellerup

Hellerup is a Danish town of Region Hovedstaden, located in the Gentofte Municipality in Denmark. It is bordered to the east by the sound Øresund and to the South by Copenhagen and counted among the most affluent areas in Denmark....

) was a Danish

Denmark

Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...

 fencer

Fencing

Fencing, which is also known as modern fencing to distinguish it from historical fencing, is a family of combat sports using bladed weapons.Fencing is one of four sports which have been featured at every one of the modern Olympic Games...

, shooter

Shooting

Shooting is the act or process of firing rifles, shotguns or other projectile weapons such as bows or crossbows. Even the firing of artillery, rockets and missiles can be called shooting. A person who specializes in shooting is a marksman...

, and athlete. He competed at the 1896 Summer Olympics

1896 Summer Olympics

The 1896 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the I Olympiad, was a multi-sport event celebrated in Athens, Greece, from April 6 to April 15, 1896. It was the first international Olympic Games held in the Modern era...

 in Athens

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

. He is probably best known for drawing up the first modern set of rules for the game of handball

Team handball

Handball is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each pass a ball to throw it into the goal of the other team...

.

Fencing

Nielsen's main sport was fencing, in which he competed in the sabre

Sabre

The sabre or saber is a kind of backsword that usually has a curved, single-edged blade and a rather large hand guard, covering the knuckles of the hand as well as the thumb and forefinger...

. At Athens, Nielsen placed third in the sabre event. He split his matches in the five-man, round-robin tournament. Nielsen defeated Adolf Schmal

Adolf Schmal

Felix Adolf Schmal was an Austrian fencer and racing cyclist. He competed at the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens....

 and Georgios Iatridis

Georgios Iatridis

Georgios Iatridis was a Greek fencer. He participated in the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens.-Career:Iatridis competed in the sabre event. In the five-man, round-robin tournament, he lost all four of his matches. He was defeated by Ioannis Georgiadis, Adolf Schmal, Telemachos Karakalos and Holger...

, but lost to Telemachos Karakalos

Telemachos Karakalos

Telemachos Karakalos was a Greek fencer. He competed at the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens.Karakalos competed in the men's sabre event. In the five-man, round-robin tournament, Karakalos won three of his four matches. He defeated Georgios Iatridis, Adolf Schmal, and Holger Nielsen but lost to...

 and Ioannis Georgiadis

Ioannis Georgiadis

Ioannis Georgiadis was a Greek fencer. He competed at the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens, the 1906 Intercalated Olympics and the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris....

. This 2-2 record put Nielsen in third place.

Firearms competitions

In the military rifle event, Nielsen quit the competition after the first day. He had shot 20 times out of the full 40, though his score was unknown. Nielsen placed fifth in the military pistol event. He won a bronze medal in the rapid fire pistol, coming in last of the three shooters that finished the competition. His best result of the Games was a surprise silver medal

Silver medal

A silver medal is a medal awarded to the second place finisher of contests such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, and contests with similar formats....

 in the free pistol competition; his score of 285 was far behind Sumner Paine

Sumner Paine

Sumner Paine was an American shooter. He competed at the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens.Paine entered all three of the pistol events in the 1896 Games...

's 442 but was sufficient to defeat the other three shooters in the event. His scores for each of the five strings of 6 shots were 12, 85, 62, 24, and 100.

Discus

Nielsen also competed in the discus

Discus

Discus, "disk" in Latin, may refer to:* Discus , a progressive rock band from Indonesia* Discus , a fictional character from the Marvel Comics Universe and enemy of Luke Cage* Discus , a freshwater fish popular with aquarium keepers...

 throw. He did not place among the top four in the event, though records are unclear as to which place between fifth and last (ninth) he received.

Other activities

Nielsen is also credited with developing an early set of rules for handball

Team handball

Handball is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each pass a ball to throw it into the goal of the other team...

 in 1898, and with developing a form of external cardiopulmonary resuscitation

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation is an emergency procedure which is performed in an effort to manually preserve intact brain function until further measures are taken to restore spontaneous blood circulation and breathing in a person in cardiac arrest. It is indicated in those who are unresponsive...

in 1932. The National Research Council gave support to this method in 1951, however, it was superseded by mouth to mouth resuscitation in recommendations of 1958. (Artificial Respiration, the history of an idea. A B Baker Med Hist. 1971 15(4): 336-351