Since 1926, the USC Fencing Team has proven to be a dominant force, winning numerous championships and representing the bold Trojan spirit. Although it has changed over the last three-quarters of a century, as athletes and coaches have come and gone, one aspect of the team has remained the same throughout its history: the dedication to the sport of fencing and to teaching its skills to all who seek to learn.
The beginnings of the USC Fencing Team date back before its creation in 1926 to the initiation of Rufus B. von KleinSmid as the fifth President of the University of Southern California in 1921. Von KleinSmid was, among his many talents, a skilled fencer and an enthusiastic promoter of the sport. He received instruction on a regular basis at the Los Angeles Athletic Club (L.A.A.C.), an institution which is still in existence in its original location downtown. The fencing instructor at the Athletic Club was a Belgian fencing master by the name of Henry J. Uyttenhove. Shortly after von KleinSmid took office, fencing was first offered as a "Sophomore Sport," essentially a recreational sport separate from the varsity athletics of the university. None other than Henry Uyttenhove became the first fencing instructor at USC.
In 1926, a few years into the fencing program, the team grew out of its sophomore sports standing as "the department was reorganized by Coach Uyttenhove, and with the material at hand he put out an honest to goodness fencing team." After only being in existence for one year, the USC Fencing Team placed second in the Pacific Coast Intercollegiate matches of the American Fencers League of America (the precursor to the USFA), held in San Francisco.
With a flood of interest in fencing by the students of USC, women's fencing was first offered as an intramural sport in 1927 under the tutelage of Uyttenhove, and already in 1928, several of the women were placing in the finals of the Pacific Coast Championship Tournament.
The USC Fencing Team would go on to become a powerhouse in Pacific Coast Intercollegiate tournaments, winning countless titles in several weapons as Uyttenhove continued to instruct his students. For example, by 1940, after fifteen years of fencing at USC, the fencing team had collected 14 Pacific Coast Intercollegiate titles.
Coach Henry Uyttenhove
Rufus B. von KleinSmid
Henry Uyttenhove trains Douglas Fairbanks in "The Mark of Zorro"
Jean Heremans (left) with David Niven on "The King's Thief"
Olympic Fencer and Three Time Oscar Winner, Edward Carfagno
Stirling Silliphant meets with Bruce Lee
Swords and the Silver Screen
When USC President Rufus
B. von KleinSmid began training with Uyttenhove at the Los Angeles Athletic
Club, he was not the only VIP to learn from the maestro. In 1920, an actor
by the name of Douglas Fairbanks
was engaged to star in a Hollywood motion picture, "The Mark of Zorro".
Fairbanks employed Henry Uyttenhove to instruct him on the fencing arts
and to train him for his movies, and soon he began taking lessons at the
Athletic Club. There, he met von KleinSmid and the two became very good
friends. They were often seen dueling each other and it is fair to say
these earliest connections between USC and Hollywood were made on a fencing
strip.
Douglas Fairbanks would
go on to become the first president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts
and Sciences. According to the Academy, "The College Affaire Committee
was one of the first committees established by the Academy. It met for
the first time just 13 days after the Academy's organization banquet in
1927 and that meeting's purpose was to confer with USC President Rufus
von KleinSmid about the possibility of introducing appropriate motion
picture courses into the university curriculum. The result of that and
future meetings, as well as the friendship that existed between von KleinSmid
and the Academy's first president, Douglas Fairbanks, was "Introduction
to Photoplay." First offered in the spring of 1929, this lecture
series course featured speakers that included Fairbanks, directors D.W.
Griffith and Ernst Lubitsch, MGM Production Chief Irving Thalberg and
Producer William deMille." Out of the friendship between the two
swordsmen, the world-renowned USC School of Cinema-Television was born
in 1929.
Uyttenhove's stint as
fencing trainer for Douglas Fairbanks, Ramon Navarro and others continued
through such films as "The Three Musketeers" (1921), "The
Prisoner of Zenda" (1922), "Robin Hood" (1922), "Monte
Cristo" (1922), "Rupert of Hentzan" (1923) and "Scaramouche"
(1923). Uyttenhove was a pioneer in that he began the expert technical
staging of screen duels. His legacy was felt by all who followed him,
including Fred Cavens, Ralph Faulkner and Jean Heremans.
Jean
Heremans would become Uyttenhove's successor in many respects.
Similar to Uyttenhove, Heremans was an international champion from Belgium
who took over the position of fencing instructor at the Los Angeles Athletic
Club. Also like his predecessor, Heremans would go on to instruct the
USC Fencing Team and work in Hollywood. According to "Swordsmen of
the Screen" by Jeffrey Richards, Heremans "entered screen fencing
when hired by MGM tin 1948 to supervise the swordplay for their remake
of "The Three Musketeers". Thereafter, he directed duels utilizing
every kind of sword: sabre ("The Prisoner of Zenda" - 1952 version),
rapier ("Swordsmen of Siena"), scimitar ("Princess of the
Nile"), broadsword ("Prince Valiant"). He also claims the
distinction of creating the longest recorded screen duels, one of five
minutes in "The Three Musketeers" and one of six-and-a-half
minutes in "Scaramouche" (1952 version)." Heremans also
appeared in two films, "The Last Time I Saw Paris" in 1954 and
as one of the Cardinal's Guards in "The Three Muskateers" in
1948.
Not only the coaches,
but the fencers of the USC have also received their 15 minutes of fame.
The women's fencing team of the 1930-1931 school year was featured in
an as-yet unidentified film as the USC Yearbook from that year states,
"the fencers recently appeared in a talking picture which is to be
released at the leading theaters in the city." Edward
Carfagno, chosen to represent the U.S. on the 1940 Olympic
Fencing Team and another USC Fencing Team alumnus, was nominated for Oscars
13 times, and won Academy Awards in art direction for "The Bad and
the Beautiful" in 1952, "Julius Caesar" in 1953 and "Ben
Hur" in 1959 for his work in Art Direction. His movie career spanned
more than 50 years and 76 films. Another fencing alum, Stirling Silliphant,
was one of the most important and prolific writers of television drama
in the 1960s, remembered particularly for his work on Naked City and Route
66. These Emmy-winning shows were not the only claims to his abilities
as Silliphant won a Best Screenplay Oscar for the tense racial drama,
"In the Heat of the Night" (1967). Some of his work was classic
in another sense: Silliphant worked on such popular, high-camp films as
"Shaft" (producer, 1971), as well as its sequels, and provided
the screenplays for the disaster flicks, "The Poseidon Adventure"
(1972), "The Towering Inferno" (1974) and "The Swarm"
(1978) and the Sylvester Stallone arm-wrestling epic "Over the Top"
(1987).
More recently, fencing
coach Scott Frank became involved in the highly praised short film out
of USC, "George Lucas in Love." This "Shakespeare in Love"
spoof was well received (Siskel and Ebert thought it was very entertaining)
and Dr. Frank can be seen in a role he plays very well, that of a fencer,
as well as carrying the credit for the stunt co-ordinator in the movie.
The 50's, 60's and 70's
Following Henry Uyttenhove's departure from coaching at USC, Jean Heremans, a Belgian champion fencer, took his place and whipped a new team into shape. The 1949-1950 team was undefeated in League competition. His team was regarded by many as being "unbeatable" and the fencing team sought competition outside the collegiate league from clubs such as the Los Angeles Athletic Club, the Inglewood Dragoons, the Hollywood Athletic Club and the Faulkner School of Fencing.
When Jean Heremans left USC, he was replaced by Dr. Francis Zold, a well-known name in Southern California collegiate fencing. Zold had the pleasure of training a young Sherry Rose, regarded at that time as one of the outstanding amateurs in the country winning several awards in national and international competition. Zold continued to teach fencing at USC through the 1970's.
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The USC Lyon Center, home to USC Fencing
In the 80's and 90's, with the resurgence of interest in recreational sports and the construction of the USC Lyon Center, the fencing team received a new base and more ability to recruit new members. Now, in the twenty-first century, the fencing team remains as committed to teaching new fencers the skills they need to compete at a high level as the team was in 1926 when it all began. This latest reincarnation of the fencing team, with Dr. Scott Frank, Darryl Hwang and Jeff Alulis as coaches, has produced champion fencers in the collegiate league. The team continues to dominate and to proudly represent the Trojan spirit. As sure as the fencing team chanting the SoCal spellout before every competition, so too is the future of the USC Fencing Team certainly bright.
Acknowledgements:
USC El Rodeo Yearbook
USC Daily Trojan
Mr. E. Comstock - USC Cinema/TV Library
Mr. Rudy Behlmer - Author of 1965 article Swordplay on the Screen