Angelica Rozeanu

Angelica Rozeanu
Angelica Rozeanu at the 1955 World Championships
Personal information
Full name	Angelica Rozeanu-Adelstein
Nationality	Romania/Israel
Born	(1921-10-15)15 October 1921 Bucharest, Romania
Died	21 February 2006(2006-02-21) (aged 84) Haifa, Israel
Medal record Representing Romania World Championships 1957 Stockholm Doubles 1957 Stockholm Team 1956 Tokyo Doubles 1956 Tokyo Team 1955 Utrecht Singles 1955 Utrecht Doubles 1955 Utrecht Team 1954 Wembley Singles 1954 Wembley Doubles 1953 Bucharest Singles 1953 Bucharest Doubles 1953 Bucharest Mixed doubles 1953 Bucharest Team 1952 Bombay Singles 1952 Bombay Mixed doubles 1952 Bombay Team 1951 Vienna Singles 1951 Vienna Doubles 1951 Vienna Mixed doubles 1951 Vienna Team 1950 Budapest Singles 1950 Budapest Doubles 1950 Budapest Mixed doubles 1950 Budapest Team 1948 Wembley Singles 1948 Wembley Mixed doubles 1948 Wembley Team 1939 Cairo Doubles 1939 Cairo Team 1937 Baden Mixed doubles European Championships 1960 Zagreb Doubles 1960 Zagreb Mixed doubles 1958 Budapest Singles 1958 Budapest Doubles 1958 Budapest Mixed doubles 1958 Budapest Team

Angelica Rozeanu (née Adelstein) (15 October 1921 – 21 February 2006) was a Romanian table tennis player of Jewish origin, the most successful female table tennis player in the history of the sport, winning the women's world singles title 6 years in succession.

Table tennis career

Rozeanu started playing table tennis while recovering from scarlet fever when she was eight. In 1933, at age 12, she won the Romanian Cup. She won the Romanian national championship in 1936 and remained Romania's female champion for the next 21 years (1936–57, excluding World War II). Her first major win was the 1938 Hungarian Open.

Her career was interrupted by World War II, as from 1940 to 1944 she was barred from even entering a gymnasium in Romania and was unable to play.

Rozeanu won her first World Championship in 1950, starting the winning run that would see her win the championship six years in succession, a feat yet to be matched. She was also the last non-Asian woman to win the title. In total, she won 17 world titles (and 12 silver and bronze medals at the World Championships), three world women's doubles titles, and three world mixed doubles titles. By far Romania's greatest profile in the sport, she was also the President of the Romanian Table Tennis Commission from 1950 to 1960.

Rozeanu emigrated to Israel in 1960. She won the 1961 Maccabiah Games Women's Table Tennis Championship, and was Israel's champion in 1960–62. She kept in touch with her native Romania, and visited it for the last time in 2005. In 2006, she died at the age of 84.

Recognition

Rozeanu was given the Romanian title of Merited Master of Sport in 1954. She has also received four Order of Work honors. In 1997 she was awarded the Knesset Medal. She was awarded the title of Honorary Citizen of Haifa in 2001.

She was inducted into the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 1981 and into the ITTF Hall of Fame in 1995.

See also

• List of Jewish Romanians
• List of World Table Tennis Championships medalists

Sources

• Profile at ITTF News
• Obituary at The Telegraph
• ""Angelica Rozeanu – the world's greatest female table tennis player in history," 2/21/06". Archived from the original on 27 September 2007. Retrieved 2 April 2007.
• Jacov Sobovitz, Angelica Adelstein Rozeanu, Jewish Women Encyclopedia