Charles Selberg
Fencing Master at UC Santa Cruz, member of a team that won gold at the World Master’s Championships
Preserving Fencing History
The passion for fencing history you’ll find reflected here on the West Coast Fencing Archive can be traced to the legacy of Charles Selberg.
An exceptional teacher and storyteller, Charlie brought fencing history to life for his students through his vivid tales of great fencers and famous bouts.
His estate, filled with posters, photos, scrapbooks and other fencing memorabilia, became the initial collection for the Archive. Since then, we have incorporated sixty more collections and counting.
The Latest Story
Helene Mayer by Romaine
After spending the better part of this week running down stories that haven’t yet fully revealed themselves, I thought I’d revisit one of my many favorite subjects: Helene Mayer. There are a lot of photographs of Ms. Mayer out there, but several of the following are, I believe, unique to the interwebs until now.
Other Tales from the Archive
1958 Pacific Coast Championships: Men’s Sabre Finals
As we here at The Archive continue to mine the amazing things found in the trove acquired from Heizaburo Okawa, I find myself drawn to the filmed elements we had transferred to digital.
More Fencing!!!
To fulfill a request made by a concerned reader of our website, I now present… Fencing! It is, after all, what the website is purportedly about, yet I do tend to get caught up in personalities and storylines. Blame my upbringing. Still, a little fencing tournament...
Dining with Hans Halberstadt
After a too-long hiatus from posting to the site, I figured I’d start simple. But, like everything, there’s a bit more to the story. Over the summer, Friend of The Archive Jamie Douraghy had the excellent idea of calling me to let me know that retired fencing master...
Tales from the Archives: FDH
The language in the following cautionary tale is NSFW. It is also not suitable for youngsters. But it is an exemplary tale of why you should not draw the ire of your coach or maestro. The effect of such misjudgment can reverberate for a long time to come. Sit back and...
Michael Marx vs Vladimir Smirnov
One of the things, we are also collecting here at the West Coast Fencing Archive, besides medals, blades, and posters is stories. We have a rich tradition here on the West Coast but it is mostly known through oral tradition.
Where have we been?
Where Have We Been? What a crazy bunch of weeks! It may still take a bit to get back up to speed with regular stories, but the reason will hopefully be made clear as I describe recent events. First, Nationals. That would be the US Fencing National Championships,...
The Last Captain
FEATURE LENGTH FENCING DOCUMENTARY
For fifty years, the Hungarian National Sabre team had two constants: they took home gold in every tournament they entered and they had George Piller.
This is the story of Jekelfalussy (Piller) Gyorgy, the 1932 Olympic Sabre champion who defected to the United States during the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne.
By Doug Nichols and Greg Lynch
Meet the Fencers
Meet the Fencing Masters
Relic Spotlight
A hand-engraved medal from the Colonel Laurance Brownlee collection.
Film Library
Check out our video library
Vintage Posters
View our collection
Books
By the West Coast Fencing Archive
SHARE YOUR
STORY
Have something to share or add? Our goal is to capture the stories we know are out there. Plus photos, videos, home movies, posters—you name it. All this material helps preserve the stories of West Coast fencing.
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