Are we related to anyone famous? Here are a few for your consideration:
Ingo Rademacher is an actor, probably most famous for his role as “Jax” on the ABC soap opera “General Hospital”. He was also a fifth-place finisher in the 16th season of “Dancing With the Stars”. He was born in Germany just 40 miles away from Olpe but his family moved to Australia when he was a child. Although I can’t prove it, his proximity to Olpe leads me to believe that YES, he is probably distantly related to us. He has a cute kid named “Peanut”. I am totally serious. Watch this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QFzWw6VlnE
Hans Rademacher was a mathematician and is famous for the Rademacher Distribution which is “a discrete probability distribution where a random variate X has a 50% chance of being either +1 or -1”. That sounds to me like a fancy-pants way of saying “heads or tails” but what do I know. Hans was born near Hamburg, Germany which is quite a ways distant from Olpe, so I doubt he is a close relative. However, he did get fired from his position at the University of Breslau because he stood up to the Nazis. So YES, let’s welcome him to the family!
Franz Rademacher was a Nazi bad guy later convicted of war crimes. He was born near Neustrelitz which is really, really far from Olpe. So on that basis, I say NO, he’s not a relative and anyway who wants to be related to Nazi bad guy?
Pete Rademacher was a gold-medalist heavyweight boxer in the 1956 Olympics and still lives Medina County, Ohio. He was born in Washington State, but his grandfather was from Weibern, Germany – located about an hour and a half south of Olpe. Maybe a stretch but I say what the heck, YES, possibly a distant relative. Read more about him here.
Ruth Rademacher is someone you might remember. She married Leo Rademacher, one of Joe and Annie Rademacher’s sons. Leo grew up here in Longmont and got his PhD at the University of Colorado. Ruth was on the U.S. Ski Team for the 1948 Winter Olympics in St. Moritz, Switzerland. Ruth died just a couple of years ago. You can read her obituary here. Did I forget anyone? Any names you’d like to add?
