Charlotte Rickert Stengel: A Look Back, Part II

CAIRO — But Charlotte’s appeal was never only about power, it was about personality.

The audience did not simply watch a strong woman, they watched Charlotte.

Europe in that era loved spectacle. Variety theaters, cabarets, circuses, and traveling shows filled the cultural landscape, and performers who could astonish an audience were celebrated like modern celebrities and Charlotte was one of those performers.

In 1935, Charlotte joined a major German variety production known as "Nachwuchs am Varieté" translated roughly as “up-and-coming talent.” The show highlighted the abilities of young performers—dancers, singers, musicians, jugglers, and acrobats and among them was the teenage girl who had become known as the strongest woman in the world.

The production appeared at Berlin’s famous Wintergarten Theater, a legendary venue that had been a centerpiece of Berlin nightlife since the late 19th century. The theater had hosted some of Europe’s most celebrated entertainers, and now Charlotte Rickert stood beneath its lights when she was still only a teenager.

Yet her name was already appearing prominently on the bill.

She was not the stereotypical image of a massive weightlifter or a towering performer. The audience saw a young woman who looked almost delicate—but who possessed a strength that seemed impossible.

In 1936, Berlin became the center of the world’s attention as the Olympic Games were coming to Germany, and the country was determined to showcase itself as a place of athletic excellence and cultural achievement.

Women’s weightlifting was not an official Olympic sport at the time. However, Charlotte was connected with Olympic-era exhibitions celebrating athletic ability, and accounts of her life describe her performing in association with the 1936 Olympic festivities.

According to stories Charlotte later shared, she received a special gold medal recognizing her participation.

Her abilities attracted enormous attention because she was demonstrating strength at a time when women were rarely celebrated for physical power.

By the summer of 1939, Charlotte was performing in Denmark with one of America’s most famous cowboy stars, Tom Mix. For a young performer who had spent her childhood dreaming of new stages and new opportunities, it seemed like another door was opening. There were plans for Charlotte to appear in a film with the American cowboy star.

Hollywood seemed within reach.

But history intervened. The outbreak of World War II changed everything.

And tragedy soon followed.

Tom Mix died in 1940 in a car accident in Arizona, ending those plans. The Hollywood opportunity disappeared, and Charlotte and her family remained trapped in a Europe consumed by war.

The performer who had once traveled freely across borders now lived in a continent where borders were closing and danger was everywhere.

During the war years, the Rickert family continued performing. According to Charlotte’s recollections, they were ordered to entertain German troops, including soldiers near active combat zones and for performers who had spent their lives bringing joy to audiences, the circumstances were increasingly grim.

They were no longer simply traveling entertainers.

They were people trying to survive.

One of the most dramatic stories Charlotte told from this period involved an incident in Ludwigshafen.

Her family was staying in a house when an Allied bomb landed on the roof. According to Charlotte’s account, the bomb did not explode.

Her father, recognizing his daughter’s unusual combination of strength and agility, ordered her to climb onto the roof and remove it. Charlotte did what she had been trained to do her entire life.

She climbed.

She lifted.

She carried.

And, fortunately, the bomb turned out to be a dud.

Whether beneath the lights of a theater or facing danger during wartime, Charlotte’s extraordinary abilities had become more than a performance.

The most harrowing chapter of Charlotte’s wartime story came later, when her family was sent to perform near the front lines.

According to Charlotte’s own recollections, the family was compelled to perform for German military units in Poland during one of the darkest periods of the war.

She later suggested that they were viewed with suspicion because of alleged assistance given to Jewish people, and that some believed the circumstances placed their lives in danger.

During one such episode, the family found itself caught in active fighting.

Charlotte’s mother, Elisabeth, was shot in the back and badly wounded. What happened next became one of the defining stories of Charlotte’s life.

According to her account, the teenage performer who had once carried circus props and lifted weights now carried something far more important:

Her mother.

Charlotte used her strength to lift her injured mother and carried her through difficult war torn forests,  eventually reaching safety and medical assistance.

It was not a performance.

There was no audience.

No applause.

Only survival.

When the war finally ended, the Rickert family had lost nearly everything.

The fame, the money, the comfortable life of European performers—all of it had been swept away.

Charlotte later remembered that at one point she had no shoes. Someone saw her situation and gave her a pair.

That simple act stayed with her.

She made herself a promise:

If she ever saw someone else in need, she would help them.

It was a promise that would shape the rest of her life.

When American forces entered the German city of Wiesbaden at the end of World War II, Charlotte Rickert had already lived more than most people experience in a lifetime.

She had grown up under the bright lights of European circus tents.

She had performed before enormous crowds.

She had traveled from country to country with her family.

She had seen her dreams of Hollywood come close enough to touch, only to disappear.

She had survived a war that destroyed much of the world she knew.

And now, standing in the aftermath of that war, she found herself face-to-face with a new beginning.

According to Charlotte’s recollections, she greeted the arriving American soldiers with bouquets of flowers.

Among those soldiers was a young American officer named George Stengal. 

George was working with U.S. Army intelligence, and while he was becoming interested in Charlotte personally, he was also gathering information as part of his duties during the occupation.

Charlotte later laughed when remembering that period.

“I knew him for almost a year before I realized that he was fluent in German,” she said.

The young officer and the former circus star quickly became close.

What began amid the uncertainty of postwar Germany became a lifelong partnership.

They were married in Wiesbaden, and in 1947 George brought Charlotte to the United States.

For Charlotte, America represented something she had spent years dreaming about: a chance to rebuild.

When she arrived in America, Charlotte attempted to reclaim the career that had defined her youth.

She returned to performing and joined a traveling circus that toured the eastern United States.

The stage had always been her home.

The applause had always been familiar.

But life had changed.

The same courage that had carried her through war would soon be tested again.

During one performance, tragedy struck.

A fire and explosion erupted in her trailer.

Charlotte immediately rushed back inside.

Her young son, George Jr., was only 19 months old.

She managed to rescue him and get him into the arms of someone waiting outside.

But when she tried to escape herself, smoke and confusion overwhelmed her.

She became disoriented and could not find the door.

Charlotte suffered severe burns over a large portion of her body—injuries that left her near death for weeks.

The woman who had lifted weights, carried injured people, and performed feats of strength now faced a battle unlike any she had encountered before.

Her performing career was over.

But Charlotte Rickert Stengel had never been defined by only one role.

She was not simply a strongwoman.

She was a survivor.

After recovering from her injuries, Charlotte and George eventually settled into a quieter life.

She returned to New York, where she opened a storefront school in Astoria, Queens to train circus performers, including jugglers and acrobats.

But as George’s rope business career grew in Coxsackie, the couple began spending more time in the Catskills.

The region had long been a destination for travelers, performers, and families seeking a slower pace of life.

For Charlotte, it became home.

She and George eventually settled in Greene County, with a primary residence in Cornwallville near Durham and another home in Cairo.

The woman who had once traveled across Europe chasing applause found a different kind of fulfillment in the hills and small communities of upstate New York.

She no longer needed a spotlight.

She found purpose in service.

The lesson Charlotte carried from her father was simple.

“Always remember, nobody is better than you and nobody is worse than you.”

Those words stayed with her.

They became the foundation of the way she treated people.

She remembered being displaced.

She remembered needing help.

And she never forgot the person who gave her shoes when she had none.

So when she saw people struggling, she acted.

At first, helping others meant opening her own home.

People who needed food, clothing, furniture, or simply a place to rest found their way to Charlotte.

Her house became a refuge.

Eventually, that effort grew into something much larger.

Charlotte helped establish what became Greene County’s first food pantry. Through the years, she became the driving force behind the food donations at Resurrection Lutheran Church in Cairo.

And she did not simply sit behind a desk.

She worked.

Five days a week, she organized donations, recruited volunteers, delivered supplies, and searched for ways to help people get back on their feet.

She drove thousands of miles along the back roads of the Catskills every year helping those who needed it.

At one point, she logged approximately 17,000 miles annually making deliveries and checking on people.

The irony was not lost on those who knew Charlotte.

The same hands that once bent heavy springs for cheering crowds were now carrying boxes of food for neighbors.

The same woman who had once challenged strongmen was now challenging poverty and she still had the same personality.

Ray Houghtaling remembered that Charlotte had a unique ability to combine kindness with a strong sense of humor.

If someone came to the food pantry smoking a cigarette, Charlotte had a simple response.

She would snatch the cigarette away and tell them:

“If you can afford cigarette, then you can afford food!”

Even as she aged, Charlotte refused to slow down.

At 73, she was involved in a serious automobile accident that left her with a damaged disc in her back.

Many people would have stepped away after such an injury. Charlotte did not.

She returned to helping others while still undergoing physical therapy.

She could still move heavy bookcases.

She could still work harder than people half her age.

And she still believed that helping someone else was simply what a person was supposed to do.

By the time Charlotte reached 90, her accomplishments had multiplied.

She had become a beloved community figure.

The Cairo Rotary Club honored her as Person of the Year.

In 2008, she received the Tyson Foods Hunger All-Star of the Month Award for her dedication to fighting hunger.

The recognition was meaningful.

But those who knew Charlotte understood something important:

She never helped people for awards.

She helped because she remembered what it felt like to need help- making Charlotte indeed at the time... the strongest woman in the world.