Franjo Bučar (25 November 1866 – 26 December 1946[1]) was a Croatian writer and sports popularizer . He is considered to be the father of Croatian sport and olympism.[2]
Bučar was born in Zagreb to Slovenian father Jožef (Josip) Bučar and Croatian mother Franjica Mikšić[3] and educated in Zagreb, Vienna, and Stockholm. He worked on a study of Croatian literature and also wrote about Scandinavian literature. He was a prominent sports writer and wrote manuals for many types of sports. He was the popularizer and initiator of introduction of many sports in Croatia – football, gymnastics, ice skating, alpine skiing, ice hockey, fencing and others.[1]
He participated in the establishment of numerous clubs and professional alliances and also played a prominent role in the Croatian Sokol movement.[4] He left an extensive correspondence with major figures of European culture and sport and created a library of several thousand volumes. He received national and international awards. In 1914 Bučar was elected the first president of the Croatian Sports Federation, which he founded in 1909.[1]
The founder and president of the Yugoslav Olympic Committee, which initially worked in Zagreb, he was a member of the International Olympic Committee from 1920 until his death in 1946.[5]
In 1991 the Franjo Bučar State Award for Sport, the highest award for exceptional achievements in the development of sport, was established in Croatia.
| Preceded by | President of the Yugoslav Olympic Committee 1919–1927 |
Succeeded by |