OTTO LANG (Hollywood): How Skiing has come to America

A Film by Gerald Lehner (Austrian Broadcasting Corporation - ORF): OTTO LANG, an American originally hailing from Salzburg, Austria, used to work as a ski instructor in the Arlberg region. In 1937 his work took him to Mount Rainier in the Pacific Northwest and Sun Valley in Idaho where he became a ski instructor to the rich and famous. This background led to a career as a film producer and director in Hollywood.
The "Landesstudio Salzburg" of Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF) produced a documentary about Otto Lang, when, by chance, journalist and author GERALD LEHNER also of Salzburg, Austria, met Lang near Seattle and asked him for an interview. Lang was then almost 95-years-old. In the U.S. Lang is revered as a filmmaker, producer, author and pioneer of skiing. Many Europeans are unaware that he was also the director of the TV show DAKTARI, which delighted millions.
Lang produced the first film about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and worked at 20th Century Fox with actors JAMES STEWART and JAMES MASON. He has been nominated for an Oscar four times. Until his death just a few years ago, Lang was convinced that winter sports -- in the broader sense - were the key to a full and happy life.
His road to success began in Mühlbach am Hochkönig in Salzburg, where in 1929 he became a fully certified ski instructor under the tutelage of pioneer skier PETER RADACHER SEN.
Shortly after the U.S. entry into the WWII in 1941, Lang produced an educational film for the mountain troops of the U.S. Army 10th Mountain Division. It was based on the modern Arlberg skiing technique, developed by the Tyrolean HANNES SCHNEIDER. MATTHIAS FANCK, grandson and estate administrator of German movie pioneer ARNOLD FANCK donated a few scenes of the famous 1931 movie "Der weiße Rausch" (1931), in which Lang's mentor, HANNES SCHNEIDER, plays a leading role. In 1939, the Nazis took Schneider's ski school in Tyrol and he immigrated to the U.S. When asked who has influenced his artistic work, Lang would say: STEFAN ZWEIG. After all, in 1926, before he fled from the Austro-fascists and Nazis, a much younger Lang was the private gym instructor of the famous author.
CONTACT FOR MORE INFORMATION: [e-mail]

[@duvidl]

I met Otto Lang at the screening of a Warren Miller ski film in Santa Monica, CA in the 1980's. It was nice to speak with him. Also, I had a ski lesson with Hannes Schneider's son Herbert in New Hampshire in the early '60's.

[@amir071]

Just for the record, Otto Lang was born in Tešanj (Teshany) in Bosnia and Herzegovina :)

[@tarikbosnian9955]

Ja sam isto pretrazivao Tesanj i naisao na njegovo ime, Samo nije mi jasno kako da Austrijanac se rodi u Tesnju (I ja sam iz Tesnja)

[@homotopf9461]

@@tarikbosnian9955 thats actually easy to answer, he was born in austria, but that area is now part of bosnia. So he was not born in Bosnia, dont forget, this all happened over 100 years ago, the borders were different

[@thatcherwarrickhess3399]

Very nice film - I loved the music and archival audio. I am currently making a podcast called Object Obscura - where I talk to an expert about an object and find the person who it belongs to. I have two vintage skis with Otto Lang's name on it - made by the Groswold Ski company. The email doesn't in the descriptions does not to work - how can I get in contact with Gerald Lehner about Otto Lang and my skis?