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From “Terminator” to “Governator”
 is name has long been a household word around the world, but Arnold Schwarzenegger's astounding level of name recognition went up more than a few notches when he lent a heavy Austrian accent to the California gubernatorial recall election in August 2003.
Arnold Schwarzenegger moved solidly into the
field of politics, California style, in August 2003.
POSTERS > Arnold Posters from Art.com
Of course, Schwarzenegger's run for governor was only made possible by his long-running success in Hollywood. The story of how a policeman's son from a small town in Austria came to be a multimillionaire superstar in America would make a good movie.
Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger came into the world at his family's home in the Austrian village of Thal bei Graz on July 30, 1947. His parents were Aurelia Jadrny (1922-1998) and Gustav Schwarzenegger (1907-1972). His father was a policeman, a member of what the Austrians call the Gendarmerie, or rural police force. Later Gustav would become the commander or chief (Gendarmerie-Kommandant) of Thal's village police department. Thal is only a few miles west of Graz, Austria's second largest city and the capital of the province of Styria (die Steiermark in German). Schwarzenegger and his older brother Meinhard grew up and attended school in Thal and Graz. It was in nearby Graz, then a city of 230,000 on the Mur river not far from the Yugoslavian border (now the Slovenian border), that Arnold did his first serious bodybuilding workouts at the “Athletik-Union” gym as a teenager.
2005 A&E DOCUDRAMA
The TV movie "See Arnold Run" is running on the US
cable/satellite channel A&E during the month of February.
Arnold is portrayed by three different actors, including Jürgen Prochnow.
The Schwarzeneggers lived in an apartment on the second floor of a large centuries-old house at Thal-Linak 145. Their residence in what was then known as the Försterhaus (forest warden's house) was part of Gustav's benefits as a policeman in the Gendarmerie. The house still stands, inhabited now by the Anderwald family, and looks much more prosperous than it did in the 1940s and '50s when it had none of the modern amenities it has today, including indoor plumbing. One of the daily chores for Arnold and his brother was hauling water to the house from a well. Arnold lived in that house in Thal until he left Austria for good in 1966, aged 19. Although there has been talk of turning the former Schwarzenegger residence into a museum (along with rumors that Arnie wants to buy it back), so far it's only been just talk.
Arnold Schwarzenegger and his family lived in this house
until he was 19 years old and left Austria for good in
1966. They lived on the second floor.
PHOTO: Café-Restaurant Thaleresee
The Schwarzenegger homestead isn't the only thing that has changed in Thal. Today there is little remaining in Arnold's hometown that he would recognize. (He has returned only a few times for brief visits over the years.) His old elementary school, the Hans Groß Volksschule, has also been rebuilt and no longer looks anything like it did when Arnold and his brother attended class there. The popular Café-Restaurant Thalersee on the banks of Lake Thal (der Thalersee) has expanded and even has its own Web site. It is still owned by the same Kling family as in Arnold's day. The village's Catholic church was also remodeled years ago. Even the old sports field where Arnold kicked his first soccer balls has vanished. But nearby is a new nine-hole golf course for the yuppies of Graz who have been steadily moving out to the city's scenic former hinterlands, including Thal.
Back in the Thal of the 1950s, Arnold could have never imagined the future gentrification of his birthplace. In those days, despite its proximity to Graz, Thal was a provincial, isolated place to live, with a total of three telephones and one TV set (at the local Gasthaus). But Arnold soon began to learn about the wider world he was destined to inhabit. In 1953, as a young boy, Arnold's father took him to Graz to attend the dedication of a public swimming pool, featuring none other than the former Olympic swimming champ... More on the next page.
N E X T > More About Arnold
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