89:, a Czech athlete who after being a champion woman athlete had become a man. By 1936, he dropped his previous female name Elvire and started living as a man named Willy. However, as he was still registered as a woman named Elvire, he repeatedly came into trouble and lost jobs which were not considered acceptable for women, such as working in a hotel kitchen. Thus, after consulting doctors for examinations and being operated on, De Bruyn officially become Willy de Bruijn by 1937; his story was told in four articles titled "How I became a Man" in the April 1937 issue of the newspaper
58:. He was officially inscribed as the daughter of his parents, and raised as a girl, but he soon was considerably taller and stronger than other girls his age, and by the age of fourteen he realised that he was not like other girls. This deeply upset and troubled him, even contemplating suicide. After De Bruyn finished his schooling in 1928, he started working in a cigarette company, before working in his parents' café a few months later. In the evenings, he secretly began reading about his condition in medical literature by e.g.
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in front of about 100,000 spectators. By then, De Bruyn had become the biggest
Belgian star in women's cycling. However, he felt more and more uncomfortable racing and winning against women due to feeling "like a man, never like a woman". He continued racing to earn money but deliberately finished
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De Bruyn continued cycling, but without much success. He opened a pub in
Brussels, "Café Denderleeuw", where he presented himself as "Willy ex Elvira de Bruyn" and "Elvira de Bruyn, world champion cycling for women, became a man in 1937".
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On 4 August 2023, Google celebrated Willy De Bruyn's 109th
Birthday with a doodle. On 25 July 2024, The
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as well as mythological and anthropological studies. Eventually, he became convinced that he was a
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De Bruyn started cycling in 1932. In 1933, he won the women's
European Championship in
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419:"Overlooked No More: Willy de Bruyn, Cycling Champion Who Broke Gender Boundaries"
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327:"Brussels names street after transgender cyclist Willy De Bruyn"
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Ride the
Revolution: The Inside Stories from Women in Cycling
191:"elvire/willy de bruyn: een aanzet tot verder onderzoek"
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A street was named after him in
Brussels in July 2019.
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1934: Sprint event at the track championships, Antwerp
161:published a belated obituary for De Bruyn in their
354:"4 August: Remembering Willy De Bruyn on Birthday"
196:(in Dutch). Fonds Suzan Daniel. pp. 18–21
73:. In 1934, he won the Belgian Championship in
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26:; 4 August 1914 – 13 August 1989), was a
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30:cyclist, who became unofficial women's
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100:In 1965, Willy de Bruijn was selling "
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82:second or third instead of winning.
189:De Weerdt, Denise (December 2006).
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496:20th-century Belgian LGBTQ people
104:" at the Belgian village at the
399:Willy De Bruyn's 109th Birthday
352:Desk, OV Digital (2023-08-04).
77:and the World Championships in
248:Meyerowitz, Joanne J. (2009).
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42:De Bruyn was born in 1914 in
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280:Gazet van Aalst en Omstreken
142:1934: World Championships,
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476:Belgian LGBTQ sportspeople
282:(in Dutch). 21 August 1965
127:1932: Belgian Championship
54:with both male and female
491:Intersex transgender men
218:Clemitson, Suze (2015).
24:Elvira (Elvire) De Bruyn
481:Belgian transgender men
307:www.cyclingarchives.com
85:De Bruyn learned about
20:Willem Maurits De Bruyn
471:Transgender sportsmen
466:Belgian male cyclists
106:New York World's Fair
301:Archives, Cycling.
111:He died in 1989 in
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382:has generic name (
331:The Brussels Times
163:Overlooked No More
34:in 1934 and 1936.
60:Magnus Hirschfeld
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405:2023-08-10
363:2023-08-10
312:2024-03-13
144:Schaerbeek
79:Schaerbeek
56:sex organs
38:Biography
372:cite web
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153:Tributes
429:30 July
113:Antwerp
52:Belgium
28:Belgian
337:5 July
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138:Leuven
91:De Dag
75:Leuven
22:(born
194:(PDF)
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384:help
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256:ISBN
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