Did Brazilian football fans take their own lives inside the stadium after the loss to Uruguay in 1950?

Question

An oft-repeated claim about the Uruguay v Brazil 1950 World Cup match is that upon the blowing of the final whistle, several Brazilian fans took their own lives inside the stadium.

The LA Times says that "[a]t the final whistle one distraught fan committed suicide while three others suffered fatal heart attacks"; Wikipedia says that "[a]t least two Brazilian fans committed suicide inside the stadium and many suicides were reported across the country in the following days", citing a WorldSoccerTalk article. However, neither of these articles reference any sources, or explain where they got this information from.

The only place I found that lists a source for the suicide claim is Matthew Schorr's Soccer Politics article, which refers to a 2010 article which is no longer accessible, even on the Wayback Machine.

So, is there any evidence that Brazilian football fans completed suicide inside the stadium after the match?

Answer 1

This is probably false.

The event, known as the "Maracanazo", happened on July 16, 1950.

Some of the Brazilian main newspapers at time are still active and keep their archives available online. They reported some incidents with the fans on the next day's editions, but no completed suicides, let alone deaths by suicide inside the stadium:

• Folha de São Paulo reported 8 deaths, and highlighted 3 had been caused by "emotion". Unfortunately, the text of that news is deteriorated and cannot be read, but it's safe to assume no completed suicides happened, since it would be worthy to be put in the title. On the 18, they reported a murder after a fight over the match, but again, no mentions of any deaths by suicide.

• O Estado de S. Paulo reported 169 injured people, victims of "run-overs, falls and other accidents". Again, no mention to any deaths by suicide.

• O Globo reported the same figure of 169 injured, and featured a "dead by emotion". They even went as far as reporting the name and address of every single injured/dead. O Globo is based in Rio de Janeiro, the city were the match took place, so I would assume they were in the best position compared to the previous sources. They never mentioned a death by suicide.

One interesting thing is that the alleged deaths by suicide are barely mentioned by Brazilian press when talking about the Maracanazo. One of the few Brazilian articles mentioning it quotes a journalist dismissing it as rumor:

"Many players left the field crying [...] It was a great trauma. There were stories about suicides too, but none were confirmed."

Finally, the source in Soccer Politics is not very promising. It was authored by Continental AG, a German automotive parts company. Whatever the reason they had to write about the 1950 World Cup, I speculate they simply repeated the same rumors.