The History And Evolution Of Spinning

Scottish Champion Ronnie McKenzie performing a flying sit spin

Boys doing Biellmann spins, four-feature level four spins... Figure skating's 'new' judging system has both unnecessarily complicated the art of spinning and forced skaters to treat spins as seriously as they do jumps. After all, "you don't want to leave points on the table" and such. Ardent supporters of the IJS seemingly delight in pointing out how spins were often throwaway elements under the 6.0 system; rest periods between cross-cuts, telegraphed jumps and wonderfully musical though technically less demanding footwork sequences. We all know that narrative, just as we know that Ulrich Salchow and Axel Paulsen invented the jumps that bear their names, Donald Jackson landed the first triple Lutz in international competition and the delightful Dick Button performed the first double Axel and triple loop. The history of skating's all important jumps has been wonderfully documented, yet unfortunately the evolution of spins has never been offered the same treatment. In order to fully understand how we got to where we are today, it's probably a good idea to start at the very beginning.

The three-turn, known as far back as 1772 when Robert Jones wrote the first instructional manual on figure skating, was of course the forerunner of double and triple three-turn's which Jean Garcin of the Gilets Rouge called 'hooks'. Swiss skating historian Nigel Brown recalled, "It was the single hook or three turn that was employed to join up one skating movement with another. This simple turn was often called a half-spin and was considered a very graceful movement as well as an indispensable one. The spin, consisting of two or three revolutions, was used mainly to terminate a series of skating movements. It completed a small free-skating programme as it were, bringing the performance to an exciting finish. This pirouette was often placed between two distinct skating movements but it was never encouraged as it was considered ugly and out of place."

In the 1850's, skaters from Boston, Philadelphia and New York began experimenting with spins. George Henry Browne, who lobbied for the introduction of the International Style in North America in the early twentieth century, claimed that Charles H. Fuller and his brother William performed "spins, rolls and acrobatic feats" during this period and that Joseph H. Murch of Boston was the first to introduce the two-foot whirl. The crossfoot spin was already known as early as the 1860's, being included in the Philadelphia Skating Club and Humane Society's repertoire of club figures. Browne claimed that Jackson Haines and E.B. Cook introduced Ringlet-Spins circa 1862, which were defined as "complete revolutions on an edge on one-foot", usually added as flourishes to loop figures. George Meagher noted that Ringlets differed from loops only in the shape of the marks left upon the ice, a loop being cycloid, and a Ringlet being perfectly round. In 1863, E.B. Cook endeavoured to differentiate between the terms spin and whirl, suggesting that one-footed pirouettes should be termed spins and two-footed pirouettes should be termed whirls.

During the period that followed, flat-foot spins on both one and two feet, crossfoot spins and two-foot whirls became wildly popular and North America's top 'fancy' skaters began adding their own variations to the extremely limited variety of spins then known. Albert Howard started his two-foot spin from a backward entrance; Charles V. Dodge would start out with a two-foot whirl and then jump on his toes until his feet wound around then drop back to the blade and finish with a crossfoot spin. George Browne noted, "Callie Curtis, in the 60's, could make several revolutions on the toe at the end of a one-foot eight and return to the eight without any intermediate strokes or steps. Curtis could also jump from one toe-spin to another." Toe-spins - or toe-pirouettes - didn't really gain a lot of steam until Halifax and New York club skates with toe rakes came into vogue. Without the evolutions in skate-making during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, spinning never would have evolved past upright spins and toe-spins never would have been the ever popular flourishes to early twentieth century free skating programs that they became.

The Jackson Haines spin

While North American skaters were spinning standing up, legendary figure skating pioneer Jackson Haines was dropping it like it was hot in Vienna with the introduction of his Jackson Haines spin. Starting with a right outside forward flat-foot spin then bending clear down to the ice in a sitting position and straightening up again while evolving at a rapid pace and finishing with a pirouette on the toe, the Jackson Haines spin was in essence skating's first true combination spin, which included the sit spin position that would of course later become one of figure skating's primary spin positions. Haines' spin spread like wildfire. In Germany, they called it the 'Sitzpirouette'. In Canada in the early twentieth century, it was called the 'Bowsprit'. Well into the thirties and forties, people still called it the Jackson Haines, even if they were just executing a sit spin on its own.

At the same time fancy skaters in North America were experimenting with upright spins and Haines was thrilling audiences from Stockholm to St. Petersburg with his signature spin, the stiff English Style skaters in Great Britain were having a minor fit about all of this uncivilized spinning business.
Henry Eugene Vandervell and T. Maxwell Witham showed enthusiasm for double and quadruple three-turns on one foot (referring to the latter as a 'double-double') but warned members of The Skating Club in London of allowing these three turns to "degenerate" into "mere" spins. Montagu Sneade Monier-Williams went so far as to say that spins "often proved themselves to be absolutely destructive to the good form of those who practiced them", believing they had no place in English Style or 'combined' skating. "Toe-spins, performed by our Canadian and Swedish friends," he scoffed, "are quite unsuited to concerted skating." Witham described the forward outside one-foot spin as an "abominably ugly position which has undoubtedly been the cause of its unpopularity in England." George Wood added that if 'kicked figures' such as cross-cuts and toe-spins became part of the English Style, it would be reduced to "a niggling, ungraceful, petty, and hybrid style."

Excerpt from Frederick Toombs' 1879 book "How to become a skater"

To the shagrin of these well-to-do Victorian gentlemen, the evolution of spinning continued at a rapid pace. Both Leopold Frey and Eduard Engelmann performed spins at the 1882 Great International Skating Tournament in Vienna. In 1895, George Meagher described two Canadian additions to the upright spin repertoire - the 'Letter K' spin and the 'Toronto Spin'. The latter, described as starting "with a sharp outside edge spin on one foot, and, whilst revolving at good speed, the toe of the balance leg is gradually lowered, with the point of the skate resting upon the boot of the other foot" certainly sounds like the a scratch spin if you ask me.

After the formation of the International Skating Union, spins quickly made their way into the free skating performances of many of the sport's first World champions. George Henry Browne recalled how Austria's Gustav Hügel amazed spectators at the 1900 World Championships in Davos with "his corkscrew spin on bended leg, coiling around it the unemployed held in both hands, and finishing it with a pirouette on the toe, all that tremendous speed." An Austrian, Georg Wassmuth, was the first to perform a spin on his heels known as an 'apple' and Henning Grenander of Sweden made a speciality of his 'heel spin eight', striking off from a right forward outside edge, crossing his feet at the end of the circle and spinning counterclockwise on the heel of his skate. Irving Brokaw recalled that Ulrich Salchow once ended his program with a Jackson Haines spin and that Fritz Kachler upstaged him by performing two Jackson Haines spins in succession, separated by a 'spectacle move'. It was during this period that the first of many, many women to make spinning history came on the scene. At the 1906 World Championships in Davos - the very first ISU championship for 'ladies' - Jenny Herz of the Cottage-Eislaufverein made history as the first woman to perform the Jackson Haines spin in competition... wearing an ankle-length dress.

Jenny Herz performing the Jackson Haines spin in Davos in 1906

Through the 1910's, professional skaters were pushing the spinning envelope far more than the amateurs. Remember Isabella Butler? The university educated mother who jumped "The Dip Of Death" with Barnum And Bailey, toured America skating on artificial ice and taught women to skate before they could vote? Well, her husband Tom, a stunt bicycle rider and circus man, met Joseph Chapman at the Brooklyn Rink and positively blew his mind with his spinning prowess. Chapman recalled, "I can see in my mind's eye [Butler] doing a sitting (or Haines) spin with one of his flexible legs reared straight up in front of him. Upon seeing this leg projecting straight and high in front of his face he, with the instinct that made him the highest paid clown at the Hippodrome, snatched his cap off his head and hung it on his upright toe, without interrupting in any way his gay and speedy whirl." Charlotte Oelschlägel, star of the Berlin Eisballets and the Hippodrome in New York City, often ended her programs not with her famous Charlotte spiral but with a Jackson Haines spin. She recalled, "On the stage of the Hippodrome I frequently execute difficult spins and jumps on one foot, and then on the other foot, not for the purpose of prolonging the number but for the purpose of showing I can do them equally well on either foot."

By the roaring twenties, the idea of finishing spins on a sustained backward edge as opposed to abruptly stabbing the ice with one's toe-pick or finishing with a toe-spin began to gain steam but Maribel Vinson Owen recalled that in the women's ranks "spins were frowned upon in many circles as late as 1927." Gillis Grafström introduced the Grafström spin, done in a back outside position entered from a forward outside counter, with his tracing shoulder and arm held forward and free leg and hip back, his head looking over his free shoulder. He also introduced the earliest version of the flying sit spin and the change-foot sit spin. While amateur pairs teams peppered their performances with a couple of very basic waltz spins, professional pairs teams were already wowing audiences with the neck spin and an early incarnation of the headbanger. Vinson Owen aptly noted in 1940 that in the amateur ranks prior to the 1932 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, a spin as rudimentary as the camel spin would have undoubtedly been frowned upon if it had suddenly made its appearance in competition, not to mention the hold-the-foot and back-bend variations which are accepted almost casually today." And that brings us to the camel spin and the layback spin... You might want to put a shot of Bailey's in your coffee before we get into this historical hot mess!

Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine

Famous Swiss born coaches Jacques Gerschwiler and Gustave Lussi made their marks as great teachers of skating on different sites of the Atlantic... and both had connections to the 'origin story' of the camel spin. Before we get to those, it's important to clarify that the camel spin wasn't originally called a camel spin. In the thirties when it rose to prominence - mainly in the women's ranks - it was known as an arabesque, parallel or airplane spin. Only when a skater performed the airplane spin poorly, claimed Maribel Vinson Owen, it was referred to as a camel. Gerschwiler's young protégé Cecilia Colledge has historically been the skater given credit for the invention of both the camel and the layback (or backbend) as she was the first to perform them in international competition in the early thirties.

Cecilia Colledge performing a camel spin in 1934

However, Lussi frequently told his students that the spin originated at the Toronto Skating Club in the twenties and was called the Campbell spin, named after an Australian named Campbell who came to Toronto and created it. In a skating equivalent of the telephone game, claimed Lussi, 'Campbell' devolved into 'camel'. Who was this Australian who came to North America named Campbell that Lussi spoke of? Primary sources offer a clue to that little mystery. In May of 1930, Australian professional skaters Sadie Cambridge - not Campbell - and Albert Enders arrived in New York City aboard the S.S. Mauretania. That autumn, they performed at the St. Regis Hotel in New York... where Lussi directed and choreographed shows... and washed dishes back in 1915 after immigrating from Switzerland. Though Sadie Cambridge and Albert Enders didn't move to Canada to teach skating until the early thirties, it's entirely possible that they made a trip to Toronto during their visit to North America in 1930. After all, the duo were performing adagio neck spins in the early twenties... certainly an advanced skill during that era. Maribel Vinson had a different theory entirely, stating in 1951, "I have been told... that [Charlotte Oelschlägel's] combination spins have never been excelled, including the camel spin, a move which was forgotten after Charlotte's return to Europe, only to be 'discovered' again in England in 1934." Whether Charlotte, Colledge, Sadie Cambridge or another Australian mystery skater named Campbell was the camel spin's inventor, by the late thirties, the spin was incredibly popular and the inside camel was being performed as well.

Sonja Henie performing a crossfoot spin

Sonja Henie, better known for her exceptionally fast flat-foot and crossfoot spins, originally performed the camel spin with a bent free leg position. After turning professional, she took a cue from another Jacques Gerschwiler student and straightened out her leg. Bill Unwin explained, "Although Sonja never admitted that she saw Belita [Jepson-Turner] skate, she did see Belita's 'Suspense' and 'Silver Skates'. Ted Shuffle said that once she'd seen Belita in those shows, she straightened her leg out on her camel [spin] and he said the line improved in Sonja's skating dramatically. He said Sonja skated way better in her films after she'd seen Belita's films than the previous ones."

Freddie Tomlins, one of the best male spinners during the thirties

The foot-in-hand Jackson Haines or 'Figure Four' spin in Canada - a precursor to the spin position we know today as the cannonball - also rose to prominence in the thirties, popularized by the students of Willie Frick.

Louis Rubenstein performing the 'Figure Four' spin in the nineteenth century

Maribel Vinson Owen recalled, "One day in 1931 on my first visit to Willie's home city, Berlin, I was practicing at the Sports Palast, and in the course of things did a Jackson Haines, coming up holding my free leg with my hand close to my body, free knee bent at hip height and parallel to the ice. Immediately a man came dashing over to me, exclaiming, 'I know who your instructor is. Only Willie Frick could have taught you that spin.' At the time, of course, he was right, though since then pupils of many other teachers have learned it." Maribel adapted this spin to create her very own variation called the Vinson Spin, based on a pose suggested by Boston sculptor Leonard Craske. In the Vinson Spin, after spinning a few revolutions in the Foot-in-hand Jackson Haines position, the skater would stretch their free leg to the side "with a straight knee at head height, still of course holding the hand." Vinson Owen also claimed to be "the first to do, at least on this continent" the 'Flip' airplane, a variation on the camel where the skater first performed an upright flat-foot spin then dipped or 'flipped'  forward into the camel spin. Essentially this was a upright/camel spin combination without a change of foot.

Megan Taylor showing her spinning prowess in Australia in 1939

Despite the many innovations to spinning that occurred in the thirties, the most important development was the focus on being centred and not travelling. This seemed to be something that Gerschwiler, Lussi, Frick and the rest of the 'elite' coaches of the period all actually seemed to agree on! Eminent British skater, judge and historian T.D. Richardson recalled that Gerschwiler "holds the theory, a subtle one at that, that the rotation in the spin comes from the check of the forward movement by the marked turning of the body, and that when a spin is not centred, that is to say when the skater is travelling as opposed to remaining in one place, it is because this forward movement has not been sufficiently checked."

Evelyn Chandler spinning up a storm in a hotel show in 1938

During World War II and the Sonja Henie boom when touring and hotel ice shows drew throngs of new fans to the sport, it was common practice for ice show producers to feature an exceptional spinner in a prominent role. Few casts were complete without a comedy act or two, a beautiful ice queen, an adagio pair and a skater with an uncanny knack to make audiences dizzy with their fast revolving pirouettes. Evelyn Chandler, one of the first female skaters to perform the double Salchow jump, was considered one of the best spinners in the professional world during this period and long before he was Mr. Debonaire, Roy Shipstad was billed to audiences as 'The Human Top'. Long before triple jumps became the norm, audiences were simply captivated by the magic of spinning.

Roy Shipstad showing off his sublime spins

In the amateur world, Gustave Lussi led the way in another wave of spinning experimentation in the forties. "We tried all kinds of things like double Salchow into a toe spin," he recalled. Though Gillis Grafström and Marcus Nikkanen had experimented with a hop from a sit to back sit position in the twenties and thirties, it was Lussi's pupils who added the modern flying sit and flying open Axel sit spins to the repertoire of skating elements during this period.

Maribel Vinson Owen's description of Marcus Nikkanen's flying sit spin

Dick Button has claimed that Arthur Vaughn, Jr. and William Grimditch were the first to perform the flying sit spin and Axel sit spin "correctly" during the War years and by the late forties, Button, Johnny Lettengarver, Jimmy Grogan and Eileen Seigh were all including flying sit spins in their free skating routines. Lussi later recalled, "One night I was talking in my sleep and rolling all over in bed. My wife woke me up and I sat straight up in bed and said, 'I've just invented the flying sit spin.' So I went in the next day and taught it to Buddy Vaughn [in 1942]. It wasn't as open then. With Hayes [Jenkins in the 1950's] we really started to open it up. He would really fly. But the greatest flying sit I had was [John] Misha Petkevich... he came down the rink full speed and let go like anything... Everyone had to scatter to get out of his way."

Lussi student Dick Button gave his invention, the 'modern' flying camel spin, its international debut at the 1947 World Championships in Stockholm. By the next year, everyone and their dog were performing his novel new spin, many calling it the Button camel. Button later reminisced, "I recall how steadfastly Mr. Lussi and I had worked on a Button camel, or flying camel, and how jealously I had guarded it its first year for fear a rival would see it and beat me to the punch by skating it in a competition. In skating, as in any field, once you have shown an original idea in public, opponents are surely to copy it if they can, and soon the new movement becomes a part of the standard technique."

Cecilia Colledge performing the jump-airplane spin in the thirties

Similarly to the case with Grafström and the flying sit, skaters had attempted to 'fly' during the camel long before Button and Lussi developed the modern flying camel technique.  In 1940, Maribel Vinson Owen described a "jump-airplane" spin, however it was dissimilar to Button's flying camel in that the jump didn't occur until after several rotations and not long after the skater jumped, they pulled into an upright position, exited the spin and called it a day.

Maribel Vinson Owen demonstrating the jump-airplane spin 

According to Dick Button, we have France's Jacqueline du Bief to thank for the accidental invention of the illusion spin in the early thirties. He recalled, "Jacqueline, on beginning the [camel] spin, lost control, regained it, then lost it again, and was finally able to stabilize her position. At first she felt she was doing a terrible spin; then she began to emphasize her flailing arms, making the lurching of her body appear quite intentional. When a judge later questioned her about her unorthodox movements, she looked him dead straight in the eye, replying in complete sincerity that she had invented it (she didn't say when) to fit her style of skating and that she called it a 'Now I Have It, Now I Don't' spin. It gained her points in the competition."

Ronnie Robertson in action

Ronnie Robertson, who worked with Lussi, was a prodigal spinner known for his fast blur, corkscrew and crossfoot spins who earned international renown for his efforts in this department of skating in the fifties. Lussi's grandson claimed NASA once sent a team to study Robertson and how Lussi got his skaters to spin so fast and not get nauseous. Lussi claimed Robertson spun at 6.5 revolutions per second. In 1958, a roller skater named Rick Mullican invented the travelling camel entrance into the arabesque position. Though to this day more popular on rollers than on ice skates, figure skaters with roller skating backgrounds like Germany's Marina Kielmann, later translated the travelling camel entrance to the ice quite effectively.

Rosemarie Stewart and Bob Dench demonstrating the Dench Double Spin and pair camel spin

Though upstaged by dazzling lifts and death spirals, pairs spins developed greatly over the years as well. By the forties, amateur pairs teams had added the back outside double spin, combined double spin on inside edges in the spread eagle position and the Dench Double Spin to their routine. Germany's Maxi Herber and Ernst Baier and Austria's Ilse and Erik Pausin popularized side-by-side spins in the thirties. Herber and Baier have been credited as the first team to perform both the forward change-camel pair spin and change-foot side-by-side spins in the late thirties. Though Sadie Cambridge and Albert Enders popularized the side-by-side Jackson Haines spin back during the roaring twenties, the athleticism and innovation of Herber and Baier and the Pausin's was arguably what pushed pairs teams to push the spin envelope. By the late fifties, pair spins in the Killian and Tango positions and side-by-side spins were old hat.

Tatiana Nemtsova of Russia performing a half Biellmann spin

Though Toller Cranston was the one who popularized the broken leg sit spin in the seventies, multiple instructional books on skating reveal that the spin was already well-known in the early sixties.

Heather Belbin in broken leg spin position in 1951

At the 1952 Swiss Championships, Swiss skater Susi Wirz performed a variation of the camel spin where her boot was grasped by her her hand. This style of spin was later performed by Soviet skaters Tatiana Nemtsova and Tamara (Bratus) Moskvina. These efforts were precursors to the spin later popularized by Denise Biellmann as the Biellmann spin. Like the camel spin, the Biellmann spin's origin story is a fine example of why it is just plain irresponsible when studying history to definitively claim that anyone was 'the first' to do just about anything.

Jeannette Altwegg, Ája Vrzáňová and Joan Lister spinning up a storm in 1948

Swiss skater Karin Iten claimed that she'd invented the spin, child star Janet Champion was said to have performed it in the Ice Follies, World Professional Champion Pamela Prior was said to have performed it in the thirties. Cecilia Colledge even performed a one-handed spin that resembled the half Biellmann at the 1937 World Championships in London.

Patricia Pauley going in for the haircutter in the late fifties

Maribel Vinson Owen described a "hold the foot airplane" in 1940 "in which the skating hand reaches around and grasps the heel of the free skate over an exaggeratedly arched back, either at the very entrance into the spin or after a bit of speed has been lost and the pull-away of the free leg has consequently died down somewhat." Especially considering that in the forties, fifties and sixties touring ice shows, hotel shows and British ice pantomimes featured dozens upon dozens of inventive spinners. pinpointing that one skater who performed both the 'half' and 'full' Biellmann spin first is a futile task. It's worth noting that Otto Hügin, who coached Denise Biellmann, called it the 'Karin-Spin' in his 1973 book "The Technique Of Skating".

Before Denise Biellmann drew acclaim for the spin that became her namesake, Dorothy Hamill was delighting audiences with her 'Hamill camel', which she debuted in competition as a junior at the 1970 U.S. Championships in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In her book "A Skating Life: My Story", she recalled, "Gus Lussi had tried to teach me an interesting transition between my back camel spin and my back sit spin... I did my best to translate what Mr. Lussi had said but it was difficult, since he was unable to demonstrate it himself. So I came up with my version of what I thought he meant. Vera Wang and her partner Jimmy Stewart were training in Toronto that summer also. Jimmy would playfully tease me about my steadfast devotion to this new spin. He'd say, 'Hey, Hamill, how's your camel?' And the name stuck around. Everyone started referring to it as the Hamill Camel. It remains my trademark to this day."

Many have argued that in the eighties when great strides were made in the evolution of jumping, spinning suffered a lull. Dick Button claimed that spinning "hadn't been done as well since [Lussi] stopped teaching." Though there is perhaps some truth to these arguments, the decade of Dynasty hair, gaudy sequinned dresses and Safety Dancing wasn't without its exceptional spinners. Canadians Liz Manley, Gary Beacom and Kay Thomson were all quite sensational, the latter including a back layback and several other innovative variations on standard positions in her free skating programs that were very much ahead of their time. Alexander Fadeev did a double Axel into a sit spin, while his Soviet teammate Victor Petrenko was performing the layback, a rarity in the men's ranks. Natalia Mishkutenok and Artur Dmitriev wowed audiences with their 'Natalia Spin', a unique pair spin where Mishkutenok held Dmitriev's ankle while he spun in an upright position and she was upside down. Their coach Tamara (Bratus) Moskvina admitted to stealing the move "from a Canadian couple".

As women started landing triple Axels and men quads in the late eighties and early nineties, the narrative about spins being 'throwaway' rest period elements under the 6.0 system became a go-to for skating commentators, sportswriters and fans alike. However, it was during this decade that Denise Biellmann brought the Biellmann spin and headless scratch spin to the masses by winning professional competition after professional competition. It was also during this decade that Evgeni Plushenko became the first man to perform the Biellmann spin in international competition. Most importantly though, it was in the nineties that two prodigal young Swiss skaters left the jaws of audiences on the floor by really taking spinning to 'the next level'. Nathalie Krieg and Lucinda Ruh, both ahead of their time, were performing 'IJS' spins long before Salt Lake City and earning ovations not for what they did on the air, but what they accomplished while spinning around on the ice.

On July 1, 1997, British Champion Neil Wilson became the first skater to hold a Guinness World Record for the most rotations (sixty) per minute on one foot in a spin. Ruh later topped Wilson's record with one hundred and three rotations per minute, only to best her own record later the same day with one hundred and fifteen rotations. In 2006, Russia's Natalia Kannounikova more than doubled Ruh's record with three hundred and eight rotations per minute and in 2015, Olivia Rybicka-Oliver of Hammonds Plains, Nova Scotia - at eleven years of age - toppled Kannounikova's record with three hundred and forty two rotations.

Over the course of the centuries, the evolution of spinning has been nothing short of remarkable. Without innovations in skate-making and the human desire to push boundaries and experiment with new positions and combinations of spins, figure skating certainly wouldn't be what it is today. Though the current 'IJS' system has perhaps overvalued the difficulty of unattractive 'features' at the cost of aesthetics and musicality in spinning, there's no denying that spins are finally being given the credit they have long been due in competitive figure skating.

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.

A Haupt, Skip And A Jump Through Skating History

In figure skating, more often that not timing is everything. Unfortunately, the subject of today's adventure in figure skating history just wasn't very lucky in that respect. Missourian skater Ollie Haupt Jr. won three medals at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships but the temporary kibosh on international figure skating competitions during World War II unfortunately prevented this young American sensation from reaching his true potential on the World's biggest stages.

The son of Oliver and Harriett Haupt, Oliver 'Ollie' Haupt Jr. was born in 1921 and grew up in St. Louis, Missouri. He was the oldest of three siblings and his father was the manager of one of the pioneer Ford automobile dealerships in the city. Starting his short but impressive career on the ice in speed skates, it wasn't long before this Ollie's talent was recognized by coach George Muller and he traded in his runners for toe picks. As a teenager in the thirties, Ollie was a tennis and swimming enthusiast and an honours student at Ben Blewett High School who was indeed going places. In 1934, he was the U.S. novice men's champion. The following year, he claimed the U.S. junior pairs title with Jeanne Schulte. Two years later, he claimed the U.S. junior men's title in Chicago. Medals at the Midwestern Championships in singles, pairs as well as the Foxtrot, Fourteenstep and Tango with his sister Gloria followed. Walter Powell, an esteemed judge and referee who tragically died in the 1961 Sabena Crash, was his silent benefactor.

Jeanne Schulte and Ollie Haupt Jr. receiving their prizes at the 1935 U.S. Championships from New Haven Skating Club President Dr. A.R. Diefendorf

Graduating from high school the same year he won the U.S. junior men's title, Ollie was able to devote more time than ever to his craft. A talented free skater, his Axel, loop and mazurka jumps earned the praise of no harsher a critic than Maribel Vinson. In his senior debut at the 1938 U.S. Championships in Philadelphia, he finished third behind three time and defending champion Robin Lee and perennial runner-up Erle Reiter. At the next two U.S. Championships, he would finish second behind Robin Lee and Eugene Turner respectively and in 1940 he made the U.S. Olympic team. Lucky guy, right?

Wrong. After going so far as to headline in a December 1938 show at Madison Square Gardens that was a fundraiser to send the U.S. figure skating team to the Olympics, the 1940 Winter Olympic Games, which were moved from Japan to Switzerland to Germany were finally cancelled in November 1939. With the World Championships also on hold due to the War, Ollie's only chance to haupt on a major podium went haupting out the window.

Ollie Haupt Jr. and Polly Blodgett. Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine.

Ollie retired from competitive skating, became certified to judge up to the fourth test and made a brief foray into the coaching world, taking a job at Iceland in California. The November/December 2012 of the "Professional Skater Magazine" explained, "When Ollie Haupt Jr. was drafted in 1942 to serve in the U.S. Coast Guard, eight of his family and friends went to Union Station to see him off. Ollie's mother handed him a fifth of whiskey as he was getting onto the train. First sent to the Marine Commando School, he transferred to the Naval Air Corp only to discover that his eyes were lacking in depth perception, forcing him to drop out. Determined to stick to the sea, he entered the Merchant Marine and trained as an officer."

Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine

I'm sorry, having your big shot at Olympic glory cancelled because of a War then being drafted to go fight in it? War, war, what is good for? Absolutely nothing is right.

Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine.

Surviving the ordeal in one peace, Ollie took jobs in television, as well as coaching at the Junior Skating Club of New York and Philadelphia Skating Club and Humane Society. He later coached in North Carolina and served as Vice President of a midtown Manhattan firm called Pesce Advertising. He passed away on February 17, 1984 of an apparent heart attack. His name may be relegated to the footnotes of skating history, but had that history taken a different course and war not have broken out, he may well have been remembered among the great American skating champions that followed closely after the War like Dick Button and Karol and Peter Kennedy. We'll never know.

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.

#Unearthed: An American Family In Frankfurt

When you dig through skating history, you never know what you will unearth. In the spirit of cataloguing fascinating tales from skating history, #Unearthed is a once a month 'special occasion' on Skate Guard where fascinating writings by others that are of interest to skating history buffs are excavated, dusted off and shared for your reading pleasure. From forgotten fiction to long lost interviews to tales that have never been shared publicly, each #Unearthed is a fascinating journey through time. 

Skating is a terrible sport for the arrogant. The ice is slippery business and has a way of reminding us all - no matter how good we (think we) are - that we are fallible. Irish born American John Ross Browne wore many hats through his life, among them teacher, father, writer, government official, world traveller and - you guessed it - figure skater. In 1861, Browne, his wife Lucy and nine children moved to Germany for two years. His time spent in Frankfurt inspired his 1866 book "An American Family In Germany" and this wonderful primary source account of skating in the city at the time. Pour yourself a nice cup of tea and see how things played out for An American In Frankfurt:

EXCERPT FROM "AN AMERICAN FAMILY IN PARIS" (JOHN ROSS BROWNE)

The River Main was blocked up with ice, and skating was the popular amusement of the season. By paying few kreutzers - for what don't know, unless it might be to support the corporation - anybody that pleased could enjoy the privilege of the river. I went down one day to take look at the skaters, and certainly it was a very lively and amusing scene. Boys and girls, big and little, young men and old men, were flying over the crystal element in full glee. Smart buckish gentlemen were pushing before them ponderous old ladies who were seated in sledges or sliding-chairs. Pretty blooming damsels of vigorous form were flying hither and thither, laughing and joking with amazing zest. Whole schools of students were turned out to enjoy the exercise, with their teachers leading the way. The fathers of families were disporting themselves before their admiring Fraus, while their little responsibilities were clapping their hands and laughing merrily at the sport. Old apple women were selling apples, cakes, and nuts; old men were sweeping the ice or shovelling off the snow; grand officers in the military line of life were standing on the quays, looking on with remarkable condescension; policemen were watching about generally to preserve order, which nobody had the least idea of‘breaking; a buffoon dressed in an absurd costume, was navigating a whirling ship that flew round in a circle, while he called aloud upon all classes to take passage in the same for the regions of joy; strangers in motley groups were smoking their two-cent cigars or blowing their fingers to keep themselves warm; and, in short, every body was doing something very amusing to an American.

I saw a gentleman capsize a lady whom he was sliding in a chair before him. The lady turned all over on the ice, making convulsive efforts to keep down her hoops. What did the merry crowd of skaters do? Pick her up? By no means. About fifty rushed in to compliment the unfortunate hero of the disaster upon his skill, and laugh at the unfortunate lady. 

I saw a stout gentleman pitch over and get the breath knocked completely out of his body. It was a capital joke; the crowd roared and cheered. It was such glorious fun to see fellow's breath knocked short off.

In fine, the whole scene was so inspiring that it unconsciously brought me back to the days of boyhood, when used to go skating on the Ohio River. Thinks I, by Jove, old boy, if you had pair of skates, couldn't you show these chaps how to cut the pigeon-wing? Couldn't you go the back flourish in a style that would open their eyes? Couldn't you charm the ladies with some novelties in the poetry of motion? Zounds! Couldn't you make those clumsy Dutchmen wish they had cultivated the science of skating in the United States of America? Pooh! pooh! What burlesque they make of it! They don't know how to skate - they don't comprehend the first principle of the art!

"Sir," said a polite gentleman with whom I had slight acquaintance, stepping up with a handsome pair

of skates swinging from his hand, "Would you like to try your skill? I have just been enjoying it; but perhaps you are not accustomed to skating?"

"Accustomed to skating!" I retorted, a little indignantly; "Why, lieber Herr, I was considered the best

skater in Louisville, Kentucky. True, have not practiced much in California, but you know skating, like swimming, can never be forgotten. So, by your leave, here goes."

Taking the skates, I went down upon the ice. A dozen boys rushed toward me and offered to put the skates on my feet for the trifling consideration of three kreutzers. "Gehen Sie fort!" said I, "Did you ever know Californian who couldn't put on his own skates?" The boys, when they heard themselves thus addressed in German, cried out, "Ein Englander! Ein Englander!" and about fifty miscellaneous skaters of both sexes rushed up to see the Englander put on his skates. I could fancy, as I buckled the straps on my boots, that every man, woman, and boy in the crowd enjoyed the most enthusiastic expectations in reference to my skill in this complex and difficult art. The weather was cold, and the straps were rather short; but I succeeded in getting the skates on at last, and an encouraging cheer arose as stood up and made few preparatory flourishes. It should be borne in mind that eighteen years had elapsed since my last excursion upon ice. Well, I don't intend to boast. It is not my way. I like modesty in all things; but I can say with perfect confidence and propriety, there was not skater upon that field of ice who attracted half so much attention as I did from the very first stride. 

It was altogether different from swimming, this thing of sliding on the top of the water - frozen water, too, and very slippery at that: the hardest kind of water in case of sudden contact between the surface and the point of a man's nose. Very strange, wasn't it? - one leg actually tried to run away and cut a figure on its own account. The other started off in an opposite direction, and I made a strong effort to drag back the first leg and carry it forcibly along, thus exhibiting a very curious and unnatural rivalry between two members of the same family. I leaned over at first to try and get a little ahead of leg

number one, which was considerably in advance at the start; but the other, taking a sudden shoot out at right angles, enraged me to such degree that immediately I whirled and got after it, determined to make it bear the entire weight of my body; but somehow was utterly unable to gain upon it single inch. At this stage of affairs number of ladies came flourishing around me, with their merry laughing eyes shooting forth scintillations of electricity; and, being of very susceptible temperament, I think the sight must have disconcerted me little, for I began to look up in the sky quite accidentally, and my back was all doubled up trying to keep from noticing them. The little boys cheered and cried out, "Englander! Englander! Ho, ho! See the Englander!" The gentlemen roared "Bravo! bravo!" and

the ladies were absolutely convulsed with suppressed admiration. It was a new style of skating altogether. They had never seen such complicated figures executed by a foreigner or any body else. 

These manifestations of applause gave me considerable confidence; and, after jumping three feet backward, two feet forward, and eighteen inches in the air, and doubling up several times before and behind, I stood perfectly still, merely to show that these remarkable feats of activity were not involuntary, and that I could stand still whenever thought proper to do so. The thunders of applause that greeted this achievement were truly gratifying to my national pride. Cries of Bravo! and Encore! resounded all over the ice. The ladies absolutely shed tears of delight, and saturated their handkerchiefs with the excess of their emotions; and the little boys shouted, in paroxysm of glee, "Englander! Englander! See the Englander!" 

While was studying out what sort of figure to out next, a very respectable-looking old gentleman stepped up and observed in good English, "Sir, beg pardon - "Oh, don't mention it," said I; "there's not the least necessity." "Sir," continued the old gentleman, "I observe that you are an Englishman." "Precisely." said I; "born in the city of Lun'on seven-and-thirty years ago. There's where I learned to skate; but the weather is generally very foggy there, which accounts for the winding and circuitous figures I cut on the ice. "I thought so!" persisted the old gentleman; "in fact, I knew it; and having observed your motions for some time, it occurred to me to suggest, with due respect, that if you continue cutting the same figures much longer you’ll be very likely to strain yourself. I know of a man who was ruptured in that way." "The devil you do!"  said I, indignantly; "that man certainly didn't understand how to skate. You will observe, sir, that with me the case is entirely different. I am going to cut some figures now that nobody ever saw or ever will see again in this part of the country."

The old gentleman begged that I would not attempt any new feats of dexterity; but, nettled at his unfounded insinuations, I boldly struck out. This time it was really miraculous the progress I made after eighteen years of inactivity. It is entirely out of my power to describe the galvanic jumps, the

sudden and incomprehensible whirling of each leg entirely on its own responsibility and without the slightest volition on my part; the wild, savage, and determined manner in which threw out my arms and grasped at imaginary objects in the distance; the final complication of flourishes which brought me up all twisted into compound and tangled knot; and the very singular and romantic adventure which occurred at this period of the affair. I flatter myself. Such an exhibition of skill has rarely been witnessed on the River Main; and I am the more confident in this opinion on account of the number

of ladies who gathered around to enjoy it.

You remember, perhaps, the old shawl I wore at Washoe? Well, that identical shawl dropped from my

shoulders just as I was brought up in the unexpected manner already described. Now comes the cream of the romance. A beautiful and blooming young lady came sweeping along on the ice as gracefully as any sylph could possibly be expected to travel on skates. She saw the shawl, darted at it, caught it up with amazing dexterity, and was about to hand it to me with s smile of malicious triumph, when I darted forward to receive it and to express my profound thanks and unbounded admiration.

What do you think happened? Positively the most remarkable and mortifying accident that ever occurred here or elsewhere, to the best of my knowledge. I undertook to make graceful obeisance to the beautiful creature as approached; but, being unable to stop my headway or regain my equilibrium on account of some radical defect in the skates, I actually batted her over! Yes, I confess it with profound humiliation - butted that bewitching creature clear over, hoops, shawl, muff, skates, and all, and, what is worse, became dangerously mingled up in her embraces upon the ice! It was a dreadful scene of misplaced politeness, and I could not but feel that she was forcibly struck by my manners - or rather my head. Upon my honor, I never was so mortified in my life. The whole crowd roared and cheered, and the little boys gathered round in paroxysm of delight, shouting at the top of their voices, "Englander! Englanderl Ho! See the Englander!" 

Somebody disengaged the lady and lifted her up. "Lieber Gott!" said she, with some asperity, "Ich glaub Sie sind ein Englander!" "Ya, schön Fraulein!" looking up at her with an expression of profound humiliation; "Geborn in der Stadt London! Ich war never outside that city before in my life, schön Fraulein. Sorry to say, miss, the style of skating there is altogether different from the German style." "Nicht gut! Nicht gut!" cried the excited damsel, with a glance of disdain; and, giving a beautiful whirl on one leg that came miraculously near carrying off the end of my nose with the point of her skate, away she flew amid the cheers of the by-standers. After this, I picked myself up, so to speak, and concluded it would be better, on account of the severity of the police regulations, to pull off the skates, return them to the owner, and retire from the field, satisfied with the reputation I had already achieved. 

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.

The Errand Boy

Engraving from George Meagher's 1900 book "Lessons In Skating"

We have certainly looked at the popularity of "special figures" more than once on the blog before. The art of carving intricate designs on the ice was an integral part of the development of figure skating back in the 'fancy skating' days and guess what? Today, we are going to talk about it some more. 

Prior to the twentieth century in skating circles from Berlin to Boston, the mark of a good figure skater was to the eyes of many, his or her ability to not just trace numerals like three's and eight's but to carve out letters of the alphabet on the ice. In 1790, German skater Gerhard Ulrich Anton Vieth published his essay "Ueber das Schlittschulaufen" with detailed instructions for skating the letters of the alphabet in large curves and the popularity of this unique art spread like wildfire across the Continent and even overseas. Frank Swift and Marvin R. Clark's "The Skater's Text Book" spoke of American skater Charles Baudouine's talent for "cutting letters on the ice, which is done with the heel of the skate, he being able to cut the whole alphabet, shading each letter beautifully." Many skaters utilized this particular skill as a speciality to gain advantage in early competitions or to wow spectators on chilly ponds but today, we are going to look at one incredible tale from the home country of Lidwina, The Patron Saint Of Skating... a story where carving out the alphabet on the ice took on a far more practical purpose.

In 1850, the French periodical "Musée des familles - lecture du soir" recorded the unbelievable story of one errand boy with a special gift: "Our most agile French skaters would only seem clodhoppers compared with the heavier Dutchman. Skating is the poetry of that prosaic nation. Keeping to the ground by only the merest strip of steel, they fly on invisible wings, and glide between heaven and earth on an immense limpid mirror that gives slightly under their weight but scarcely retains the snowy trace of their passage. It is like a dream come to life. I have seen Dutchmen trace exquisite profile portraits, scenery and monuments, arabesques and the most complicated fancy designs on the ice, with one foot. An Amsterdam shopkeeper, with whom I lodged, had an errand boy who was dumb and made the tour of the port every day with the speed of an arrow. On his return to his master's door, he paused for a few moments and traced a thousand curious little lines on the ice. I approached with the shopkeeper and we read all the news of the day, written on the ice with his skate just as you write on paper with a pen. The only difference was in the size of the letter."

Well over a century later, we may regard Charlotte Oelschlägel carving out the word "SPIES" in the ice in the film "The Frozen Warning" as a novelty or show biz gimmick but I don't think anyone can argue that the story of this forgotten Dutch errand boy who couldn't speak but used his skates to communicate the news of the day is anything but impressive.

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.

The Three Bruises, A Trio Of Skating Cut-Ups

Even in their heyday, the names Jeoffery Stevens, Sidney Spalding and Monty Stott probably meant very little to audiences. However, if you were a skating aficionado in the thirties or forties, you definitely knew who The Three Bruises were.

Originally hockey players, Stevens, Spalding and Stott teamed up on a Christmas Eve in the late twenties in a London arena. Amused by the antics of two cleaning women who had gotten in one of their bosses bottles, the young men would goof around before and after hockey games and soon developing a comedic drag act where they parodied cleaning women. It turned out to be a huge hit and soon the young men were 'discovered' by impresario Claude Langdon, who needed a comedy act for his show "Marina". They called themselves The Three Bruises and soon they were so popular in England that they appeared in performances before King and Queen of England, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and King Alfonso XIII of Spain.

The Three Bruises were in Czechoslovakia when the Germans invaded prior to World War II. After bumming through Europe, they managed to safely make their way back to Great Britain before heading to America in 1939 with Arthur M. Wirtz's  All Star European Ice Revue "Hello America!" While in America, all three men enrolled in the U.S. military during the War but returned to skating
in Wirtz's Centre Theatre productions before joining Hollywood Ice Revue in 1949 and transforming briefly into The Four Bruises, taking ice comedian Buster Grace into the fold.

The Four Bruises. Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine.

All Three Bruises certainly earned their names. Jeoffery was a comedian both on and off ice. The "Hello America!" program boasted, "One night when finishing up a rehearsal, there was a spill and the jagged point of a figure skate ripped out his left eye, part of his nose and a good five inches of forehead. He spent weeks in the hospital and his present nose was built from part of his hip bone by a clever plastic surgeon. The muscle of his left eye was severed and, although he can see out of it, it never moves. Altogether it took 37 stitches to close the wound." He also got hit with a stick while playing hockey and ended up getting twenty seven stitches for a broken upper jaw. He was so stitched up he referred to himself as "a crazy quilt".

Sidney fell down a cliff in 1932, got up, dusted himself off and walked away with only bruises. The 'straight man' of the group, he was a licensed radio operator and a talented defence hockey player who turned down offers to play in Canada when he teamed up with Stott and Stevens. Monty was born in Calcutta, India and was sent to England by his parents to be educated. He attended school at Brighton, where he learned to skate and took up hockey. He worked on tramp steamers in the summer and operated the rink in the winter. Off the ice, he operated an antique shop in Brighton. He once suffered a serious neck injury but didn't know it was broken until three hours later when he fainted at home.

In addition to their popular cleaning women act, one of their signature numbers was a ringmaster act with a two-man skating skating horse alternately named Stalebiscuit or Tishy The Wonder Horse. During one performance, Monty and Sidney fainted mid-performance while in their horse costume.
They didn't like the smell of the leather, so they doused the inside of the hide with 'lavender water'. Overcome by fumes, Tishy The Wonder Horse with the two skaters inside had to be carried off the ice to recover.

Photo courtesy City Of Vancouver Archives

Though the trio were in negotiation with the Ice Capades at one point, they remained fiercely loyal to Arthur M. Wirtz throughout their professional career. Many of their trademark acts were later copied by other comedic ice show trios and in the sixties, a trio calling themselves The Bruises appeared on the scene, stealing both their ideas and name. Though they faded into obscurity, these three hockey players from London were right up there with Shipstad and Johnson, Frick and Frack and others in terms of comedy acts in their heyday, very much pioneers in the ice comedy world.

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.

The Hammersmith Ice Drome

No journey into figure skating history would be complete without discussing the Hammersmith Ice Drome in London and its role in bringing skating from the classes to the masses.

In the early twenties, Claude Langdon (who you'll remember from the "King Bat Of The Forest" blog back in October 2015) bought a rather "sad [dance] hall" called the Palais de Dance at Hammersmith with the goal of giving the "little man" a chance to skate. In converting the dance floor to a skating rink between 1924 and 1927, he discovered that the ancient foundation was built over an ancient well and part of an old farmyard. The reconstruction of the floor into an ice rink - as well as putting in new seating and furnishing - turned out to be a very expensive affair. With the support of friend Captain T.D. Richardson, the rink opened in 1929 with a 'Funk' floor using chippings of coiled steel in the base of the rink and it wasn't long before skaters like Richardson, Howard Nicholson and Trudy Harris were taking the ice there.

Photo courtesy "Skating World" magazine

Ice skating carnivals had been attempted in a smaller scale at the Prince's Skating Club, Hengler's and the Niagara rinks but these festivities pandered to those with deep pockets, not the masses. If you skated at the Westminster Ice Club, the temporary ice rink in the basement of the Albert Hall or the Park Lane Ice Club at Grosvenor House, you had money, a title or both. Langdon was insistent that the ice at Hammersmith be accessible to everyone - from royals to ragamuffins.

In his 1953 book "Earl's Court", Langdon recalled how ice carnivals got their start at the Hammersmith in the early thirties: "On our ice I coined the idea of the Ice Carnivals, which had a big society following, and were widely taken up by the Press. It was the first time such a thing had been organized on indoor ice anywhere in the world. There were great occasions when at gay parties we roasted oxen whole on the ice; the Duke of Windsor (then Prince of Wales), Sir Samuel Hoare, Lord Lytton, Lord Jellicoe and others were among our guests... There were many attractions to bring the ordinary man and his wife to the ice, even if they could not skate, as well as to interest the wealthy and discerning skaters who otherwise patronized the Westminster Ice Club and Grosvenor House."

Sonja Henie and Cecilia Colledge even came there to practice and give exhibitions. The "London Star" reported that on one such occasion "the principal attraction was little Cecilia Colledge, who is now lady champion of Great Britain and quite apart from her artistic athletics is one of the most beautiful girls in the Kingdom. Cecilia devotes her life to skating. She spends hours on the ice daily either at Westminster or Hammersmith. The rhythm and grace of her movements are a perfect delight, and Continental experts who watched her exhibition performance at the Hammersmith rink assure me that within the next two years this accomplished Marylebone child (for she is little more than that) is likely to win the world championship." As we all know, this prediction eventually proved correct.

Claude Langdon and Belita

In 1934 at the height of the rink's popularity, Langdon gave his staff the day off, hired a pleasure-steamer and took them on a cruise down the Thames. It was then that his business partner, A.C. Brake, broke the news: "Ladies and gentlemen, I can assure you that, although you may have heard rumours to the contrary, we are definitely not abandoning ice entertainment. Mr. Langdon may decide to extend his interests in dancing and the palais, and perhaps he will be able to extend his interest in ice entertainment, too. But you who are expert in matters of the ice rinks need have absolutely no fear of your jobs. I give you my word." His word was good.

Though the Hammersmith Ice Drome once again became a dance hall, Langdon went on to reform the Richmond rink as a sports centre accessible to all Londoners, stage lavish ice spectacles in Brighton and establish the Empress Hall in Earl's Court. His stories of working with a who's who of the figure skating world including T.D. Richardson, Papa and Sonja Henie, Cecilia Colledge, Megan Taylor, Jeannette Altwegg and Belita are nothing short of epic and if you are as fascinated by The Hammersmith and its role in skating history as I was, you just may want to read his book.

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.

The 1978 World Figure Skating Championships

Held from March 1 to 6 at the Nepean Sportsplex and Ottawa Civic Centre in Canada's capital city, the 1978 World Figure Skating Championships marked the second time in the seventies that the World Championships were held in Canada - the first being the 1972 World Championships in Calgary.

The event, held in conjunction with the Minto Skating Club's seventy fifth anniversary, turned out to be an incredibly exciting one as the defending champions in three out of four disciplines were dethroned, but it was not an event without its problems.

Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's address from the 1978 World Championships program. Photo courtesy Eileen Mortimer.

After the opening ceremonies, there was a posh reception at the city's Rivermead Golf Club where guests were greeted by a live bagpiper and two cardboard cutouts of Mounties... the real Mounties' horses being stolen to little amusement. As a result, the security got beefed up a little bit for the competition itself and the Army stepped in with their jeeps to guard the gates and check points at the event. Legendary coach Carlo Fassi was reportedly upset about having to show his pass to go to the bathroom. Interestingly, the Army even stepped in to help transport and print copies of the results. The lone computer used to calculate the event's results was actually housed in a nearby building. The judge's marks were fed into terminals in the rink then plugged into this computer, printed out and brought back again by soldiers. So much for WiFi, right?

Eager young fans awaiting skater's autographs in Ottawa

The positives of the 1978 event most definitely outweighed the criticisms. There was not only some excellent skating on the ice, but the strong attendance, largely owing to the hard work of event chairman Peter Mumford, resulted in an almost five hundred thousand dollar profit for skater development in Canada. A young Liz Manley, volunteering as a flower retriever, was inspired by the greats of the seventies. Also, there was a greater deal of optimism among the skaters after the ISU had banned Soviet judges in light of some (how shall we say) questionable work at the previous year's Worlds.

THE PAIRS COMPETITION

The pairs competition in Ottawa proved to be yet another win for the Soviet pair of Irina Rodnina and Alexander Zaitsev. It was Rodnina's tenth win at the World Figure Skating Championships and in doing so, she tied Ulrich Salchow and Sonja Henie's singles records. Despite making history, the Soviet pair had quite a time with the doping afterwards, reportedly having to drink glass after glass water for well over an hour after the event to produce enough urine for testing. Rodnina admitted in a March 9, 1978 "Ottawa Citizen" article that their free skating performance wasn't their best but that the doping ordeal was in fact "the most difficult task of the competition."

The silver medal went to the East German pair of Manuela Mager and Uwe Bewersdorf and the bronze to none other than Americans Tai Babilonia and Randy Gardner, who were audience favourites in Ottawa. Canada's sole representatives, Brantford's Lea-Ann Jackson and Cambridge's Paul Mills, just missed the top ten in eleventh place after Canadian Champions Sherri Baier and Robin Cowan were forced to withdraw pre-competition due to a ruptured calf muscle in one of Baier's legs that was plagued by tendinitis. The girl simply couldn't have caught a break if she tried in Ottawa. She also had a bandaged wrist which had been broken four times, was recovering from the flu and had a pulled groin muscle. Whoever thinks pairs skating is easy is kidding themselves.

Tai Babilonia and Randy Gardner. Photo courtesy Eileen Mortimer.

1953 World Champion Mr. John Nicks, the coach of Tai and Randy, waxed poetically on the current state of pairs skating in an interview with Donna Gabeline. Referring to the 'rag doll' pairs emerging from Communist countries during the seventies, Nicks said, "'It's not a pair. It's a team of one and a half. I think I'll go to the NBA and get a seven-foot basketball player and teach him to skate. This athleticism is getting out of balance. They are forgetting about appreciation of music and unison in size and line. There are very few skaters around who have the strength of character of a Toller Cranston. We don't see much originality these days because everyone is concentrating on perfecting moves already around. I just hope Tai and Randy don't fall into the trap of being like everyone else." 

THE ICE DANCE COMPETITION

The ice dance event in Ottawa marked a changing of the (skate) guard. After the three compulsory dances (the Starlight Waltz, Tango Romantica and Kilian) and Paso Doble OSP, twenty two year old Natalia Linichuk and twenty seven year old Gennadi Karponosov had managed to pull off a pretty convincing lead over defending World and European Championships Irina Moiseeva and Andrei Minenkov... a lead they carried right through the free dance which accounted for fifty percent of the total score.

Marina Zueva and Andrei Vitman. Photo courtesy Eileen Mortimer.

Lynn Copley-Graves' wonderful book "The Evolution Of Dance On The Ice" recalled, "In the free dance to one cut from 'West Side Story', Irina ignored the plot and died on Andrei's knee at the end as he moved dramatically around the rink, starting the fad for deaths on ice. She held the pose too long and they collapsed, turning the drama to comedy and losing, forever, the title."

There was a bit of the usual see-sawing among the other top couples, with Hungarians Krisztina Regőczy and András Sallay finishing third after the compulsory dances, losing that spot to Britons Janet Thompson and Warren Maxwell in the original set pattern dance and then ultimately claiming the bronze with a strong free dance effort. Maxwell joked to one reporter, "I'm a bookie in London. Want to make a bet on a horse, luv?"

Newly crowned Canadian Champions Lorna Wighton and John Dowding went back and forth from fifth to sixth to fifth in the compulsory dances, finished sixth in the original set pattern and despite a fifth place free dance remained in a close sixth behind the Czechoslovakian team of Liliana Řeháková and Stanislav Drastich. The Canadians, who were praised by the "Globe and Mail" as having "managed to look like they were courting in a good, staid Canadian way" finished ahead of the third Soviet team, who Copley-Graves explained "used dramatic, posed moves of the type frowned upon by the new rules while interpreting fast-paced Congo march music with drums and cymbals." An early precursor to the Duchesnay's "Savage Rites" perhaps?

THE MEN'S COMPETITION

The big news in the men's competition in Ottawa didn't even come from any of the medallists. Canada's Vern Taylor made history by completing the first triple Axel in competition. It wasn't a beauty by any stretch of the imagination but then ISU President Jacques Favart and a technical committee reviewed videos of the jump after the fact and decided to recognize Taylor's effort as a historic first. On his contribution to skating history, Taylor then remarked, "There (was) so much momentum and I was going so fast it was difficult to stop. Now that I've done it, it will just be like doing a double Axel." Of thirty or forty attempts in practice, Taylor had only landed approximately five before pulling off his 1978 feat. A fifteenth place finish in the compulsory figures and twelfth place in the short program kept him well out of the mix and despite landing the triple Axel, Taylor finished out of the top ten in twelfth place overall. He wasn't the only man attempting the jump in Ottawa. Japan's Mitsuru Matsumura was tackling the jump in practice, as was West Germany's Rudi Cerne.

Among the leaders, the men's event was actually a fascinating one in 1978, with a great deal of movement. Charlie Tickner of Denver, Colorado was one of the earlier skaters to recognize the value of sports psychology. He began undergoing hypnosis in 1973 and stated in 1978, "I use it every day to build up my confidence, convince myself that I'm going to skate well. It's just a few words I repeat to myself in the morning when I get up, before I'm fully awake." The hypnosis paid off in a four triple free skate and gold medal for Tickner but interestingly, he didn't win any single phase of the competition. The school figures (the counter, forward bracket and back loop) were won by defending World Champion Vladimir Kovalev, the short program by East Germany's Jan Hoffmann and the free skate by Great Britain's Robin Cousins. Ultimately, Hoffmann would claim the silver, Cousins the bronze and Kovalev, who struggled in both the short program and free skate, would drop off the podium entirely and wind up in fourth.

Eighteen year old Canadian Champion Brian Pockar of Calgary would finish in tenth place, one spot ahead of a young Scott Hamilton. In his book "Landing It: My Life On And Off The Ice", Hamilton reflected, "Not bad for my first time out. Considering a year earlier I was watching the competition from home after finishing ninth at Nationals, this was a quantum leap for me." Even without Soviet judges on the panel, some of the results remained controversial. When Kovalev received marks between 5.2 and 5.8 for a rather lacklustre short program, the audience in Ottawa got their 'boo' on.

THE WOMEN'S COMPETITION

In the women's competition, the results were all over the place. Starting the competition with a decisive lead, seventeen year old Anett Pötzsch of East Germany wasn't able to beat eighteen year old American Linda Fratianne in either the short program or free skate but she was able to coast to victory overall, leaving Linda to settle for silver. In a March 11, 1978 article in "The Hour", Pötzsch rejected the implication that her free skating performance was overly cautious: "I did not skate conservatively. I gave it my best because there were only a few points between me and Linda. If I had not given it my best I would not have made it."

Linda Fratianne practicing her figures in advance of the competition

Like Tickner in the men's event, Italy's Susanna Driano (who was actually born in Seattle but skated for Italy under dual citizenship) won her medal - a bronze - by way of flip-flopping results. She didn't finish in the top three in any phase of the competition, but dramatic switches from phase to phase of the competition from the skaters below her - Dagmar Lurz, Denise Biellmann, Elena Vodorezova, Lisa-Marie Allen and Emi Watanabi - assured her that medal win.

Susanna Driano. Photo courtesy Eileen Mortimer.

Elena Vodorezova had actually won the free skate the year previous in Tokyo. Despite finishing in unlucky thirteenth place both years in the school figures, she wasn't able to put out the same level of performances in the free skating events in Ottawa as she had previously. That didn't stop her from having some fun. In March 1978, "The Montreal Gazette" reported, "She and a couple 13 year-old teammates created a traffic jam in the lobby of the Holiday Inn by getting on the elevators and playing with all the buttons. Now her coach goes along and slaps her wrist if it goes near the control panel."

To no surprise, the skater who actually finished second in the free skate was Switzerland's Denise Biellmann, who was already being hailed as being ahead of her time. Eighteen year old Canadian Champion Heather Kemkaran was twelfth and another eighteen year old Canadian, Cathie MacFarlane of Calgary, wound up in seventeenth place in her first and only trip to the World Championships.

Skate Guard is a blog dedicated to preserving the rich, colourful and fascinating history of figure skating. Over ten years, the blog has featured over a thousand free articles covering all aspects of the sport's history, as well as four compelling in-depth features. To read the latest articles, follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube. If you enjoy Skate Guard, please show your support for this archive by ordering a copy of the figure skating reference books "The Almanac of Canadian Figure Skating", "Technical Merit: A History of Figure Skating Jumps" and "A Bibliography of Figure Skating": https://skateguard1.blogspot.com/p/buy-book.html.