A Minoru Blog? I Just Couldn't Sano!

On the island on Honshu to the south of Tokyo was a town located in Higashiyatsushiro District of the Yamanashi Prefecture called Isawa. It no longer exists, now amalgamated as part of city of Fuefuki. However, it was in that town on June 3, 1955 that Minoru Sano, a trailblazer in Japanese figure skating was born.

Minoru first took to the ice at the age of four with his brother and sister on Lake Shōji near Mount Fuji and after his first visit to an indoor skating rink while attending elementary school, he attended a specialized training camp for promising young skaters at Nihon University in Tokyo. It was there he started working with Tsuzuki Shoichiro, who would remain his coach for his entire amateur career. Moving his way up the ranks, Minoru won his first senior medal - a bronze - when he was a fifteen at the 1971 Japanese Championships. By the following year in Osaka, he'd moved up a rung on the podium to claim the silver. It was gold in 1973 in Takano, Kyoto. His first senior men's title earned him a trip to the 1973 World Championships in Bratislava, where he finished a forgettable fourteenth.

That fall, Minoru travelled to Calgary, Alberta where he made history (for the first time in his career) by winning Japan's first medal at Skate Canada International, a bronze behind Toller Cranston and Ron Shaver. After repeating as Japan's senior men's champion in Hiroshima in early 1974, he returned to the World Championships, this time in Munich, West Germany. A disappointing eleventh place finish in the school figures left him in a position where he needed to make up ground in the short program and free skate and he did just that, moving up to eighth place from eleventh. That 'coming from behind after figures' scenario would be one that repeated itself time and time again throughout much of the rest of his competitive career, as was the case that fall at Skate Canada in Kitchener, where he climbed all the way from fifth place to take the silver medal behind Ron Shaver, ahead of American Charlie Tickner. Another medal at the Moscow Skate competition in the Soviet Union later in the fall of 1974 established Minoru as a skater to watch.

After winning a third Japanese men's title in Shiganawa in early 1975, Minoru headed to the World Championships in Colorado Springs ready to make a move on the top echelon of skaters. Disaster struck when he sprained his foot just days prior to the competition. Although he dropped two places down to tenth place, his gutsy performances earned Japan two men's spots for the 1976 Innsbruck Olympics. However, after the competition what he thought was a sprain turned out to be a fracture. The prospects of Minoru's Olympic dream appeared bleak.

Minoru rallied to win a fourth consecutive Japanese title in Tokyo, earning (alongside Mitsuru Matsumura) one of two men's spots on the Japanese Olympic team heading to Innsbruck. The judges didn't quite know what to do with him, offering scores in the figures that ranged from sixth to eleventh and in the short program that ranged from fourth to tenth. At the end of the day, he finished ninth overall. It was Japan's best result in the figure skating events of those Olympics. In Sweden at the World Championships that followed, he finished seventh overall. However, the March 4, 1976 issue of The Ottawa Citizen noted, "His spectacular high-speed performance [in the short program] included the only successful triple lutz/double toe-loop of [the] competition."

Minoru's final season in the amateur ranks was his most successful. In 1977, he won his fifth consecutive Japanese men's title in Kyoto then headed to the World Championships in Tokyo. Despite the pressures of performing in front of a massive hometown crowd, Minoru actually won the free skate ahead of a who's who of top men's skaters of that era - Jan Hoffmann, Vladimir Kovalev, David Santee and Charlie Tickner among them - with his daringly athletic performance. A sixth place finish in the figures almost kept him off the podium but he managed to win the bronze medal, a historic first medal at the World Championships for Japan.

Vlasimir Kovalev, Jan Hoffmann and Minoru Sano on the podium at the 1977 World Championships

Leaving the amateur ranks on a high note, Minoru turned professional and married an Olympic gymnast. He dabbled in music, releasing songs with Toshiba EMI and helped found Japan's first homegrown ice show, Viva! Ice World. In the show, he skated both singles (showing off a newly acquired backflip) and pairs with Emi Watanabi.

In 1980, he moderated a weekly sports news show on Nippon Television called Exclusive! Sports Information and took a stab at competing in the World Professional Championships in Jaca, Spain. He tied in the judge's scores with American Scott Cramer and lost the title on the audience score by literally one point. Unphased, Minoru continued his skating with Viva! Ice World and work in television on FNN News Report as a sportscaster throughout the eighties. Confusingly - believe me - another Minoru Sano was also an extremely popular Japanese personality during this period. The other Minoru Sano was a celebrity ramen noodle chef.

Minoru continued performing professionally in Japanese skating shows until the early nineties before beginning work as a television commentator for Fuji TV and coach. Among his former students? Shizuka Arakawa, Yamato Tamura and his own daughter Midori, who became a successful professional skater in her own right. He also appeared in the 2009 Japanese skating film "Coach" starring Miwa Nishida, Noburo Kaneko, Yuna Komatsuzaki and Sayaka Yoshino. Other skating greats including Midori Ito, Shizuka Arakawa and Miki Ando made cameos in the film.

Currently, Minoru coaches alongside Yutaka Higuchi and Miwa Fukuhara at the Meiji Jingu Outer Gardens Skating Rink in Tokyo's Sendagaya district and serves as the President of the Japan Figure Skating Instructor Association. He has also served on the council of the Japan Skating Association. The dedication that Minoru has shown to the sport of figure skating - wearing pretty much every hat there is at one point or another - is remarkable and his skate of a lifetime back in 1977 can't help but make you smile, even to this day. To Minoru Sano, the skating world owes a big "domo arigatou"!

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 1925 European Figure Skating Championships

German editorial cartoon of skaters at The 1925 European Figure Skating Championships

On February 7 and 8, 1925, a frozen lake in the mountains of the Black Forest, an hour from the small town of Triberg im Schwarzwald in Baden-Württemberg, was the unlikely yet idyllic setting for the 1925 European Figure Skating Championships. The event marked the first time in fifteen years that Germany had played host to the European Championships; the first since the Great War ended. Interestingly, the event also marked the final appearance at the Europeans of the man who finished second at the 1910 European Championships in Berlin... Werner Rittberger, who was credited as the inventor of the loop jump.

Six men from three countries vied for gold in Triberg before a panel of five judges - two from Germany, two from Austria and one from Hungary. Despite poor weather conditions - rain and a thaw - all six skaters performed exceptionally well in the figures. As expected, the two German judges cast their votes for Rittberger. One of the two Austrian judges and the Hungarian judge placed Austria's Willy Böckl first, while the other Austrian judge voted for another Austrian, Otto Preißecker. Despite drawings that a reporter from the "Wiener Sportagblatt" described as "magnificent", Georges Gautschi placed outside of the top three, hampered by the fact that he was the only competitor without a judge on the panel to support him. However, that same reporter noted, "Böckl offered the most consistent performance and created a clear lead mainly by [his] wonderfully soft transitions. Rittberger (Berlin) did much better compulsory exercises as in the previous year in Davos. Dr. Preißecker shone as well, but his tracings were not perfect. [Paul] Franke (Berlin) skated well, but was nevertheless the weakest among the championship candidates."

The following day, the temperature dropped by ten degrees and the sun came out as the six men took the ice to perform their free skating programs. The reporter who covered the event for the "Wiener Sportagblatt" called the event thusly: "In [free] skating Rittberger offered little content, but in the execution gave a first-class performance. Gautschi also did not show too much, but has in the presentation substantially improved. Dr. Preißecker skated nervously and for this reason was a little weaker than we are used to. [Ludwig] Wrede's freestyle was excellent. He succeeded in everything, including the Axel Paulsen backwards. [Willy] Böckl brought a lot of difficulty to his freestyle, but the very unfortunate music inhibited [his performance] and much of its effect was robbed."

Willy Böckl

After the judge's marks were tallied, four judges still had Bockl first in free skating, while the Hungarian judge tied he and Rittberger. Overall, Böckl easily took the win. Gautschi and Preißecker were close in the free skate, but Preißecker managed to defeat him by four ordinal placings for the bronze. It's interesting to note that Austrian judge Karl Mejstrik had Rittberger, Preißecker, Gautschi and Wrede in a four-way tie for second in the free skate. As he'd won the event twice before, Böckl's win was far from a surprise to anyone. However, Ludwig Wrede's fifth place finish shocked many. He had won the silver medal at the event the year prior and had been considered one of Böckl's main challengers prior to the competition.

Medal from the junior men's event at the 1925 European Championships

In addition the 'main event', a number of other skating titles were decided in Triberg at the European Championships. There were also non-championship classes for senior men and women, junior men and senior pairs. Skaters from the Wiener Eislaufverein - Hugo Distler, Hilde Thiel and Karl Kronfuss - swept the singles events, while Else and Oscar Hoppe of Troppau took the pairs title. Speed skating races were also held, and these were dominated from skaters from Vienna also.

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.

Sewing And Salchows: The Lev Mikhailov Story

Stanislav and Nina Zhuk, Tatiana Vladimirovna Nemtsova and Lev Mikhailov in 1961

Born April 26, 1938 in Moscow, Lev Federovich Mikhailov began skating on an outdoor rink on Shiryaev field at Sokolniki Park in Moscow rented by the DSO "Spartacus" during the gloomy post-War years. Training conditions were severe. It was often bitterly cold and snowy, the ice conditions varied wildly and needles from trees often littered the ice.

After taking lessons from Georgiy Konstantinovich Felitsyn, Lev began working with Evgeny Vladimirovich Nikitin. Both coaches focused on improving his school figures, which were a characteristic weakness from the beginning to the end of his competitive career. However, in free skating, Lev was something of a prodigy by Soviet standards at the time. He began competing at the age of thirteen, winning his first competition in 1951: a joint meeting of Soviet and Czechoslovakian skaters at the "Dynamo" stadium. Nikitin recalled, "His skating is unforgettable for those who saw it. It's a pity that his name is almost unknown to modern specialists... So far in the world he has no equal."

Lev's school figures weren't his only roadblock. Another was his grades in school! In the July-December 1960 issue of "USSR" magazine, Victor Kuprianov recalled an amusing incident from Lev's youth thusly: "Regular medical checkup is one requirement [in youth sports], another is grades. At school tournaments the contestant is required to produce his report card. One poor grade and he is disqualified... This happened to Lev Mikhailov, the present figure-skating champion, a good many years back when he wasn't on speaking terms with math, and so he was barred from competition."

Lev Mikhailov on the podium at a competition in the Soviet Union

After winning his first of five Championships of the USSR in 1956, Lev headed to Paris to compete at the European Championships. Along with Valentin Zakharov and Igor Persiantsev, he was one of the first three skaters representing the Soviet Union to compete in an ISU Championship at that event. Though he placed a dismal fifteenth, by the following year he climbed to eighth on the strength of his free skating.

After amassing another two top ten finishes at the 1958 and 1959 European Championships, Lev made his only trip to the World Championships in 1959, placing a disappointing seventeenth. In his final major ISU Championship, the 1960 European Championships in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, he placed only eighth but wowed audiences by performing an airy double Axel and single Axels in both directions, earning the admiration of Dick Button who told a reporter from the German newspaper "Sportecho" that Lev performed the jump better than him. Though his record in major ISU Championships wasn't overly impressive, Lev amassed a number of medals in domestic and international competitions in Czechoslovakia, Poland and the Soviet Union in the late fifties. He won the Winter Spartakiade of Moscow in 1957 and the Winter Spartakiad of Sverdlovsk in 1958. Lyudmila Kubashevskaya recalled, "He had a memorable appearance: short stature, curly hair, dark 'gypsy' eyes. He had his own peculiar style of skating, combining unusual plasticity of movement, vortex speed, high jumps and at the same time the elegance of skating, the internal culture of movement. On ice, he was inimitable, he could make a new element out of any mistake. Telling about his skating is just as impossible as telling the words in words... His every program was unique."

Though only in his early twenties, Lev worked as a coach from 1961 to 1963 in the Central Army Sports Club's (CKSA) figure skating section while serving in the Soviet Army. His students included Elena Kotova and two time Champion of the USSR Tatiana Vladimirovna Nemtsova, the first Soviet woman to compete at the World Championships. During this period, he arranged a 'viewing' of young skaters in hopes of recruiting the more talented ones to the CSKA. One of the skaters he chose to admit to the Club was Irina Rodnina.

Lev returned to competition one final time in 1963, placing a disappointing fourth at the Championships of the USSR behind Alexander Vedenin, Vladimir Ivanovich Kurenbin and Valeri Ivanovich Meshkov. For his contributions to figure skating, he was honoured as a Master of Sport of the USSR. Unsurprisingly due to the fact that when he wasn't skating, he was often found rinkside with his knitting needles making sweaters, scarves and hats, Lev became a tailor after retiring from the sport. He passed away on August 31, 2004 at the age of sixty six, his contributions to the skating world during the post-War era virtually unknown outside of Russia.

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.

Sonja's Wild Party

On February 5, 1955, over three hundred of the silver screen's biggest stars made their way to Ciro's Nightclub on the Sunset Strip for the first big costume party in Hollywood in many years. The A-listers came at the invitation of one of Los Angeles' most popular hostesses... three time Olympic Gold Medallist and ten time World Champion Sonja Henie... and the party the Norwegian ice queen threw that Saturday night was nothing short of epic.

Joan Crawford and Sonja Henie

The costume party had a circus theme and guests were greeted at the entrance of Ciro's by mounds of sawdust, sideshow posters, snake charmers with real-live reptiles, a calliope playing Big Top music... and a three and a half ton hippopotamus who "sat with a bored expression outside the front door". Their hostess made her grand entrance riding atop a baby elephant borrowed from the Moulin Rouge, wearing a revealing spangled pink leotard.

Inside, guests sipped champagne served from giant bottles and watched acrobatic acts and clowns perform while waiting for supper to be served. A station with popcorn, soda pop and cotton candy was set up to add to the gay atmosphere. After the cocktail hour ended, a curtain that cut off the main room was pulled open and Sonja's guests marched in to eat dinner under a real circus tent, with aerialists swinging about and dogs and ponies aimlessly wandering to and fro. "I wanted to have other animals but they smell," Sonja told a UPI reporter.

The supper menu consisted of turtle soup, filet mignon and baked Alaska. Each table had a tiny merry go-round as its centerpiece. After dinner came dancing with three live bands. Well-stocked buffet tables serving caviar, crab, lobster and shrimp were set up on the sidelines. The party was so over the top that Associated Press writer Bob Thomas remarked, "Old Hollywood hasn't seen the likes of it in years."

The atmosphere was only highlighted by the imaginative costumes of Sonja's guests. Zsa Zsa Gabor came dressed as Vampira, the Charles Addams' TV character; Cesar Romero a gaucho.
June Allyson was a clown; Jeanne Crain a Balinese woman. Jane Powell came as a scantily clad Valentine and Jack Rau a panda. Peggy Lee was a tattooed lady; Susan Hayward an elephant trainer. There were three bearded ladies. Virginia Warren, the daughter of Chief Justice Earl Warren, arrived with Ed Pauley Jr., the son of the Democratic leader, dressed as a harem girl. James Mason came as a clown, sporting a bulbous prosthetic nose that lit up. His wife came in drag, sporting a moustache and goatee.

Liberace drew the most attention, arriving with his TV producer's wife Tido Fedderson, sporting a tuxedo with ruffled shirt and gold sequined tie. When questioned who he was dressed as, he cheekily told reporters, "Liberace".

Among the many other famous party-goers were Cary Grant, Lana Turner, Lex Barker, Cary Grant, Joan Crawford, Van Heflin and Bob Cummings. Judy Garland, who was almost eight months pregnant with her son Joey at the time, made a fashionably late entrance out of costume. Sonja awarded the prize for Best Costume to Esther Williams. The swimming sensation came as a Persian mind reader with a goldfish bowl advertising "underwater fortunes".

The top shelf scotch was flowing freely and Sonja worked the room in a diamond tiara and collar estimated to be worth over one hundred thousand dollars. Her guests made merry at Ciro's until the wee hours of the morning... and she reportedly didn't bat an eyelash when the fifteen thousand dollar bill for her shindig arrived. When asked why she chose to throw such a lavish get-together, Sonja smiled and told reporters, "No reason. I just felt like having a party."

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.

How The Mohawk Got Its Name

George Catlin, "Beggar's Dance, Mouth of Teton River", 1835-1837, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mrs. Joseph Harrison, Jr., 1985.66.443

"You have noticed that everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the Power of the World always works in circles, and everything tries to be round. In the old days when we were a strong and happy people, all our power came to us from the sacred hoop of the nation, and so long as the hoop was unbroken, the people flourished. The flowering tree was the living center of the hoop, and the circle of the four quarters nourished it. The east gave peace and light, the south gave warmth, the west gave rain, and the north with its cold and mighty wind gave strength and endurance." - Heȟáka Sápa (Black Elk) of the Lakota Tribe

For over a century, figure skaters of all ages have been asking their coaches why the step they are learning to perform is called a Mohawk. Some coaches may respond with a shrug. When pressed, others may invent a story about how the Mohawk was invented by a skater centuries ago named Albert Mohawk - perhaps some distant Native American cousin of Ulrich Salchow - and redirect the skater back to the task at hand. The truth is, the history of the Mohawk and how it got its name is murky at best... but a little detective work and hypothesizing can perhaps lead us to a conclusion that makes a little sense.

In his 1897 book "On The Outside Edge: Being Diversions In The History Of Skating", George Herbert Fowler claimed, "The Mohawk step was probably introduced to England on rollers by [Alfred] Moe and [E.T.] Goodrich in 1869-70. It seems to have then been transferred from rollers to ice, and christened at the London Skating Club about 1879." Edgar Syers shared Fowler's belief that the Mohawk was first performed on rollers. In the 1900 edition of "The Encyclopædia Of Sport", he remarked, "I believe that the Mohawk steps were first skated by the professionals Moe and Goodrich at the Crystal Palace Roller Rink in 1870, and afterwards skated and named at the... Skating Club."

The first book to describe the Mohawk was the third edition of Henry Eugene Vandervell and Thomas Maxwell Witham's "A System Of Figure Skating", published by Horace Cox of London in 1880. Vandervell and Witham supported Fowler's later theory that the Mohawk was first performed on rollers. The authors included the step in their chapter on roller skating and claimed that it was 'christened' by the name of Mohawk when it was introduced into the Skating Club's figures on ice and had recently come into vogue. They also remarked, "On ice this is an extremely difficult movement to most men, as few are able to turn out their feet 'spread eagle fashion' so as to describe a curve, the centre of which is at the back of the skater, as this must be done without any assistance from the hold of the skate of the ice; but with the rollers a skater has to only place the skate in the desired position and lean backwards, when the wheels will, so long as the inclination is sustained, hold his feet as it were, and compel them to describe the curve." Both Vandervell and Witham's book and Montagu Sneade Monier-Williams' 1883 book "Combined Figure Skating" described figures in the English Style which included Mohawks, such as 'Twice back - and forward mohawk at centre - and back two turns out - and forward in' and 'Forward inside Mohawk and half-double', noting that several figures including Mohawks were introduced to the Skating Club's 'club figures' but that they "were skated by a few of the members [and] have not become so popular, possibly in consequence of the difficulty of skating them." Interestingly, Vandervell and Witham had described the pattern left on the ice by a cross roll as "resembling an ancient or Indian bow."

In the decades after the Mohawk's introduction, Canadian skater George Meagher coined the term 'Wabuck' for a step he termed "a first or second cousin to the Mohawk." Forty five years after its adoption by The Skating Club, the Mohawk even had its own Waltz, performed on an eight figure and known in Europe as the 'Amerikaner Valse'. Irving Brokaw described it in the 1915 edition of his book "The Art Of Skating" thusly: "Here one partner skates a forward Mohawk, while the other executes a backward one, the partners facing each other, or side by side. The movement takes the pair around the rink in a circle, or by change of edge, it is possible to skate it in eight form. This figure is especially adapted to exhibitions, since a very showy jump can be introduced."

Ponca chiefs Ash-nom-e-kah-ga-he (Lone Chief), Ta-tonka-nuzhe (Standing Buffalo), Wa-ga-sa-pi (Iron Whip), Waste-co-mani (Fast Walker). Photo courtesy American Antiquarian Society.

But why the name Mohawk? As early as the 1850's, Britons had a fascination with the stories of 'Cowboys and Indians' in America's Wild West. In 1858 - nearly thirty years before Buffalo Bill arrived in London with his touring Wild West Show and one hundred native Americans in tow - "The Times" in London ran a story about "The American Indian" which discussed the Mohawk, Choctaw and Seminol people. Dime novels abounded with tales of 'American savages' and interestingly, Gilbert Malcolm Sproat's popular book "Scenes And Studies Of Savage Life" came out in 1868... just a year or two before Moe and Goodrich allegedly introduced the step to Londoners on rollers.

In the early 1970's, the USFSA Dance Committee researched the topic and suggested, "With the opening of the American West in the early 1800's, the English were enthralled by accounts of American Indians. A few captured Indians were even shipped across the Atlantic and put on display for the curious Englishmen. This interest in American savages caught on among English skaters, and they adopted the Indian tribal names 'Mohawk' and 'Choctaw', to describe their turns. Although the choice of 'Mohawk' and 'Choctaw' was apparently arbitrary... the reason lies in the fact that the American Indian was the 'in' topic of conversation among nineteenth century skaters."

In her book "Figure Skating History: The Evolution Of Dance On Ice", Lynn Copley-Graves asserted, "In the 1800's the British were fascinated by stories of American Indians. A few American Indians had been brought to England to entertain the British with war dances. Some skaters who saw them thought the spread-eagle pose done in Indian ceremonies resembled the turned-out position of a turn they did on the ice. The tracing made by that turn resembled an Indian bow, so they named the turn the 'mohawk' after the visiting tribe from New York State. This analogy fits the inside-to-inside mohawk." In his 1931 book "The Elements Of Skating", Dr. Ernest Jones also claimed the step was derived "from a cut-like step used by Mohawk Indians in their war dances." Muriel Kay Fulton, the author of "The Key Of Rhythmic Ice Dancing" and "Origins Of Ice Dance Music", was of the firm belief that the steps in the Schöller March (Tenstep), introduced in the late 1880's, resembled war dances that indigenous peoples introduced to European Courts during the Victorian era.

Like it or not, the origins of many figure skating elements are nebulous at best. In the days before we carried around cell phones with built-in cameras in our pockets, two skaters in different countries could easily have been working on the same jump around the same time. The one who landed it first could just as easily not be the skater that history has remembered as its originator. While we can't decisively say how the Mohawk got its name - or many other things in skating history for that matter - that shouldn't stop us from digging... and coming up with our own educated conclusions.

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 1949 World Figure Skating Championships

Held from February 16 to 18, 1949 in Paris, the 1949 World Figure Skating Championships marked the first time an international figure skating competition was held in France since the country had hosted the 1936 World Championships where Sonja Henie had won her tenth and final World title. The event was hosted at the glass-roofed Palais des Sports, an elegant indoor rink with seating for fifteen thousand.

Photo courtesy "Skating World" magazine

The American team stayed at the Hotel Napoleon, near the The Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile. They had a difficult time making their way to the Palais des Sports, as many taxi drivers refused to travel across the Seine at night. Social events held in conjunction with the competition included a reception at the Hôtel de Ville hosted by officials from Paris' municipal assembly and a tour of the city.

A series of miscommunications led to Julie and Bill Barrett boarding a last-minute flight to Paris to participate in a demonstration of ice dancing, only to arrive and find that none of the ice dancers from other countries had arrived, save two Austrian couples whose efforts, Cyril Beastall remarked, "could only be described as a travesty of ice dancing - they would have been entertaining in [England] as ice comedians and nothing more." For whatever reason, the French crowd loved the Austrian couples and the only way that the Barrett's were able to get more that polite applause out of them was by performing their pairs program.

Photo courtesy "Skating World" magazine

Interestingly, the pairs and women's competitions were judged by a panel of seven and the men's event by a panel of five. As the 1949 Canadian Championships were scheduled at the exact same time, Canadian skaters didn't make the trip and the absence of Barbara Ann Scott (who had retired from competition) was certainly felt. 

The show went on without Canada's Sweetheart and the event turned out to an incredibly memorable one. Let's hop in the time machine and take a look back at the skaters and stories that made this competition so fascinating!

THE PAIRS COMPETITION

Andrea Kékesy and Ede Király giving an exhibition in England prior to the Championships. Photo courtesy "Skating World" magazine.

Twelve teams from eight countries contested the 1949 World pairs title, which got underway at nine o'clock at night before a packed crowd. Hungary's Andrea Kékesy and Ede Király. who trained in England with Arnold Gerschwiler, were victorious. In "Skating World" magazine, Dennis Bird remarked, "The Hungarians... had the misfortune to skate first and it is a measure of their greatness that they were nevertheless placed first by each one of the seven judges. Including in their difficult program Axels, a double Salchow, a one-handed death spiral, and many intricate steps, they were easily the best pair of the evening. It was annoying that the Press box was so situated that one could neither see the Hungarians' marks as they went up, nor hear them when they were called out over a megaphone."

Andrea Kékesy and Ede Király in Paris. Photo courtesy "Skating World" magazine.

The runners-up, American siblings Karol and Peter Kennedy, were huge hits with the Parisian crowd. Dennis Bird noted, "They opened with a startling lift and skated very steadily and neatly throughout their five minutes. They lacked the contents of the Hungarian, however, a fact which probably cost them the title."

Karol and Peter Kennedy

The top two teams were miles above the rest of the field and the battle for bronze proved to be a four-way race separated fittingly by exactly four points. Americans Anne Davies and Carleton Hoffner narrowly edged three brother/sister teams - Hungary's Marianne and László Nagy, Austria's Herta and Emil Ratzenhofer and Great Britain's Jennifer and John Nicks - for the third spot on the medal podium. In "Skating" magazine, Harold G. Storke remarked, "The real surprise of the evening... was the marvelous performance of the Anne Davies-Carleton Hoffner pair. Their sparkle, smoothness and speed left no doubt in the minds of the judges - or of the crowd - that their third place was richly deserved. A little more 'contents' and they will be serious contenders for the title."

The Kennedy's wouldn't have made it to Paris that year had it not been for the interest shown towards their skating by one General Mark Clark. On March 19, 1949, the "Spokane Daily Chronicle" reported, "General Clark, possibly in the interest of having the talented twosome skate for occupational soldiers [stationed] in Europe, arranged to have them flown to Paris via MATS (military air transport service)." Though the children of a successful dentist, the financial strain of having two kids in skating had forced the Kennedy's to approach the owner of a Washington state arena for help fundraising the cost just to get the siblings to D.C. to board the MATS flight.

THE MEN'S COMPETITION

Photo courtesy Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek

With the retirement of Hans Gerschwiler, the World title was really Dick Button's competition to lose. As the defending Olympic and World Champion, the Harvard freshman was a heavy favourite and he certainly didn't disappoint. In the school figures, Button was first on four judge's scorecards. Hungary's Ede Király was second, followed by Austria's Edi Rada, who had earned a first place vote from his country's judge, won the change-loop and performed his three-change-three so well he audience actually applauded. 

In the free skate, the judges were hard-pressed not to make Dick Button top banana. They unanimously gave him marks that once again led him to the top of the podium, including one 6.0 for manner of performance, and were impressed with his lively, athletic free program. After performing the first double Axel in competition the year previous, he'd added another trick to his arsenal - a double loop/double loop combination. In his 1966 book "Konståkningens 100-åriga historia: utveckling, OS-VM-referater, intervjuer och berättelser", Gunnar Bang praised Button's performance in Paris thusly: "What a flight, what color, what tone and rhythm. [Clearly] a guy with humor, in contrast to their competitors, who mostly seemed to be a tad [lacking] in this context." The silver medal went to pairs winner Ede Király (who gave the performance of his life) and the bronze to Edi Rada. In sixth and eighth places were a young Hayes Alan Jenkins and Carlo Fassi.

THE WOMEN'S COMPETITION

With no Barbara Ann Scott in sight, Austria's Eva Pawlik was a heavy favourite to take the gold in Paris. However, in the school figures Czechoslovakia's Ája Zanová took a commanding lead with first place ordinals from five of the seven judges. The Austrian judge placed Pawlik first and the British judge placed Jeannette Altwegg first. Eva's result in the figures was still commendable, considering she was still quite weak after a hospital stay immediately following the European Championships (which she'd won) due to a reported case of acute appendicitis. Ája Zanová's marks for the counter ranged from 5.4 to 5.8, giving a sense of the high standard of the time.

Yvonne Sherman, Helen Uhl and Virginia Baxter

Although American Yvonne Sherman held her own with Europe's best skaters, teammates Virginia Baxter, Andra McLaughlin and Helen Uhl found themselves buried in the standings. Though many of her American teammates opted to take advantage of the convenience of air travel, Virginia Baxter and her mother didn't care for flying, so they had come to Paris aboard the Queen Mary.

Left: Ája Zanová. Right: Edi Scholdan and Eva Pawlik boarding a train enroute to Paris. Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine.

Eva Pawlik's son Dr. Roman Seeliger explained, "The difference in points between Pawlik and Zanová was narrow, so Pawlik was still the favourite. Her strength had always lain in the free programme. She was only third in the school figures at St. Moritz one year before. It was the free program that earned her the Olympic silver medal."

While practicing following the figures, Pawlik's broke the heel of one of her skates. Dr. Roman Seeliger claimed, "The judges did not allow her to try the shoes of a companion to get familiar with a new feeling of skating. Sabotage was supposed but not proven. As a result of the shortages in Austria, Pawlik unfortunately had no second pair of skates, so she could not compete in the free programme. That was the greatest disappointment in Eva Pawlik's career."

Ája Zanová won the title with a very fine free skating performance that included a double Lutz jump and Yvonne Sherman moved up to take the silver ahead of Jeannette Altwegg and Jiřína Nekolová. In "Skating World" magazine, Dennis Bird remarked, "[Ája Zanová's]... first jmp will stay in my mind for a long time. It was an Axel, but such an Axel as I have not seen before. She went up about three feet and, like a slow motion film, turned so slowly and gracefully that one had the impression that she was not coming down until she wanted to. It was beautiful. After that, however, her performance was not quite what I expected. With so much at stake, there seemed to be something - was it nervousness? - that held her back. None the less she was very good, and her programme contained many difficult jumps, an Axel-sit spin, a high split, and a Schäfer-parallel." The wonderfully artistic Andra McLaughlin proved to be a huge crowd favourite and an emerging French star named Jacqueline du Bief who moved up from sixteenth to ninth gained attention for a different reason.

Jacqueline du Bief was a delightfully musical skater, whose performance to Rossini's "Semiramide" and Offenbach's "Orpheus In The Underworld" included double Lutz, double loop and double Salchow attempts. Her talent as a free skater unfortunately had the opposite effect, when the coaches of her rivals began to 'take an interest' in her. In her autobiography "Thin Ice", she recalled, "I began to feel the effects of my resistance to the instructors of the big foreign schools. These gentlemen could never see the pupils of other people do well without a certain amount of displeasure, and from that moment they began ‘to take an interest’ in me. When I say ‘in me’ I ought rather to say in my faults, in my mistakes, which they remarked on as forcibly as they could, pointing them out to anyone who might have failed to notice them for themselves. This was certainly not very nice for me but it was encouraging; it was a good sign, and more than any compliments it proved to me that I was beginning to take on some importance and was no longer considered just an uninteresting debutante. It was at the close of these competitions that I received my first invitations to give exhibitions abroad."

Ája Zanová receiving a congratulatory kiss from Dick Button

Most of the most extraordinary stories that came out of the women's event in Paris was that of sixteen year old Beryl Bailey. Though she placed an unlucky thirteenth, the fact she gave an excellent performance in the free skating made her the heroine of the British team - not because she'd skated so well, but that she'd taken the ice at all. Beryl, Joan Lister (who'd been forced to withdraw) and Jeannette Altwegg's mother had all either contracted the stomach flu or were suffering from food poisoning and had spent the last twenty-four hours in bed or 'la salle de bain'. Beryl, a student of Jacques Gerschwiler, had decided to skate at the very last minute and was so sick that she collapsed after performing. Cyril Beastall remarked, "The fact that Beryl... skated as well as before was a revelation - she was certainly not well enough to take the ice, but her actions marked her as a grand little sportswoman."

As all proper competitions do, the 1949 World Championships ended with a party at the Hotel George V. In his book "Dick Button On Skates", Dick Button recalled, "Following the tournament, Pierre de Gaulle, Lord Mayor of Paris, and brother of General Charles de Gaulle, gave a reception for Miss Zanová, Andrea Kékesy and Ede Király, pairs winners, and me."

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.

Worth The Hassle: The Nicole Hassler Story

Born in Chamonix, Mont-Blanc, France on June 1, 1941, Nicole Monique Marcelle Hassler was the daughter of Albert and Josephine Hassler and granddaughter of Ernest and Marie-Clémentine (Payot) Hassler. From an early age, Nicole and her brother Charles were no stranger to an ice rink. Their father was a decorated athlete who had competed in three Winter Olympic Games in two sports: speed skating and ice hockey. Albert Hassler played on the winning French team at the 1924 European Ice Hockey Championships.

Albert Hassler on the speed skating track

After retiring from competitive speed skating and hockey, Albert Hassler - who ran the Hôtel Beaulieu in Chamonix - became 'the original Suzanne Bonaly'. Despite having absolutely zero figure skating experience himself, he took it upon himself to coach Nicole as a figure skater for much of her career. Nicole's loyalty to her father's instruction actually proved to be a detriment as she was often not given the same attention in the French skating community as the students of Jacqueline Vaudecrane. Later in her career, she finally received formal instruction in the art of skating from no less a coaching great than Arnold Gerschwiler himself.

Despite the fact she had little formal instruction early in her career, Nicole made a slow and steady rise in the skating world from the late fifties to mid sixties. After placing a dismal twenty third of twenty nine entries at the 1958 World Championships in Paris and sixteenth at the 1959 European Championships in Davos, she climbed her way up to win her first French title in 1960, dethroning two time French Champion Dany Rigoulot. That particular victory capped off a fierce battle between the two talented young skaters. Nicole beat Dany at the 1959 European Championships; Dany beat Nicole at the 1959 World Championships. The following year, Nicole lost to Dany at both the French and European Championships. Dany turned professional, leaving Nicole to reign as French women's champion the next five years.

From 1962 to 1965, Nicole enjoyed both thrilling highs and crushing defeats on the international stage. She thrice won the Richmond Trophy in England and at the 1963 World Championships in Cortina d'Ampezzo (where she won the bronze medal) the Canadian and French judges had her ahead of the winner Sjoukje Dijkstra in the free skate.

Sjoukje Dijkstra, Regine Heitzer and Nicole Hassler on the podium at the 1963 World Championships (left) and 1964 European Championships (right). Photo courtesy "Skating" magazine, BIS Archive.

Despite winning four consecutive medals at the European Championships, Nicole's reputation as a medal contender was marred by a particularly poor free skating performance at the 1965 World Championships in Colorado Springs. She placed a disappointing eighth overall at that event and two judges had her as low as thirteenth in the free skate.

Though considered her country's only hope for a medal in the women's figure skating competition at the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble, Nicole ultimately chose to retire from competition in 1966. Three years later, she made history by becoming the first skater to pass both the Gold Figure and Dance tests of the Fédération Française des Sports de Glace. After this impressive feat, she opted to step away from the sport entirely for several decades to raise a family. She spent some time living in England and, of course, had ties to her family business.

Photo courtesy German Federal Archive

Though criticized for lacking the same attack in the jumping department as her competitior Sjoukje Dijkstra, Nicole was renowned as one of the finest spinners of her era. Denise Biellmann, Lucinda Ruh or Nathalie Krieg she was not, but as compared to many skaters of her time she was certainly a cut above the rest. Her talent certainly didn't go unnoticed. In her book "Patinage sur glace historique", skating historian Jeanine Hagnauer praised her effusively: "I can say Nicole Hassler is the most brilliant skater France [has seen] since the start of the women's French Championships in 1908, after Jacqueline du Bief." Following Nicole's retirement, another French skater didn't stand on the women's podium at the European Championships until Surya Bonaly won her first title in 1991 in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Around the same time Surya Bonaly burst on the scene, Nicole slowly re-emerged into the skating world. She organized a skating club at Plaisir, a commune in Yvelines in northern France, and taught there for several years until her father's death in September of 1994. Sadly, Nicole only outlived her father by two years, passing away on November 19, 1996 at the age of fifty five. Today, a gymnasium in the Salle Multisports in Yvelines which bears her name is sadly one of the few reminders of this largely forgotten French star of decades past.

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.

How The OSP Came To Be

Lyudmila Pakhomova and Alexander Gorshkov

"Skating is and will always remain essentially a dance." - Manfred Curry

Although we think of the development of the OSP as an international matter, the origins of the 'Original Dance' actually trace back to the roaring twenties when former German pairs champion, author and international judge Dr. Hugo Wintzer of Dresden, Germany submitted a failed proposal to the ISU for an ice dance competition, including an "original dance", to be included at the World Figure Skating Championships. Wintzer's "original dance" proposal was in many ways moreso a precursor to what we'd think of today as a free dance. He described it as a "dance of one's choice, 2 minutes" and stated that "the character must be that of a dance throughout. Thus figures appropriate to a pair or single skating should be considered incorrect; for example, separating figures, spirals, and successions of steps without a rhythmic repetition of movement. In senior dancing competitions, every series of dance steps must be skated at least three times in immediate succession."

Although Wintzer's proposal got absolutely nowhere, in 1928 at the USFSA's Annual General Meeting, the USFSA Governing Governing Council voted to adapt his 'Original Dance' proposal and include it at the 1929 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in New York in conjunction with compulsory dances. The judges were a bit all over the place but the Original Dance's debut was a success from a skater's standpoint. Among those competing in that first original dance competition were American skating legends like Maribel Vinson, Theresa Weld Blanchard and Nathaniel Niles. However, interest in the original dance in the United States soon fizzled.

In the thirties in England, a New Dance Competition at the Westminster Ice Rink in England  sponsored by the "Skating Times" encouraged ice dancers to develop new variations on traditional compulsory dances. Although dances like Eva Keats and Erik van der Weyden's Westminster Waltz, Reginald Wilkie's Quickstep, Argentine Tango and Paso Doble, borne of this movement, survived as compulsory dances, others like the Roquina Waltz and Argentina Foxtrot flopped. A set pattern dance conceived by George Muller in Colorado Springs that was discussed at the first International Dance Conference in London in 1948 gave further impetus to the OSP movement but its impact wasn't recognized until some time later.

The concept of an Original Dance was again briefly revived in Great Britain as an Exhibition Dance in NSA tests of the fifties but it it wasn't until the early sixties after the Sabena Crash that talk of an OSP started getting serious. In her book, "Figure Skating History: The Evolution Of Dance On Ice", Lynn Copley-Graves notes that in May of 1961, "Courtney Jones organized an Original Dance Competition sponsored by the Queens Ice Club to find new dances from competitions and club dance sessions. He secured an NSA permit, donated a trophy, invited amateurs and pros to open in an 'open' format and refereed. Seven judges judged nine original dances for originality of steps rather than skill of performance. Eight border dances suitable for club sessions, among them two sambas, two beguines, and a tango-bolero, a foxtrot, a polka, and a mazurka [were skated]. The ninth, a reverse waltz, was like the Three-Lobe Waltz in reverse. The entrants expressed a preference and need for Latin and South American rhythms. The judges' opinions varied widely because it was difficult to mark a dance high that was skated poorly but fit all the rules. The tango-bolero won, but not so overwhelmingly that the NSA adopted it... As a step toward the original set pattern dance, the ISU considered holding a New Dance Competition, similar to the one held at Queens in May, after the next Worlds, with a rhythm chosen from rhumba-bolero, polka, or Westminster-type waltz. The dance could not use movements permitted in free dancing but absent from the compulsories. The dance could proceed either clockwise or counterclockwise around the rink, but could not double back on itself."

Lynn Copley-Graves also noted that during the 1966/1967 season, "The ISU Ice Dance Committee revived the USFSA idea from the late 1920's of adding an original set pattern dance to competitions. The Sportclub Riessersee organized a trial event for the DEU under ISU supervision and invited ISU member countries to send two couples; those whose dance teams placed in the top ten at the 1966 Worlds could send three couples. The ISU wanted to ensure that the original set dance would not be a free dance. It would be scored as a compulsory with one mark from each judge."

This test event took place in the first week of September, 1966 at the Olympia Eisstadion in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Although nine couples were initially entered, Americans Lorna Dyer and John Carrell and the French team of Brigitte Martin and Francis Gamichon both withdrew. Seven teams remained to skate compulsory dances, the new original set dance and the free dance. Janet Sawbridge and Jon Lane of Great Britain skated a Paso Doble, Gabriele and Rudi Matysik of West Germany opted for a Mambo, Brits Vivienne Dean and Michael Webster selected a Tango and Czechs Milena Turnova and Josef Pepek chose a Fox-Polka. Three teams settled on straight up interpretations of the polka: West Germans Angelika and Erich Buck, Czechs Jitka Babická and Jaromir Holan and Brits Mary Parry and Roy Mason. Sawbridge and Lane's Paso Doble got the nod in the original dance with average marks of 5.5 and "Skating World" magazine noted that the original set dances were "all exceptionally good, and we are in for a treat in future years if these dances are anything to go by."

At the 32nd Biennal Congress of the ISU in Amsterdam, West Germany in 1967, delegates voted to introduce an "original set pattern dance", effective September 1968. The regulations were as follows:

a) This dance shall not be a free dance.
b) Each couple may choose their own music and tempo.
c) Only regular dance rhythms with constant tempo may be used.
d) The choice of steps, connecting steps, turns and rotations is free, provided they conform to the rules of the ISU.
e) This dance must be composed of repetitive sequences. The sequences must consist of either a half or a whole circuit. Altogether, the dance must complete three circuits of the rink, i.e. six or three sequences, according to the arrangement. Reverse direction is permitted provided it is constant.
f) The dance sequence must not cross the middle axis of the rink.
g) It is permitted to change the dancing hold three times in the sequence if this takes a half circuit. If it takes a full circuit, six changes are permitted.
h) Hand-in-hand positions with outstretched arms are not permitted except at the start of a sequence and must not exceed seven steps.
i) Separations of partners must not exceed the duration of one bar of music.
j) Toe steps are not permitted.
k) ISU Rule 358 must be observed with regard to dress.

Skaters were also required to submit the type of music and rhythm they had selected as well as a brief description to the judging panel prior to the OSP. Some coaches, including the indomitable Gladys Hogg, expressed concerns over whether or not judges would penalize couples who chose a rhythm they weren't partial to. Miss Hogg and Alex Gordon initially both expressed their belief that judges should be able to come to a conclusion as to which couple was the strongest based on the compulsories and free dance alone. In November of 1968, Janet Sawbridge and Jon Lane, who'd won the original set dance in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in 1966, competed in one of the first competitions to ever include the OSP - that year's British Championships - but lost to Diane Towler and Bernard Ford. Both couples were coached by Miss Hogg.

With free reign to select a concept and music of their choosing, skaters went a little crazy that first season. From "The Sailor's Hornpipe" to "The Peanut Polka" and more than one honky tonk country hoe-down, the judges were left a bit bewildered both in national and international competitions that first year. Copley-Graves noted that at the World Championships, "Towler/Ford skated an exciting, controversial OSP with perhaps more than the six allowed changes of hold... Pakhomova/Gorshkov beautifully executed a waltz OSP to haunting music in a minor key with 'absolutely no tempo', according to Alex [McGowan], to the orchestrated music 'Beryozka,' named for a small birch tree that is common in Russia." The 'one mark' judging system tested at the 1966 international event in West Germany was retained in the OSP's infancy.

As one of Henri Meudec's final tasks as ISU Ice Dance Committee chair, the 'free for all' OSP's were quickly put to bed. At the 1969 ISU Congress in Maidenhead, England, it was decided that the rhythm for the OSP would be set by the Ice Dance Committee. The first rhythm selected was the Polka and by the 1971/1972 season, all sixteen teams at the World Figure Skating Championships were skating Samba OSP's. In 1975, vocals were prohibited in the OSP.  Since the seventies, the OSP has varied in form and constantly evolved. It's been known as the Original Dance and Short Dance and may soon become the Rhythm Dance, a term previously used at the World Professional Championships in Landover, Maryland. Although much has changed over the years, I think it's always good to Rocker Foxtrot back to your roots.

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.