Tenley Emma Albright (born July 18, 1935, in Newton Centre, Massachusetts) is a former American figure skater. She is the 1956 Olympic champion, the 1952 Olympic silver medalist, the 1953 and 1955 World Champion, the 1953 and 1955 North American champion, and the 1952–1956 U.S. national champion. At age 11 Albright suffered an attack of polio. Skating was her therapy to regain muscle strength. [1]
Figure skating career [edit]
Albright won the silver medal at the 1952 Olympcs. She won her first World title in 1953, silver in 1954, a second gold medal in 1955, and her fourth medal, silver, in 1956.[2]
In 1956, while training for the Olympics, Albright fell due to a rut in the ice and cut her right ankle joint to the bone with her left skate.[3] The cut was stitched by her father, a surgeon.[3][4] At the 1956 Winter Olympics in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, she became the first American female skater to win an Olympic gold medal.[5]
Albright retired from competitive skating after 1956 but has maintained a prominent role in the figure skating profession as a member of the Executive Committee of the U.S. Olympic Committee[4].
Personal life [edit]
A graduate of The Winsor School in Boston, Albright entered Radcliffe College in 1953 as a pre-med student,[4] and focused on completing her education after the 1956 Olympics.[5] She graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1961, and went on to become a surgeon.[5][6] She is currently the Director of the MIT Collaboratives Initiative.
Albright was married to Tudor Gardiner, a lawyer, from 1962 to 1976. She married former Ritz-Carlton hotel owner Gerald Blakely in 1981.
Results [edit]
References [edit]
External links [edit]
| Persondata |
| Name |
Albright, Tenley |
| Alternative names |
Albright, Tenley Emma |
| Short description |
United States figure skater |
| Date of birth |
July 18, 1935 |
| Place of birth |
Newton, Massachusetts |
| Date of death |
|
| Place of death |
|
United States
