Category: English style

English skating and national identity

Bev1 Comment

My article on English skating just came out! Here’s the citation:

Thurber, B.A. 2021. “The English Style: Figure Skating, Gender, and National Identity.” Sport History Review. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1123/shr.2020-0023.

Abstract

During the second half of the nineteenth century, a unique style of figure skating developed in Great Britain. This style emphasized long, flowing glides at high speed with a stiff, upright body posture. It contrasted with the International style, a type of skating developed on the Continent that favored brisk limb movements and showy tricks, such as jumps and spins. English skaters saw the International style as effeminate, while their own represented their idea of masculinity and allowed them to express their national identity. After the founding of the International Skating Union in 1892, British skaters found it necessary to adopt the International style to be competitive. Women proved better able to do so than men, and Madge Syers won the gold in the 1908 Olympics. Over time, the process of transnational exchange enacted through international competition resulted in the near-disappearance of the English style.

The Waldrons

Bev1 Comment

According to British Ice Skating’s records, Miss B. Waldron finished third in the Challenge Cup, which functioned as the British National Championship in the English Style, in 1904. This seems exciting, because it makes 1904 the first year—and the only year before 1950 (I haven’t seen records after 1949)—that two of the three medalists in this co-ed event were women. The winner was Phyllis Squire, and H. M. Morris took the silver.

Wanting to find out more about this, I looked for contemporary coverage in the British Newspaper Archive. The coverage in the Field says it was Mr. Waldron! Here’s the article from the March 12, 1904 issue.

The Field, March 12, 1904, 418. Image © The British Library Board. Courtesy of the British Newspaper Archive.

The coverage of the 1903 events—the Challenge Shield for combined skating as well as the Challenge Cup for individual skating—describes the skating of National Skating Association member Mr. W. A. V. Waldron, who participated in both events.

The Field, March 7, 1903, 367. Image © The British Library Board. Courtesy of the British Newspaper Archive.

The only Waldron in British Ice Skating’s membership records is a Miss B. Waldron. As far as I’ve been able to tell, the Field only knows about this Mr. Waldron. Clearly something has gone wrong. What happened? Why did the Field write Miss B. Waldron out of skating history? And has this happened to other women?

Mr. Waldron made an appearance in a competition at Brighton in 1899, where he was definitely male—he skated as Phyllis Squire’s partner. They lost to Mr. and (the future) Mrs. Syers.

The Field, April 1, 1899, 470. Image © The British Library Board. Courtesy of the British Newspaper Archive.

Is it possible that the Field‘s reporter didn’t attend the events, and just assumed the competitor called Waldron in the 1903 and 1904 events was a man, and connected him wtih the one they knew from 1899? The Brighton competition seems to have been a local one, independent of the National Skating Association, though perhaps a forerunner of the official competitions held a few years later.

The next question is, were Miss B. Waldron and Mr. W. A. V. Waldron related?

References

Information from British Ice Skating’s records was kindly provided by Elaine Hooper, BIS’s historian.

Articles from the Field can be found in the British Newspaper Archive.

The cost of skating (in 1899)

Bev

In 1899, Frederick George Aflalo compiled a book called The Cost of Sport. It’s an attempt to quantify how much you should expect to pay to participate in various sports. There’s a short section on skating by Theodore Andrea Cook. Cook lists the following expenses:

  • Skates: A sturdy pair of boots plus some nice blades. No price is given for the boots, but the blades cost about one pound. According to the Bank of England’s inflation calculator, that’s about £129.47 today.
  • Club membership: No price is given.
  • Admission to artificially frozen ice rinks: Again, no price is given.
  • Travel to natural ice: This is where the bill gets huge, with a four-month stay in Switzerland for “the best skating in the world” at luxury hotel rates (p. 344).
  • Personal ice rink: The equipment for ice maintenance costs “something under a sovereign,” or a bit less than a pair of good blades. Labor, however, can be very expensive!

The cost of clearing away snow is often a heavier matter, and the secretary of the Wimbledon Lake Skating Club has reckoned that a really heavy fall costs the club not far short of a sovereign a minute while it falls.

Cook 1899, p. 344

Comparing this list to the expenses facing skaters today is quite interesting. Skaters still need skates, ice time, and club membership. Skaters still travel to training camps, though these are generally no longer held on natural ice. Personal ice rinks are uncommon today. Interestingly, two of the major expenses facing today’s skaters are absent: coaching and costumes. Back then, skaters helped each other informally and skated in clothes suited to everyday wear. There’s also the expense of testing and competing, including travel to competitions. Skaters also did these things in 1899, but Cook does not mention them.

Reference

Theodore Andrea Cook. 1899. “Ice Sports” in The Cost of Sport, edited by F. G. Aflalo, p. 342-347. London: John Murray.