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by Lori Lakin Hutcherson, GBN Founder and Editor-in-Chief
Growing up in 1920s New York, Mabel Fairbanks dreamed of becoming a champion figure skater, but was denied entry to ice rinks due to segregation. She learned how to skate in part by eavesdropping on white skating instructors until her local rink manager finally admitted her.
After her professional career on the ice ended, Fairbanks became a figure skating coach and worked with World Champion pairs team Tai Babilonia and Randy Gardner, Olympic gold medalists Scott Hamilton and Kristi Yamaguchi and Atoy Wilson, the first African American athlete to win a U.S. skating title.
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Though she was never able to compete for her own prizes, Fairbanks was recognized as a pioneer of the sport when she became the first African American inducted into the U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 1997. She was posthumously inducted into the International Women’s Sports Hall of Fame in October 2001.
Fairbanks’ resting place at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles is marked by a plaque etched with a pair of figure skates and the words “Skatingly Yours,” the phrase she’d add whenever she signed autographs.
U.S. Figure Skating currently champions The Mabel Fairbanks Skatingly Yours Fund, which financially assists and supports the training and development of promising Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) figure skaters with the goal of helping them realize and achieve their maximum athletic potential. There is also Mabel Fairbanks merchandise available at usskating.org where the proceeds go directly to the Skatingly Yours fund.
To learn more about Fairbanks, check out the NPR Code Switch podcast episodeabout her story and legacy and the 2019 children’s book Ice Breaker: How Mabel Fairbanks Changed Figure Skating (She Made History) written by Rose Viña and illustrated by Claire Almon.
Sources:
- https://www.npr.org/2022/02/28/1083461601/ice-breaker
- https://usfigureskating.org/sports/2025/8/22/mabel-fairbanks-skatingly-yours-fund.aspx
- https://www.latimes.com/sports/story/2020-08-21/racism-mabel-fairbanks-figure-skater-telling-her-story
- https://www.nbcwashington.com/celebrating-black-history/mabel-fairbanks-changing-the-face-of-figure-skating/2582568/
- https://www.icetheatre.org/mabel-fairbanks-bio.html
- https://www.theguardian.com/news/2001/oct/08/guardianobituaries
*This year marks the 100th anniversary since Dr. Carter G. Woodson founded Negro History Week in February 1926. Fifty years after that, President Gerald Ford officially recognized Black History Month. In 1986, Congress passed a law designating February as Black History Month across the U.S.
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