The best paired her with some of the biggest male stars of the time, including Tyrone Power in Thin Ice and Second Fiddle (1939), Don Ameche (for the second time) and Cesar Romero in Happy Landing (1938), and Ray Milland and Robert Cummings in Everything Happens at Night (1939). Henie famously asserted that she wanted to do for skating what Fred Astaire had done for dancing on film. Kestnbaum argues that the costumes Henie wore in her shows and films, which were short, revealing, full of sequins and feathers, and more reminiscent of the costumes of female entertainers than of the clothes worn in the more conservative world of competitive figure skating of the time, most likely contributed to the "showiness" that influenced the costume choices of later generations of female competitive figure skaters.[15]. Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives, Thematic Series: Sports Figures, Hamill, Dorothy Skating, besides being an important form of win, Fleming, Peggy Plot. However, being a naturalized citizen of the United States effectively put a stop to any propaganda on her behalf until Pearl Harbor. 1974); James Robert Parish, The Fox Girls (1971); and James Vinson, ed., The International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, vol. An obituary is in the New York Times (13 Oct. 1969). Walsh also . Henie had turned down contract offers following the 1932 Olympics, but now set about in earnest to make a career as an exhibition skater and film star. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. She is one of only two skaters to defend a ladies' singles Olympic title, the other being Katarina Witt, and her six European titles has only been matched by Witt. Henie's sense of drama, athletic perfection, and graceful, balletic performances wrought a permanent change in figure skating and paved the way for today's skating superstars. By this time her movie career was over. Five thousand potential ticket-buyers had to be turned away when she returned to Madison Square Garden in 1937 with the start of her Hollywood Ice Revue. https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/henie-sonja, "Henie, Sonja Sonja Henie, (born April 8, 1912, Kristiania [now Oslo], Norwaydied October 12, 1969, in an airplane en route to Oslo), Norwegian-born American world champion figure skater and Olympic gold medalist who went on to achieve success as a professional ice-skater and as a motion-picture actress. Her wealth allowed her to maintain a home in Hollywood, a villa in Norway, and an apartment in Lausanne, Switzerland, and to invest in impressionist and expressionist paintings. Sonja became the ice-skating world She incorporated 19 different spins into her programs, and she could spin nearly 80 revolutions. . the world performing in ice shows and landed many lucrative endorsement She competed in the 1924 Winter She made seventeen performances in nine cities and earned phenomenal box office returns. Now I arrive at the Garden at 6:45 and I never stop until 11:10. The daughter of a fur wholesaler in Norway, Sonja Henie received her first pair of ice skates when she was six. She In 1927, at the tender age of 14, she won the first of ten consecutive world championships. Zanuck first cast Henie in One in a Million (1936), which also starred Don Ameche, Adolphe Menjou, and the Ritz Brothers. Surely she exceeded nearly everyone's expectations when she was rated as the third most popular film star of 1938, surpassed by only Shirley Temple and Clark Gable. "Sonja Henie, Skating Star, Dies." Complaints by Austrian skaters would result in new rules allowing only one judge per country for each event. Through her live ice shows and a series of Hollywood movies, Henie enlarged the audience for figure skating and transformed it into a thrilling entertainment. On a hilltop overlooking the Henie-Onstad Museum. Sporting News (February 14, 1994): S21. With her third husband, the Norwegian shipowner Niels Onstad, she established (1968) the Henie Onstad Art Center, a museum of modern art in Hvikodden, near Oslo, Norway. She died a year later at age fifty-seven. She divorced Daniel and married Winthrop Gardner, a wealthy aviator, in Already exposed to Norway's favorite sport, skiing, Henie preferred figure skating; she loved the "whirling" sensation of ice-skating and the resulting "sense of power" over distance and gravity. It was an open secret that, in spite of the strict amateurism requirements of the time, Wilhelm Henie demanded "expense money" for his daughter's skating appearances. During the shooting of Second Fiddle (1939), she greeted the then Crown-Prince couple of Norway Olav and Mrtha during their US tour. Her animated counterpart appeared in the Disney short, The Autograph Hound when Donald asked for her autograph. Jimmy Sutton (Tyrone Power), the press agent sent to Bergen to fetch her, at first treats her merely as Entry No. While we were in Paris she suddenly became much worse and she was examined by a doctor, he said. The band goes to Ellis Island to meet the girl and soon discovers that the refugee isn't a 10-year-old child, but a young woman, Karen Benson ( Sonja Henie ). The collapse of a section of bleachers during a show in Baltimore, Maryland in 1952 compounded the tour's legal and financial woes. She also planned to become a Hollywood actress and to accomplish on screen for ice-skating what Fred Astaire had done for dancing. Sun Valley Serenade - Wikipedia But Henie stopped producing shows after an accident in 1952 prior to a performance. Hans was himself very athletic; among his diverse pursuits, he was a former world champion in bicycling. Henie improved rapidly and by 1926 she was . Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives, Thematic Series: Sports Figures. A year later she won Oslos junior skating championship. In cooperation with promoter Wirtz, Henie honed her skills as a producer of ice shows as well as maintained her prowess as a skater. in ice shows and even starred in her own television special. She also forbade the skaters in her chorus from wearing hairpins, after having fallen and broken ribs because of a pin on the ice. He was 85. Henie died in her sleep on an ambulance plane that was taking her from Paris to Oslo to see a specialist. She nevertheless had negotiated an impressive contract and was an immediate hit with audiences. At the time of the 1994 Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan rivalry, their altercations were compared in the press with the sparring that went on between Henie and Swedish skater Vivi-Anne Hulten many years earlier. On 15 September 1949 she married Winthrop Gardiner, Jr., a business executive; he divorced her on 14 May 1956 for "desertion and mental cruelty." Beyond the garment's visual impact, it gave her the freedom to do jumps and other movements that had only been done by men. In addition to the MLA, Chicago, and APA styles, your school, university, publication, or institution may have its own requirements for citations. In 1923 she became the senior national champion of Norway. It would later house all of Henie's skating memorabilia. Adolf Hitler greeting Sonja Henie at a rink in Munich six weeks after the 1936 Winter Olympics, where she won a third straight women's singles title. During a career that spanned the 1920s, '30s, '40s, and '50s, the Norwegian skater made major contributions to women's figure skating, which would help propel the sport into the prominence it now enjoys as a dazzling, physically-challenging, personality-filled field. She also won gold medals in the 1932 and 1936 Olympics. At 14 she was the Norwegian In her revised 1954 biography,[9] she states that no Norwegian judge was in the panel for the 1936 Olympicsas she was entitled to as a Norwegian. During her amateur skating career, she performed often in Germany and was a favorite of German audiences and of Hitler personally. From 1931 through 1936, Henie competed in and won six consecutive women's European Figure Skating Championships. Oscar Holte, the outstanding Norwegian skating coach, supervised much of her training in Oslo and at St. Moritz, Switzerland, as she prepared to enter the International Winter Sports Week at Chamonix, France; retroactively, this special "week" became an official part of the first Winter Olympics in 1924. Miss. Among her many victories as a competitive skater, she also won ten consecutive world championships. Sonja Henie Biography, Age, Height, Husband, Net Worth, Family Her passion for performing turned her into a huge financial and popular success among athletes. Wikipedia gives the hard facts in these few words: "Sonja Henie (April 8, 1912 - October 12, 1969) was a Norwegian figure skater and film star. Encyclopedia of World Biography. Michael Weatherly's Brother Has Died - popculture.com She married Niels Onstad, a Norwegian shipping magnate. New York Times (October 13, 1969). During the years that Henie won her world championships, the five-member judging panel was dominated by three Norwegians. She was signed by In the effort, she exercised the same mental intensity and financial resources that were the foundation of her earlier work. Norway's king and queen attended the funeral service. Sonia Henie, as controversial as she was legendary Globetrotting by Later in 1927 Henie saw the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova dance in London. ed. In 1927, she won her first world figure skating championship in Oslo, and retained the title for the next nine years. Scott, Paula Pyzik "Henie, Sonja Birthday: April 8, 1912. The draw for the free skating [then] came under suspicion after Henie landed the plum position of skating last, while Colledge had to perform second of the 26 competitors. She broke with her manager in 1951, and began producing shows on her own, but gave them up after a block of seats at a Baltimore armory collapsed before a show in March, 1952, injuring more than 250 people. Typically, Henie films were short on plot and long on her trademark [1], Henie began skating at the age of 5. After the Japanese attack, she invited the boys from Little Norway to her ice shows, and gave the mechanics a plane as well a substantial sum of money for their educational fund; but her initial reluctance before the US entered the war was never to be forgotten. turn professional and tour with her own ice show. Loveland continued, "she seems to float, like something in gossamer wings, but anyone tempted to drift off into an ethereal realm is brought back by a pair of very shapely limbs, which move with the smoothness of running water and the strength of youth." Wintertime: Directed by John Brahm. Three-quarters of a century later, in 2010 . Soon after winning her first world championship, Henie saw a ballet performance by Russian great Anna Pavlova. and easily eclipsed the earnings of any other star athlete, male or female. During the 1940s, Henie's popularity with movie audiences began to falter and her contract with Twentieth Century-Fox was not renewed. While also working as an ice show star and producer, she became a multi-millionaire. In 1951 Wirtz and Henie were unable to agree on a contract and parted ways. Figure skating, Sochi Olympics: The evolution of the jump in women's The Hollywood Ice Review was polished by Henie's unwavering pursuit of perfection. Then, copy and paste the text into your bibliography or works cited list. . Henie is credited with transforming an originally demure, predictable activity by infusing it with her feminine charms and passion for the ballet. Memories of Henie, the first ice queen, nearly lost in her homeland of Unfortunately she had a serious drinking problem which eventually Henie married Daniel Reid Topping, an American sports investor from Greenwich, Connecticut, on 4 July 1940; they divorced in 1946. . Her performance, skating "at home" in Norway's Frogner Stadium, earned her the first of ten consecutive world figure skating titles (and the distinction of being the youngest world champion until Tara Lipinski edged her out in 1997 by a margin of thirty-two days). Sandvika, Brum kommune, Akershus fylke, Norway Show Map. Griffin saw Henie as person intent on reaching her professional goals and little else. Sonja Henie's Night, an exhibition that played before and during the intermission of ice hockey games at Madison Square Garden during March 1936, was a success. But Henie did not stop there. Over the next decade Miss Henie won Olympic titles at St. Moritz, Switzerland (1928), at Lake Placid (1932), and at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria (1936). ." Henie initially showed talent at skiing, then followed her older brother, Leif, to take up figure skating.
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