By Dick Button, the two-time Olympic champion who revolutionized figure skating and literally took the sport to new heights, died Thursday, US Figure Skating said. He was 95 years old.
Button died hours after a catastrophic plane crash killed skaters representing the past, present and future of the sport. The tragedy stirred memories of the 1961 plane crash that killed the entire US world figure skating team, including many of Button’s peers.
Born Richard Totten Button on July 18, 1929, the daredevil athlete defied both gravity and expectations during his career.
At age 12, Button was told he would never be a good skater. So he doubled down on his training. And just four years later, at age 16, he became US champion.
That was just the beginning of his meteoric rise. Over the next few years, Button attempted dangerous feats that seemed unfathomable at the time but are now routine for elite skaters.
At the 1948 Winter Olympics, Button became the first skater to land a double Axel jump in competition. The 18-year-old won gold, becoming the first US Olympic figure skating champion.
He also became the youngest man to ever win Olympic figure skating gold – a distinction that remains unsurpassed more than 70 years later.
Button’s penchant for taking risks included his debut of the “flying camel” spin. It’s a move where a skater spinning on one leg hurls himself into the air, lands on the other foot, and continues the spin going backward with both the torso and free leg parallel to the ice. The move is sometimes known as the Button camel.
After his first Olympic gold, Button enrolled at Harvard University – yet still managed to win the world figure skating championship every year he was a student there, according to The Harvard Crimson.
At the next Olympics, the Harvard senior became the first athlete to land a triple jump of any kind – a triple loop – at the 1952 Games. He won that Olympic title, too.
Button later became a well-known figure skating commentator both admired and dreaded by skaters he critiqued.
“No other figure skater embodies the sport as much as Dick Button. He is, and always will be, the godfather of this sport,” 1998 Olympic champion Tara Lipinski said, according to the Sports Video Group.
“Using his wit, passion, and unfiltered honesty, Dick drew in ever increasing television audiences whether they were new viewers or dedicated fans.”
Even 1984 Olympic champion Scott Hamilton – who himself became a legendary skating commentator – said he always felt the need to prove himself under Button’s watchful eye.
“Basically, I spent the last five years of my amateur career doing everything in my power to shut him up,” Hamilton said with a laugh.
“He was up there not to be a cheerleader, but to be an analyst, and so his criticisms were — to me — very inspiring and very informative.”
Button’s unique commentary led to a 1981 Emmy Award for outstanding sports personality.
He critiqued not just the technical elements of skating, but also the artistic side – and skaters he thought fell short in either category.
At the 2018 Olympics, Button described a skater whose connection to the music seemed amiss: “She has the opportunity to be smoldering on the ice, but her skating and the music mean nothing to one another,” he said, according to Slate.com.
But another athlete garnered some interesting praise: “(Satoko) Miyahara doesn’t have worthless arm movement,” Button said.
More than 50 years after his first Olympic gold, Button took to the ice again – but fell and suffered a traumatic brain injury.
“What happened was that I must have tried a jump, and I fell,” Button recalled in 2003.
“All I know is the blood was coming out of my ear. I had a concussion, and I lost the hearing in (one) ear.”
Button said he didn’t even remember his first month of recovery.
“I’m told I had to be put in a straitjacket for the first five days because I was so violent, which is a reflection of having really damaged your brain,” he said.
But once again, Button defied expectations. After extensive rehabilitation, he relearned how to walk and became a national spokesman for the Brain Injury Association of America.
By 2006, Button was back in the commentators’ booth for the Winter Olympics in Torino, delivering his refreshingly blunt analyses.
His sense of humor was still intact, too. After his life-threatening injury, Button reportedly said: “I’m fine. I’m here, and I’m wreaking havoc as usual.”
