Ruth White (fencer)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Born | July 16, 1951 Baltimore, Maryland, United States | |||||||||||||||||
| Sport | ||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Fencing | |||||||||||||||||
Medal record
| ||||||||||||||||||
Ruth White (born July 16, 1951) is an American doctor and retired foil fencer.
White was born on July 16, 1951[1] in Baltimore, Maryland where she faced racial discrimination at school for being African-American.[2]
In 1969, White became the first African-American to win a US fencing championship. She also competed at the 1971 Pan American Games where she won a gold medal in the team foil event and silver medal in the individual foil event.[2]
She competed in fencing at New York University, coached by future Olympic coach Michel Sebastiani.[3] She fenced on his women's team that won the 1971 National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association championship, as she won all 27 of her bouts.[4][5] As Sebastiani confidently predicted she would to The New York Times – she went on to compete for Team USA at the 1972 Munich Olympics.[6]
She was the first African-American women to represent the US in fencing at the Olympics.[2] She competed in the women's individual and team foil events at the 1972 Munich Olympics.[7]
Soon after she competed at the Olympics, White left fencing to go into medicine at the New York University School of Medicine and went on to work in internal medicine.[2]
White was inducted into NYU's Hall of Fame in 1989, and into the USA Fencing Hall of Fame in 2001.[2]
