Fanny "Bobbie" Rosenfeld (December 28, 1904 – November 14, 1969) was a Canadian athlete, who won a gold medal for the 100-metre relay and a silver medal for the 100-metre at the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam. She was a star at basketball, hockey, softball, and tennis; and was called Bobbie for her " bobbed" haircut. In 1949, named Rosenfeld the "Canadian woman athlete of the half-century." The

Bobbie Rosenfeld Award The Bobbie Rosenfeld Award is an annual award given to Canada's female athlete of the year. The sports writers of the Canadian Press (CP) first conducted a poll to determine the nation's top female in 1932, naming track star Hilda Strike the winn ...

is named in her honour. In 1996, she was inducted into the

Ontario Sports Hall of Fame The Ontario Sports Hall of Fame is an association dedicated to honouring athletes and personalities with outstanding achievement in sports in Ontario, Canada. The hall of fame was established in 1994 by Bruce Prentice, following his 15-year tenure ...

Personal life

Rosenfeld, who was

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

, was born on December 18, 1904 in

Ekaterinoslav Dnipro, previously called Dnipropetrovsk from 1926 until May 2016, is Ukraine's fourth-largest city, with about one million inhabitants. It is located in the eastern part of Ukraine, southeast of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on the Dnieper Rive ...

, Russian Empire (now Dnipro, Ukraine). When she was an infant, she immigrated to

Barrie Barrie is a city in Southern Ontario, Canada, about north of Toronto. The city is within Simcoe County and located along the shores of Kempenfelt Bay, the western arm of Lake Simcoe. Although physically in Simcoe County, Barrie is politically ...

, Canada with her parents and older brother. Her father, Max Rosenfeld, operated a junk business and her mother Sarah, who gave birth to three more girls, ran the home. Fanny attended Central School and Barrie Collegiate Institute, where she excelled in sports, including basketball, softball, lacrosse, hockey, and tennis. In 1922, the Rosenfeld family moved to

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, where Fanny worked at a chocolate factory. Rosenfeld died on November 13, 1969, in Toronto and is buried at Lambton Mills Cemetery in

Humber Valley Village Humber Valley Village is a neighbourhood located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is within the former City of Etobicoke and includes some of the most expensive real estate in the metropolitan west end. The boundaries are from Dundas Street on the ...

Athletic career

Rosenfeld played and competed in numerous sports, including

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping events ...

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

fastball The fastball is the most common type of pitch thrown by pitchers in baseball and softball. " Power pitchers," such as former American major leaguers Nolan Ryan and Roger Clemens, rely on speed to prevent the ball from being hit, and have thr ...

softball Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensiv ...

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

speed skating Speed skating is a competitive form of ice skating in which the competitors racing, race each other in travelling a certain distance on Ice skate, skates. Types of speed skating are long track speed skating, short track speed skating, and marath ...

, and

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

. When commenting on Rosenfeld's diverse sporting career, one author wrote, "The most efficient way to summarize Bobbie Rosenfeld's career... is to say that she was not good at swimming." In 1949, Rosenfeld was inducted into Canada's Sports Hall of Fame, one of the first women to receive the honor. In 1950, she was "bestowed the Canadian woman athlete of the first half-century award." In 1978, ''

The Canadian Press The Canadian Press (CP; french: La Presse canadienne, ) is a Canadian national news agency headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. Established in 1917 as a vehicle for the time's Canadian newspapers to exchange news and information, The Canadian Pre ...

'' began presenting the

, an annual award given to Canada's female

athlete of the year Athlete of the Year is an award given by various sports organizations for the athlete whom they have determined to be deserving of such recognition. Definition of "athlete" *In many nations, an "athlete" primarily refers to someone who participat ...

Basketball

After Rosenfeld's family moved to Toronto in 1922, she joined Toronto's

Young Women's Hebrew Association A Jewish Community Center or a Jewish Community Centre (JCC) is a general recreational, social, and fraternal organization serving the Jewish community in a number of cities. JCCs promote Jewish culture and heritage through holiday celebrations, ...

(YWHA) and was a center for their basketball team. That year, the team won both the Toronto and Ontario championships.

Hockey

Rosenfeld was a hockey player in the 1920s and was dubbed superwoman of ladies' hockey. In 1924, she helped form the

Ladies Ontario Hockey Association The Ladies Ontario Hockey Association (LOHA) was a women's ice hockey association in Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1922, but faded during the Great Depression, as ice time for women's teams became rare and the number of member teams signif ...

(LOHA). Rosenfeld competed on a championship hockey team after debuting as a track and field athlete at the 1928 Summer Olympics. She was a centre on the 1927 and 1929 Ontario champion Toronto Patterson Pats, which were part of the North Toronto Ladies' City League. She was considered the most outstanding women's hockey player in all of Ontario between 1931 and 1932.

Softball

Rosenfeld competed on a championship softball team after debuting as a track and field athlete at the 1928 Summer Olympics.

Tennis

In 1924, Rosenfeld claimed the title of the Toronto Ladies Grass Court Tennis championship, despite having only just taken up the sport.

Track and field

In 1923, Rosenfeld's softball teammates encouraged her to enter a track competition at a sporting carnival in Beaverton. She entered a dash and defeated the Canadian champion,

Rosa Grosse Rosa or De Rosa may refer to: People *Rosa (given name) * Rosa (surname) *Santa Rosa (female given name from Latin-a latinized variant of Rose) Places *223 Rosa, an asteroid * Rosa, Alabama, a town, United States *Rosa, Germany, in Thuringia, G ...

. Later that year, she began training more intensely and competed at the

Canadian National Exhibition The Canadian National Exhibition (CNE), also known as The Exhibition or The Ex, is an annual event that takes place at Exhibition Place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on the third Friday of August leading up to and including Canadian Labour Day, ...

, as well as Ontario’s first women's track and field championship. At the 1925 Ontario Ladies Track and Field championships, in a single day performance, Rosenfeld placed first in discus, shot put, dash, low hurdles, and long jump, and placed second in the javelin and dash. In the mid-1920s, she held national records in the open relay with a CNE relay team, as well as in the standing broad jump, discus, javelin, and shot put.

Olympics

During the trials for the 1928 Summer Olympics, Rosenfeld set numerous Canadian track and field records. These records included the running broad jump, standing broad jump and the discus. Her time in the 100 metres was four-fifths of a second slower than the world record at that time. She later competed as a sprinter in the 1928 Olympics, the first Games in which women were allowed to compete in track and field. Her team won a gold medal in the 4 × 100 m relay. She received a silver medal in the dash and placed fifth in the dash. She "scored more points for her country than any other athlete at the Games, male or female."

Retirement

One year after competing in the Olympic Games, Rosenfeld developed severe

arthritis Arthritis is a term often used to mean any disorder that affects joints. Symptoms generally include joint pain and stiffness. Other symptoms may include redness, warmth, swelling, and decreased range of motion of the affected joints. In som ...

, The condition forced her to stop competing in 1933, though she continued to be involved in sports as "a coach, executive or manager to various women's sports teams."

Sport involvement

In 1934, Rosefeld was coach of the Canadian women's track and field team at the British Commonwealth Games in London, England. From 1934 to 1939, Rosenfeld was president of the

. By late 1936, she served as the organization's president, secretary, and treasurer. From 1937 to 1939, she also served as president of the

Dominion Women's Amateur Hockey Association The first instances of organized women's ice hockey in Canada date back to the 1890s when it was played at the university level. The Women's Hockey Association claims that the city of Ottawa, Ontario hosted the first game in 1891. In 1920, Lad ...

, , following Myrtle Cook-McGowan and succeeded by Mary Dunn. In the spring of 1939, Rosenfeld was the manager of Langley's Lakesides softball team. The team played an exhibition game in front of 14,000 fans at

Madison Square Garden Madison Square Garden, colloquially known as The Garden or by its initials MSG, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in New York City. It is located in Midtown Manhattan between Seventh and Eighth avenues from 31st to 33rd Street, above Pennsylva ...

Journalism

In 1937, Rosenfeld turned her attention to journalism. She worked as a sports columnist for''

The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...

'' for approximately twenty years, advocating for greater participation of women in sports and more girls' physical education programs in schools. In 1937, she introduced a column called "Feminine Sports Reel," where she "covered not only sports news, but also countered the stereotype that sports made women unfeminine." For 18 years, Rosenfeld covered women's sports. Her last column appeared on December 3, 1958, but she continued to work for the newspaper until 1966.

Quotes

"Athletic maids to arms! ... We are taking up the sword, and high time it is in defense of our so-called athletic bodies to give the lie to those pen flourishers who depict us not as paragons of feminine physique, beauty and health, but rather as Amazons and ugly ducklings all because we have become sports-minded." – Fanny Bobbie Rosenfeld (Jewish Women's Archives)

Awards and honours

*1924 – Toronto grass-courts tennis championship title *Five first place and two second place titles at Ontario Ladies' Track and Field Championships *World record (since broken), . dash (11.0 seconds) *1931 – Leading home run hitter in softball league *1931–32 – Most outstanding woman hockey player in Ontario *1949 – inducted into Canada's Sports Hall of Fame *In 1949,

named Rosenfeld the Canadian Woman Athlete of the Half-Century. *In 1996, she was inducted into the

Legacy

*1976 – recognized by the Canadian Historic Sites and Monuments Board as a national historic person * 1991 –

Bobbie Rosenfeld Park Bobbie Rosenfeld Park, is a public park near the CN Tower in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 1991, two years following the completion of the SkyDome (later renamed Rogers Centre in 2005), an open space between Rogers Centre and CN Tower was renamed ...

– a park and open space located between the

Rogers Centre Rogers Centre (originally SkyDome) is a multi-purpose retractable roof stadium in Downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated at the base of the CN Tower near the northern shore of Lake Ontario. Opened in 1989 on the former Railway Lands, it ...

and the

CN Tower The CN Tower (french: Tour CN) is a concrete communications and observation tower in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Built on the former Railway Lands, it was completed in 1976. Its name "CN" referred to Canadian National, the railway c ...

in Toronto **

City of Toronto government The municipal government of Toronto ( incorporated as the City of Toronto) is the local government responsible for administering the city of Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a rec ...

plaque honouring the athlete in a planter at the foot of the CN Tower. * Government of Canada plaque at Allandale Recreation Centre in

Barrie, Ontario Barrie is a city in Southern Ontario, Canada, about north of Toronto. The city is within Simcoe County and located along the shores of Kempenfelt Bay, the western arm of Lake Simcoe. Although physically in Simcoe County, Barrie is politically i ...

in honour of the athlete who settled and grew up in the city. *1996 – commemorative stamp issued by

Canada Post Canada Post Corporation (french: Société canadienne des postes), trading as Canada Post (french: Postes Canada), is a Crown corporation that functions as the primary postal operator in Canada. Originally known as Royal Mail Canada (the opera ...

* The official website of the

2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...

states her as the first

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

-born gold medal winner. *Bobbie Rosenfeld trophy awarded by the

Canadian Press The Canadian Press (CP; french: La Presse canadienne, ) is a Canadian national news agency headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. Established in 1917 as a vehicle for the time's Canadian newspapers to exchange news and information, The Canadian Pre ...

each year to Canada's Female Athlete of the Year. *On December 28, 2022, Google released a

doodle A doodle is a drawing made while a person's attention is otherwise occupied. Doodles are simple drawings that can have concrete representational meaning or may just be composed of random and abstract lines or shapes, generally without ever lift ...

for the 118th birthday of Rosenfeld in Canada.

References

Books

* Anne Dublin, ''Bobbie Rosenfeld: The Olympian who Could Do Everything'', Second Story Press, Toronto, 2004, code *Cruxton J Bradley and Wilson, W. Douglas "Spotlight Canada: Fourth Edition"

External links

Fanny "Bobbie" Rosenfeld in Jewish Women Encyclopedie, 2005

Bobbie Rosenfeld goes for the gold
* * *
Fanny Rosenfeld
at ''

The Canadian Encyclopedia ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' (TCE; french: L'Encyclopédie canadienne) is the national encyclopedia of Canada, published online by the Toronto-based historical organization Historica Canada, with the support of Canadian Heritage. Available fo ...

''
Bobbie Rosenfeld, Greatest Sporting Moments, Virtual Museum of Canada Exhibit
* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rosenfeld, Fanny 1904 births 1969 deaths Sportspeople from Dnipro People from Yekaterinoslav Governorate Canadian female sprinters Athletes (track and field) at the 1928 Summer Olympics Olympic track and field athletes of Canada Olympic gold medalists for Canada Olympic silver medalists for Canada Jewish Canadian sportspeople Canadian people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent Canadian women's basketball players Canadian women's ice hockey players Canadian softball players Sportspeople from Toronto Jewish female athletes (track and field) Ukrainian Jews Jews from the Russian Empire Emigrants from the Russian Empire to Canada Ukrainian emigrants to Canada Persons of National Historic Significance (Canada) Medalists at the 1928 Summer Olympics Olympic gold medalists in athletics (track and field) Olympic silver medalists in athletics (track and field) Olympic female sprinters