Dorothy Franey

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Dorothy “Dot” Franey Langkop was born October 25, 1913, in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and died January 10, 2011, in Dallas, Texas. She was an American speed skater who competed in the 1932 Winter Olympics when women’s speed skating was a demonstration event. From Saint Paul, she skated for the Hippodrome Skating Club and often trained on Powderhorn Lake in Minneapolis.

Her best years were in the 1930s. In 1932 she finished third in the 1000 meters and fifth in the 1500 meters; she did not advance in the 500 meters. According to her obituary, she won national speed skating championships for four straight years, from 1933 to 1936, and she won a major race at Powderhorn Lake in 1936. A Minneapolis Star columnist joked that she was “mad at herself” because she only broke one national record that weekend.

She turned professional in 1938 to earn money from exhibitions, endorsements, and ice shows, since there was no professional speed skating circuit. She even had Camel cigarette endorsements that appeared in newspapers. She headlined her own ice revue for 14 years at the Adolphus Hotel in Dallas. In 2002, at age 89, she carried the Olympic torch to Dallas City Hall. She died of natural causes at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in 2011.