Massachusetts native Laurence Owen was just 16 years old when she won the U.S. Figure Skating Championship in January of 1961. The following month, she was on the cover of Sports Illustrated, which called her the “most exciting U.S. skater.”
Owen, who had placed sixth in the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, California, was poised to make waves at the 1961 World Figure Skating Championships Prague, Czechoslovakia.
But Owen and her team never made it to the competition. On Feb. 15, 1961, the 18-member team was killed in a plane crash in Berg-Kampenhout, Belgium, on their way to Prague. The tragedy devastated the country and the world of figure skating.
For the U.S. figure skating team, the trip was supposed to jump start the new four-year Olympic cycle after the 1960 Olympic Games. This was their chance to demonstrate the dominance of U.S. teams in the post-war era, writes Bonnie D. Ford for ESPN.com.
