Appearing on a red-orange Wheaties box broke a second barrier for a Vancouver woman. She first crushed an Olympic one that admitted her to the elite “breakfast of champions” club. Onetime Vancouver resident Gretchen Fraser (1919-1994) was the first American to win a gold medal in skiing. That victory made her America’s pigtailed sweetheart.
Gretchen Kunigk was born in Tacoma to a German father and a Norwegian mother. For Christmas 1932, when she was 13, she and her brother Bill both received skis. From then on, the family skied the south slopes of Mount Rainier at Paradise Valley ranger station. Once Bill earned his driver’s license, the siblings regularly visited the mountain to hike up the slope and then ski down.
According to Fraser’s friend and biographer, Luanne Pfeifer, Gretchen’s future husband, Don Fraser, competed in the 1936 Olympics on skis he made. Married in 1939, both Frasers qualified for the 1940 Olympics. But World War II canceled the 1940 and 1944 games, delaying the promising Olympians’ chances eight years.
Around the country, Fraser continued her downhill racing and won often. In between races, she appeared in two movies — “Thin Ice” (1937) and “Sun Valley Serenade” (1941). The star, Sonja Henie, an Olympic and international figure skating champion, needed a stand-in for skiing scenes.
