Jack Shea (speed skater), Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetJack Shea (speed skater)
US speed skater
Date of Birth: 07-Sep-1910
Place of Birth: Lake Placid, New York, United States
Date of Death: 22-Jan-2002
Profession: speed skater
Nationality: United States
Zodiac Sign: Virgo 
About Jack Shea (speed skater)
- John Amos Shea (September 7, 1910 – January 22, 2002), better known as Jack Shea or The Chief, was an American double-gold medalist in speed skating at the 1932 Winter Olympics.
- He was the first American to win two gold medals at one Winter Olympics, and was the patriarch of the first family with three generations of Winter Olympians.
- Along with his compatriot Irving Jaffee, he was the most successful athlete at the 1932 Winter Olympics. Shea won gold medals in the 500-meter and 1500-meter events at the III Olympic Winter Games in his hometown of Lake Placid, New York.
- He also recited the Olympic Oath at the Games' opening ceremonies, which were presided over by then-New York State Governor Franklin D.
- Roosevelt.
- Shea chose not to defend his Olympic titles at the 1936 Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, at the request of a Lake Placid rabbi who asked him not to compete in Hitler's Germany.Decades later, Shea played a major role in returning the Winter Olympics to Lake Placid in 1980 as a member of the 1980 Olympic Organizing Committee.
- Afterward, he served as Vice Chairman of the Olympic Regional Development Authority, the organization that manages the venues used in the 1980 Games. His son, Jim Shea Sr., was a 1964 Olympian in Nordic Combined and Cross Country Skiing; his grandson, Jim Shea Jr.
- was the gold medalist in men's Skeleton Sledding at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
- In the lead-up to the Salt Lake Games, Jack participated in the Olympic torch relay, lighting a cauldron at the speed skating oval in Lake Placid where he had won his medals in 1932.
- Shea was killed in a head-on automobile collision by a drunk driver 17 days before he was to watch his grandson participate in the Salt Lake Games.
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