Figure skater Peggy Fleming helps celebrate Broadmoor’s 100th anniversary
Olympic figure-skating gold medalist Peggy Fleming, perhaps the most glamorous skating champion to train at The Broadmoor Ice Palace, this Saturday will kick off a yearlong celebration of the 100th anniversary of The Broadmoor hotel’s opening in 1918.
Fleming will return as guest of honor at The Legacy of Ice event celebrating The Broadmoor’s storied ice arena and its legacy of skating champions, including Jill Trenary and brothers Hayes Alan and David Jenkins. Fleming will be co-celebrating her own anniversary: It has been 50 years since her figure skating gold medal in ladies singles at the 1968 games in Grenoble, France, where she was the only American to top the podium.
“It’s a big celebration, and I’m thrilled that they’re happy for me,” Fleming said on a teleconference hosted by U.S. Figure Skating recently.
Fleming’s return marks the first of a series of events The Broadmoor will host throughout 2018 to fete its centennial, culminating in a black-tie Centennial Gala, featuring dinner, dancing, entertainment and Prohibition-era cocktails, to mark the original soft opening of The Broadmoor hotel, June 1-3.
“We feel very fortunate; not many businesses are as relevant 100 years after their birth,” Broadmoor President and CEO Jack Damioli said Wednesday. “One of the things that has been consistent about The Broadmoor is it has evolved and is constantly changing. At the beginning, there was only the main building, but today we have Cloud Camp, Emerald Valley Ranch, the Fly Fishing Experience, Seven Falls, the Cog Railway and many other experiences. We have evolved and stayed current with the luxury traveler and will continue to do so in the future.”
Other events include the U.S. Senior Open golf tournament, June 25-July 1, which will conclude on the 100th anniversary of the first golf match held at The Broadmoor’s first golf course. A fireworks display is planned for the anniversary of the official June 29, 1918, opening; a Cirque du Soleil on Ice “Crystal” performance will be held at The Broadmoor World Arena Jan. 31-Feb. 4; and the hotel plans to offer its guests special themed packages throughout the year in honor of the anniversary, such as a Legacy of Ice package this weekend and a Weekend of Jazz package in April. Other events will be added, but are still in the planning stages.
The iconic resort has also issued “The Broadmoor Story,” a history book with many contributors including editor Tom Wilmes, archivist Beth Davis, assistant editor Allison Scott, and the El Pomar Foundation. The 224-page book is packed with photos, many of which have been rarely been viewed and cover the hotel’s entire history from the purchase of the 2,400-acre tract and construction of Cheyenne Lake by Prussian Count James Pourtales to the present. The book sells for $80 and is available through the hotel or online at https://shop.broadmoor.com/products/centennial-celebration-collectibles/the-broadmoor-story-with-sleeve/.
“The book is a pictorial history woven together with the stories of the people who envisioned The Broadmoor property, and the legacy we have now,” Scott said.
The Broadmoor opened June 29, 1918, after Spencer Penrose bought the 490-acre property in 1916 from the Stratton estate with the intent of creating a gateway to the West for East Coast society. The hotel formally opened with a dinner and music performance that drew hundreds of prominent community members. The resort – now owned by Anschutz Corp., whose Clarity Media owns The Gazette – has been expanded many times and includes 784 rooms, 185,000 square feet of meeting space, 10 restaurants, 10 other cafés and lounges, three golf courses, a tennis complex and several offsite lodgings. The resort has received the Forbes five-star award for 57 consecutive years and the AAA five-diamond award for 41 consecutive years.
The Ice Palace, later renamed The Broadmoor World Arena, was a cozy 3,000-seat venue that was built as an enclosed riding academy in 1930. Envisioning The Broadmoor as a natural winter sports mecca, Penrose and Charles L. Tutt Jr. came up with a plan to convert the academy into an ice arena in 1938, launching the Broadmoor Skating Club at nearly the same time. The club staged elaborate ice revues and skating extravaganzas and soon recruited world-class coaches to lure world-class skaters here. The arena hosted the U.S. Figure Skating Championships six times between 1948 and 1976, and the World Figure Skating Championships five times.
Fleming moved to Colorado Springs as an adolescent to train at the Ice Palace and later graduated from Cheyenne Mountain High School and attended Colorado College. Fleming would eventually win three world championships before topping the podium in Grenoble, France, becoming the first skating superstar of the color television age and ushering in the sport’s modern era.
The event Saturday begins at 6 p.m. at The Broadmoor International Center and will feature a dinner, program and live auction to benefit the USA Hockey Foundation and United States Figure Skating Memorial Fund. The event comes three weeks before the 50th anniversary of Fleming’s gold medal win, which came seven years after her previous coach and the rest of the U.S. figure skating team were killed in plane crash in Belgium on the way to the world championships in 1961.
Fleming has fond memories of The Broadmoor and Colorado, so much so she recently moved back to the state with her husband, Dr. Greg Jenkins. They now live in Denver to be closer to their older son after more than 40 years in California where they operated a winery.
Fleming recently told a sportswriter that “we’ve kind of come full circle, back to The Broadmoor.” She told Gazette reporter Vinny Benedetto that The Broadmoor “is very special to us. It’s where life-changing things happened to us.”
Olympic figure skating star Peggy Fleming signed her new book as well as photographs and old magazines at The Chinook Bookshop Tuesday, October 26. Photo/Kelley
FILE-This Jan. 22, 1967 file photo shows Peggy Fleming, 18, of Colorado Springs, Colo., displaying phases of her championship performance in the U.S. National Figure Skating Championship, in Omaha, Nebraska. (AP Photo/File)
Peggy Fleming is shown in a high leap at the Olympic ice rink in Grenoble in preparation for her bid for a gold medal in the women’s freestyle figure skating, February 9, 1968. (AP Photo)
Peggy Fleming performs during the freestyle skate at the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble, France. Nearly three decades after she became America’s original ice princess, Peggy Fleming still skates to the same beat. “I’ve always been myself,” said Fleming, the only member of the U.S. team to win a gold medal at the 1968 Winter Olympics. (AP Photo/file)
The Broadmoor Hotel photographed Tuesday, July 30, 2013. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette
Peggy Fleming is shown in a high leap at the Olympic ice rink in Grenoble in preparation for her bid for a gold medal in the women’s freestyle figure skating, February 9, 1968. (AP Photo)
Olympic figure skating star Peggy Fleming signed her new book as well as photographs and old magazines at The Chinook Bookshop Tuesday, October 26. Photo/Kelley
The Broadmoor Hotel photographed Tuesday, July 30, 2013. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette
Peggy Fleming is shown in a high leap at the Olympic ice rink in Grenoble in preparation for her bid for a gold medal in the women’s freestyle figure skating, February 9, 1968. (AP Photo)
FILE-This Jan. 22, 1967 file photo shows Peggy Fleming, 18, of Colorado Springs, Colo., displaying phases of her championship performance in the U.S. National Figure Skating Championship, in Omaha, Nebraska. (AP Photo/File)
Peggy Fleming on Olympic ice
(AP File Photo)
Peggy Fleming performs during the freestyle skate at the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble, France. Nearly three decades after she became America’s original ice princess, Peggy Fleming still skates to the same beat. “I’ve always been myself,” said Fleming, the only member of the U.S. team to win a gold medal at the 1968 Winter Olympics. (AP Photo/file)