Michael Kirby

Michael J.R. Kirby (February 20, 1925 – May 25, 2002 in Laguna Niguel, CA) was a Canadian figure skater who competed in men's singles, and was also an actor. Later was an ice rink owner and skating coach.

Childhood and youth As a child he suffered from rheumatic fever and started ice-skating for physical therapy. When he turned 16, he became a Canadian national champion.

Career Acting In the later 1940s, Kirby moved to Hollywood and signed a contract with MGM. He appeared in several movies including Keep Your Powder Dry (1945) with Lana Turner, and Summer Holiday (filmed in 1946, released in 1948) as Mickey Rooney's older brother.

Kirby was skating in a West Los Angeles ice rink in 1947 when the manager asked him to skate with the rink's owner, Sonja Henie. He then skated with her, and she asked him to work with her in her film The Countess of Monte Cristo (1948). He also joined Sonja's Hollywood Ice Review, which went to Europe and England. As a coach, his pupils included Ronnie Robertson (who he also outed in a book Figure Skating to Fancy Skating) and Dick Button. In 1959, he was a founder of the Ice Rink Section, Illinois Recreation Association (which later became the Ice Skating Institute). He was the organization's first president.

Personal life Kirby married figure skater Norah McCarthy in 1944. They had eight children (five sons: Terry, David, Michael, Christopher and Thomas; and three daughters: Tricia Shafer, Ann Forster and Catherine Tanner) and the union lasted 57 years, until his death in 2002 of renal failure, in his home at Orange County, Calif.

Results

Men's singles Event 1938 1940 1941 1942 Canadian Championships 5th J 2nd J 1st J 1st

Pairs with Shirley Halsted Event 1940 Canadian Championships 1st J

Fours (with McCarthy, Wilson, and Gilchrist) Event 1941 North American Championships 2nd