SkateHistory.Ca

The Navy Years

In the summer of 1942, Murray and Sheldon enlisted in the US Naval Air Corps. Sheldon's eyesight meant that he couldn't qualify for the Naval Cadet program, but he discovered that if he continued to study for his commercial pilot's license (he was already a private pilot at this point ), he could eliminate 18 months of training, enabling him to join the AVT (Aviation Volunteer Transport).

While in the Navy, Murray and Sheldon were allowed to continue to perform in Ice Follies provided that the management made an announcement at each show during intermission that they were members of the armed forces, awaiting call to active duty.

The call for Sheldon came in June of 1943, and he went through training as a naval aviator, earning his wings in November of that year. His job would be to teach flying for the Navy for the next 15 months. He was sent to Livermore, California (which would become the Lawrence Observatory, and the facility for research on the atomic bomb), and then transferred in the winter to Bunker Hill, Indiana.

It was Sheldon's observation that many of the skating instructors after the war had been pilots, and many skaters who had gone into flying had been successful at it. He attributes it to something about balance, a sense of level, the eye co-ordination that seemed to compliment the skills required in flying. These were already things that skaters had acquired along the way - in addition to being able to sense varying pressures on the feet, skating having such a different feel on the foot from walking.

In the Navy, Sheldon was exposed to distinctive eye reflex training. They were shown pictures of aircraft or ships at a Naval uniform 75th of a second. This exercise demonstrated that the eye sees history in every case, and retains a picture. It can't predict the future or perceive the present, and is the reason why a series of still pictures shown in rapid succession creates the illusion of a "motion" picture. The delay in the process is caused by the eye having to see something, interpret it upside down, relay the message to the brain, and then come back to understanding. The fact that people think they see in the present what they are seeing, try to report it, and then realize they are out of sync with what is happening. This was an intriguing concept for Sheldon, and knowledge that he would put to later use in devising ways of teaching technique to skaters, recognizing that although something looked like it should be done one way, didn't mean that it in fact was the case. More about that later.

At the end of his term, Sheldon was separated from the Navy on December 18, 1945. After Christmas he went to work on mastering the level of performance required of his skating to pass the figure and free skating elements and achieve his gold medal on November 6, 1946.

Although separated from the Navy, Sheldon was kept in the Reserve because of the Korean War, and on standby in case they needed more pilots trained. He had no option in this matter. He finally got out by sending a letter to the Navy Bureau of Personnel explaining that he was having a hardship having to maintain two residences owing to the regulations of the U.S. Immigration Dept. The Navy released him on November 30, 1955.