Al Stewart & Harriet "Babe" Topel
In Memory of Al Stewart
A Meeting At The Roller Derby
It was my pleasure to have met many wonderful friends in my years as an athlete on the road. But two people that stand out were Al Stewart and Babe Topel. I'd like to dedicate this column to them and their incredible story of dedication to the sport and to one another.
To Be Young And Fall In Love
17 Year old Speed Skater named Al Stewart in 1950
As a 17 year old, Al Stewart began to train at a roller derby training school in 1950 after his father agreed to let Al train for the sport. Al had a great love of skating that went back to when he saw roller derby on the television as a little boy. Soon after Al saw roller derby he began to skate. He grew to become a speed skater at the local rinks and even speed skated with Roger Schroeder. In the early day's of the derby skaters would have to come to where the games were held and skate on the track when the teams were not playing. Al loved the game of roller derby so much that he finally found a nearby live game and was able to skate at half time in what was called the Junior Roller Derby in New York.
At such a young age, Al Stewart was simply to involved with his skating to know that his decision to work with the derby would soon bring him a life long friend.
His amazing professional career probably started at that old training school in Passaic New Jersey where there were about fifty other skaters in training. The instructors at that time, Billy Bogash, Mary Gardner and Hank Goldberg kept the training interesting with exercises like falling, jumping over chairs, and how not to get slammed into the rail by another skater. At only 5 foot one inches, Al's small one-hundred and three pound body was put through paces that lasted for hours every day and went on for months where he built up his endurance.
Al Stewart is drafted to a team
With about fifty other skaters in training, Al kept to himself and a few of his close friends. He was not thinking of his future but was focused on one thing, and, that was his skating. One day an unprecedented thing happened at the training school. The professional team management asked for forty new skaters to fill up the teams. They pulled all forty of the new skaters from the New Jersey training center and Al Stewart was selected to become a major league skater along with some new skaters named Charlie O'Connell and Art Hickey. Al Stewart was sent to Fort Worth, Texas where he skated under the legendary "Spec" Saunders on the team called the Panthers.
Babe Topel finds the roller derby
At just 17 years of age, and no previous serious skating background a young Babe Topel found her way to the roller derby training center in Chicago. Babe Topel had a best friend who trained with her named Gloria Mack (Gardner). The two were close friends and loved to train and stayed away from any sort of dating or involvement with the male skaters. Babe had no idea that her life was on another track other than the banked track. She was destined to meet someone special in the roller derby.
The 1950 Panthers
Babe was drafted onto a professional roller derby team named the Panthers in early 1950 where she began her young career as a female athlete. Her life was exciting, some of her teammates on the Panthers team were; Buddy Atkinson Sr., Gloria Mack, Norma Rossner, Ann Calvello, and Hal Janowitz. She had ended up on a team with her best friend Gloria, and was skating with people who would become roller derby legends by the 21st century. Buddy Atkinson Sr. became the spearhead on an entire four generation dynasty of skaters and trainers from his family while Hal Janowitz became one of the games best and only well disciplined unit managers after his skating career.
Babe started her roller derby career a whole year before her soon to be found life partner. By the time she would find love, she would be a seasoned veteran of professional sports.
One of Babe's fond memories of roller derby in 1950 was when all the skaters would meet for three meals a day. Her favorite meal was breakfast with the team. Babe was becoming a part of a special family of athletes. Living with them, eating and then performing the game almost every day. She had joined the team of America's first professional athletes. It was a wonderful life.
Excitement on a Roller Derby World Tour
Babe Topel was on the road with one touring roller derby unit for an entire year. Then Al Stewart was whirred into a world class tour with the roller derby himself. Al's day to day attention was his career. He had no idea that fate had a special date in store for him in the roller derby town of San Francisco, California. Before that day in San Francisco, Al Stewart learned the ways of the world by literally traveling all around it. He boarded the original Queen Mary luxury ocean liner for a trip across the English channel where almost all of the featured skaters on the teams got seasick. Somehow Al found this delightful, not only were the "stars" seasick, he was allowed to feast on the worlds best foods on the ship all by himself.
All across Europe, from London to Paris the roller derby was a hit. He found himself aboard ocean liners, planes and trains; bringing his form of roller excitement to all the elite cities of the world. Then Al found himself in Marseilles where the athletes were sent out on a Scuba diving event. It was Ken Monte who caught an octopus on that diving event, and then later gave it to one of the hotel chefs who cooked it for dinner. What a feast the teams had that day.
The whirring action of the roller derby continued as it skated through Madrid and Barcelona, Spain. Then back to Miami where Al and Babe first skated together. Cupid's arrow had not harpooned either of them yet.
Babe and Al meet
Al Stewart met another skater named Babe. Suddenly the touring was even more exciting for the young athletes as they actually dated while they skated and toured. Dating while cruising across the world from California to Hawaii, and then the islands of Hawaii to San Francisco. The years passed quickly and the two were working for the same organization while they stayed on an intimate date basis.
A Roller Derby Mishap turns to Marriage
Al Stewart and Babe Topel were sent to Hawaii and then Australia where Babe had a small skating mishap and she broke her ankle. That same tour, Al Stewart was trying to leap over a pileup of skaters on the track. The jump caused him to tear several ligaments in his ankle. It also made the local newspaper's with a great flourish. Babe and Al had both injured the same left ankle.
The coincidence brought them closer together than ever when both skaters came back to California in casts. It was at a hospital where Al asked Babe for her hand in marriage. She had just had her left ankle re-broken by the doctors because her ankle was not healing as it should when Al decided it was time to get this young lady as his wife and start a family.
On February 4, 1956 Al Stewart and Babe Topel were married while they were in the wonderful city of San Francisco. Their long time friend Toni Tagg stood up for the couple at their wedding.
Al and Babe have spent the rest of their lives together. It is a true love story from the unlikely world of roller derby.
I had the distinct pleasure of knowing this lovely couple and skating with them for years. I am very pleased that I have been able to allow you a small look into their lives and the life of what it was like in the amazing world of the roller derby in the 50's. Al and Babe are still together today and as in love as they ever were.
