Ruth White, a doctor, a fencer and an American Olympian was member of the Fencers Club in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Ruth achieved a number of firsts in the sport: first American to reach the finals of the Junior World Championships, and first African American woman to represent the US at an Olympic Games in 1972.

 

As a 17-year-old high school senior, Ruth stunned USA fencing by winning the United States Junior and Senior Women's fencing championships. In college at NYU, she was twice National Collegiate Fencing Champion. In 1972, she once again won the US National Championships and was selected to the 1972 US Olympic Team. Ruth was coached by the world-renowned Fencers Club and US Olympic coach Michel Alaux.

 

As Ruth explained her passion for the sport:

 

"...there weren't many sports for women. Tennis, that was the only sport for women... The other thing is when you walk into the fencing salle, nobody really cared what color you were. It's just how hard you worked and how hard you tried and how well you did. And I'd never been in an environment like that before. Everything was about color back then. It was just so refreshing to escape that for a few hours the day I was at the fencing salle. It was like being in heaven."

After the 1972 Munich Olympic Games, Ruth retired from fencing and started her medical training at NYU, has been practicing internal medicine in California, and is married with three children. Not surprisingly, Dr. White has one of the more successful solo medical practices in California.