Burka, Ellen

LC control no.	n 81137241
Descriptive conventions	rda
Personal name heading	Burka, Ellen *Browse this term in* LC Authorities or the LC Catalog
Associated place	Westerbork (Concentration camp) Theresienstadt (Concentration camp)
Located	Toronto (Ont.)
Birth date	1921-08-11
Death date	2016-09-12
Place of birth	Amsterdam (Netherlands)
Place of death	Toronto (Ont.)
Affiliation	Order of Canada Canada's Sports Hall of Fame International Sports Hall of Fame
Profession or occupation	Figure skaters Figure skating coaches
Found in	Her Figure skating, c1974: t.p. (Ellen Burka) Canada. Governor General. Honours Recipients database, viewed 5 October 2016 (Ellen Burka, C.M.; Toronto, Ontario; Member of the Order of Canada, awarded on July 4, 1978, invested on October 18, 1978; Figure-skating coach in Toronto. For elevating skating to an art form and for imaginative choreography on the ice. Her skill as a teacher has made it possible for pupils such as Toller Cranston and Karen Magnussen to rise to world fame; deceased on September 12, 2016) Globe and mail, 23 September 2016, online, viewed 5 October 2016 (Ellen Burka, visionary skating coach, died at age 95 on Sept. 12 of congestive heart failure in Toronto, her home for 66 years; Ellen Danby born on Aug. 11, 1921, in Amsterdam to Jewish parents who largely hid their faith; at the Westerbork transit camp, she survived being sent to Auschwitz because the commander was a figure skating aficionado; met her husband, artist Jan Burka, in a concentration camp in Czechoslovakia, marrying in Amsterdam after the war; moved to Toronto in 1950, with her husband later leaving her to raise their two daughters alone; sought work and membership at elite skating clubs, concealing her Jewish heritage, and coached at Toronto Cricket Skating and Curling Club until age 93; named to the Order of Canada in 1978, inducted into Canada's Sports Hall of Fame in 1996 and the International Sports Hall of Fame in 2013) Amicus database, 5 October 2016 (access point: Burka, Ellen)