Roller Skates on Rubber Tile

By Clark Harper
April 1, 2026

Charlie and Mary Reynolds Babcock took ownership of Reynolda in the early 1930s.  Apparently, 25,000 square feet was not enough for Mary, so she added 10,000 more square feet by building a guest house (now the museum lobby) and an indoor swimming pool. She transformed part of the basement into a recreation center housing a ping-pong room, billiards table, shooting gallery, bowling alley, game room, and bar. A long corridor led beneath the guest house to the indoor pool, changing rooms, and a squash court. The basement was also designed for the popular pastime of roller skating.

Roller skates were invented as far back as 1760, but those early creations were primitive inline styles with wooden wheels, typically used in musical performances. Their widespread popularity as a recreational activity took off after the creation of four-wheeled “quad” skates in the late 19th century. In the 20th century, the years between the 1930s and 1950s came to be known as the “Golden Age of Roller Skating.” Mary Babcock was right on trend.

To make the basement floor suitable for roller skating, Mary covered it with black rubber tiles. To enhance the thrill for the skaters, she designed a slope at the start of the corridor to get them up to a speed fast enough to coast to the other end. Although the kids may have been superior skaters, we will note that partying adults took full advantage of the fun, as well.

The skate closet was stocked with pairs of both men’s and women’s roller skates. They were sold by Abercrombie & Fitch, where Mary shopped in New York. I was surprised to discover that, for most of its history, Abercrombie & Fitch was a massive sporting goods store, founded by New Yorker David Abercrombie in 1892!  A letter from Mary to Charlie during World War II mentions that she ran into a friend at Abercrombie’s while shopping for a raincoat. We also have a letter in the Reynolda archives to A&F, dated January 4, 1940, requesting a return for a broken skating shoe.

Roller skating was a subject in several of Mary’s letters to family members. In The Homefront: Mary Reynolds Babcock’s Letters—1942-1945, compiled and edited by her daughter Barbara Babcock Millhouse, Mary communicates to her husband, Charlie, that she enjoys having her children and their friends over for roller skating at the “Big House.” Because the Babcocks made the decision to downsize during the war to save coal, they were living across Reynolda Road in the cottage of Katherine’s former estate electrician, Robert Gibson. Therefore, Mary referred to the bungalow as “the Big House.”

In a letter to her sister Nancy, Mary reports that her daughter, Katharine (Katie), was being harassed by her peers for not opening the house to them when they requested it. “They want to be able to roller skate any rainy day at the Big House,” Mary explains.  In a later missive to Charlie, Mary writes about friends who came over from the Buena Vista neighborhood and wanted to go skating. She had to interrupt her cooking to gather all the children and take them over to the bungalow. Nevertheless, she seems to have enjoyed their company, no matter how much of a handful they were.  In a January letter, she tells her husband of a party hosted by Katie and Charlie Jr., where roller skating evolved into a wild game of tag. She reported, “…a few spills, but none serious.”  However, she found some of the children skating at the bottom of the empty swimming pool and “had to put a stop to that.”

As rambunctious as the fun and games were for kids, they may have seemed mild compared to the times the adults donned the skates.  In January of 1943, Mary hosted a party of forty guests, many of whom were officers from an Army Air Traffic and Flying Safety division being housed in Winston-Salem. The party began with a hayride in wagons stocked with whiskey, cups, and ice. This seemed to put most of the guests in the mood for roller skating, after coming inside. Mary describes one colonel who launched off from the slope, but after reaching top speed, unsure about which direction to go, he “chose to squat and crashed under the billiard table.” Flying safety indeed!  This did not deter other skaters. Mary reported that another heavy-set colonel “spent most of his time with his bum down and wheels up.”

Evidence suggests that, with all the recreational activities the Babcock family offered their family and friends, roller skating was high on the list!