26 Facts About Peter Westbrook

Peter Jonathan Westbrook was an American saber fencer.

Peter Westbrook was a 13-time national and 3-time Pan American Games saber champion, five-time Olympian, and an Olympic bronze medalist.

Peter Westbrook founded the Peter Westbrook Foundation, a 501 non-profit that uses fencing as a vehicle to help young people from under-served New York City communities develop life and academic skills.

Peter Westbrook and his younger sister Vivian were born in the United States, Peter Westbrook in St Louis.

Peter Westbrook was four when his father left, leaving his mother to raise the family in the Hayes Homes housing project in central Newark.

Peter Westbrook remained in Newark, given her Japanese relatives' objection to her returning to Japan with Black children.

Peter Westbrook's attacker pled guilty to aggravated manslaughter, and was sentenced to 16 years in prison.

Peter Westbrook trained under Dr Samuel D'Ambola, a medical doctor and the founder of the school's fencing program, winning a New Jersey state individual championship in his junior year.

Peter Westbrook received a full fencing scholarship, and trained under Hugo Castello, the multi-championship-winning coach who as of 1998 held the most wins of any college fencing coach in history.

Peter Westbrook said, 'I want you to associate mistakes with pain.

Peter Westbrook won the US National Men's Sabre Championship 13 times.

In 1974, as a college senior, Peter Westbrook placed first at the Amateur Fencers League of America's National Championships, beating among others Olympians Alex Orban and Paul Apostol.

Peter Westbrook was the first black fencer to win the US men's saber national championship.

In 1975, Peter Westbrook won a team silver medal and an individual bronze medal at the Pan American Games in Mexico City.

From 1987 to 1995, Peter Westbrook won additional silver medals for individual performance, two silver medals for team performance, and gold medals for individual and team performances.

In 1976, Peter Westbrook competed in his first Olympic Games; thereafter, he was part of every Team USA Olympic fencing team through 1996.

At the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, Peter Westbrook won a bronze medal, and was the first American to win an Olympic fencing medal since Al Axelrod won a bronze medal in foil in 1960.

Peter Westbrook became the first African American and Asian American to win a medal in fencing.

Peter Westbrook served as flag bearer for the closing ceremonies of the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain.

In Harnessing Anger, Peter Westbrook told how he came to be the first African American to win a national gold title in sabre fencing, along with his reaching international levels of success.

Peter Westbrook described how as the son of an African-American father and a Japanese mother, he was aided by his mother alone in poverty in a Newark ghetto.

Peter Westbrook died from liver cancer at a hospital in Manhattan, New York, on November 29,2024, at the age of 72.

Peter Westbrook was inducted into the Essex Catholic High School Hall of Fame in 1981, and the New York University Athletics Hall of Fame in 1985.

Peter Westbrook was inducted into the USFA Hall of Fame in 1996.

Peter Westbrook was inducted into the Sports Hall of Fame of New Jersey in 2002, and into the Newark Athletic Hall of Fame in 2003.

Peter Westbrook was inducted as a member into the FIE Hall of Fame.