An accomplished track and field athlete, Louise Stokes Fraser (1913-1978) was a one of the first two Black women to qualify for an Olympic team and founder of the Colored Women’s Bowling League.

Educated in the Malden Public School system, Fraser began running when she was a student at Beebe Junior High School. Attending Malden High School, she continued to excel at track, becoming known as “The Malden Meteor,” and received the James Michael Curley Cup for outstanding women’s track performance in her senior year. A member of the Onteora Track Club, she set a world record in the standing broad jump.

Invited to attend the Olympic Trials in 1932, Fraser won a spot on the women’s 400-meter relay team for the Los Angeles Olympic Games. Tidye Pickett, a runner from Chicago, was also selected and together they represented the first two Black women to qualify for an Olympic team. Not only were both women treated differently from the other team members—neither actually competed in the Olympics—only white women were selected for the final relay team. In 1936, Fraser and Pickett again made the Olympic Team, as members of the 400-meter relay team, and again they were replaced with white runners that were slower than they.

Upon her retirement from running, Fraser became a professional bowler, founding the Colored Women’s Bowling League in 1941 and winning many titles. She is remembered today with a plaque at Roosevelt Park in Malden, Massachusetts and a statue in her honor in the Malden High School courtyard.