Aimee Mullins (born 1975)[1][2][3][4] is an American athlete, actress, and public speaker. She was born with a medical condition that resulted in the amputation of both of her legs beneath the knee. She is the first amputee to compete against nondisabled athletes in National Collegiate Athletic Association events, and competed in the Paralympics in 1996 in Atlanta. In 1999, she began modeling, and, in 2002, she began an acting career. She has periodically spoken at conferences, including TED Talks.
Early life and education
Mullins' prosthetic leg shown at CCCB exhibit in Barcelona, October 2015Mullins watches fellow bilateral amputee Hugh Herr climb the wall at MIT Media Lab's h2.0 symposium, May 9, 2007.
Mullins was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, to an Irish father Bernard Mullins from Crusheen, County Clare, Ireland and mother Bernadette Mullins. She was born with fibular hemimelia (missing fibula bones). As a result, both her legs were amputated below the knee when she was one year old. Her parents were told she would likely use a wheelchair for the rest of her life and never walk, but by the age of two she had learned to walk with prosthetic legs. She took up sports and acting at an early age.
Mullins competed in the 1996 Summer Paralympics in Atlanta, where she ran the T42-46 class 100-meter sprint in 17.01 seconds[5] and jumped 3.14 meters in the F42-46 class long jump.[6] She retired from competitive track and field in 1998.
Philanthropy
She was elected to represent American female athletes from 2007 to 2009 as Women's Sports Foundation president; the organization was founded by sports pioneer Billie Jean King. She remains a member of both its board of trustees and its athlete advisory panel for the Women Sports Foundation.[7]Sports Illustrated magazine named her one of the "Coolest Girls in Sports".[when?] Mullins was included as one of the "Greatest Women of the 20th Century" in the Women's Museum in Dallas prior to the museum's closure.
In 2012, she was appointed by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to the State Department's Council to Empower Women and Girls Through Sports.[9]
Modeling
In 1999, she modelled for British fashion designer Alexander McQueen, opening his London show on a pair of hand-carved wooden prosthetic legs made from solid ash, with integral boots. She is able to change her height between 5 ft 8in and 6 ft 1in by changing her legs.[10] She was on billboards in the U.S. as part of the "25 Years of Non-Uniform Thinking" campaign by Kenneth Cole in 2009. She was a face of L'Oréal Paris and was appointed a global L'Oréal ambassador in 2011.[11]
She appeared on The Colbert Report on April 15, 2010, and declared having 12 pairs of prosthetic legs, including some "in museums".[12]
Speaking
Mullins appears periodically as a speaker on topics related to body, identity, design, and innovation. Her TED conference talks have been translated into 42 languages. She is credited as being one of the speakers that inspired Chris Anderson to purchase the TED conference from Richard Saul Wurman.[13] She was named a TED "All-Star" in 2014.[14]
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