[4] At five years old, he build a shoeshine box out of wooden crates from his family's store on Maxwell Street, which he used to shine the shoes of police officers for 2 cents.
[6] When he heard that the derby was holding tryouts in Chattanooga in January 1946, he traveled there by bus and was able to keep his low vision a secret during trials.
[8][3] Skobel was voted the league's Most Valuable Player of the year three times during his skating career, and was on eighteen all-star teams.
[6] He brought the idea to his local Lions Club, who helped him get a skiing instruction program started for blind children and adults.
[13] After retiring from the roller derby, he opened Sammy Skobel's Hot Dogs Plus in downtown Mount Prospect, Illinois.
[12] He ran the restaurant from 1965 to 1989, when he sold it to a former employee, James Kobler Jr.[14] He also traveled as a motivational speaker, giving talks on "Creating a Positive Attitude for Life.
"[15] In 1982, Skobel collaborated with freelance writer Joyce Buck McDonald to write his autobiography, titled Semka.
The jacket described the book as the "story of a determined young blind man from his boyhood in Chicago's Maxwell Street to a professional athletic career, setting a world speed skating record."