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A sports history full of highlights

Walk along the streets of Hamilton and you’ll have a hard time not seeing some sort of sports reference. Flags from one of the professional teams waving in the wind, people wandering around in their favorite player’s jersey or a community centre named after a famous former athlete or coach. It’s easy to see that Hamitonians love their sports and with its extensive heritage in countless different disciplines, it’s not hard to understand why.

A pigskin town

Hamilton sports heritage undoubtedly starts with the team which you will run into the most on the streets — the Tiger-Cats. The roots of this CFL team can be traced back 150 years, all the way to November 3rd, 1869. On that day, in a room above George Lee’s Fruit Store on King and James, the Hamilton Football Club was formed.

It would take just four years for the “Tigers” nickname to come into existence. In 1873, the team faced off for the first time against their archrivals, the Toronto Argonauts, debuting their now iconic black and yellow uniform. Thanks to these colors, their new name was born: the Hamilton Tigers.

Ivor Wynne Stadium. Credit: Hamilton Tiger-cats

As the sport of football grew in Canada, the Hamilton Tigers grew along with it. They would however not become the first Hamilton team to hoist the elusive Grey Cup. This honour was reserved for the Hamilton Alerts.

This team’s history is short, but sweet. Founded in 1911, they made it to the Grey Cup in their first season, only to lose to the Toronto Argonauts. In 1912 they got a rematch, this time coming out on top, laying claim to the 4th Grey Cup. There would never be a title defence as the team closed up shop before the 1913 season after disputes with the league.

Many of the Alerts players wanted to stay in the sport and moved to the Hamilton Tigers. This gave the Tigers the talent injection they needed and in the 1913 season they managed to keep the Grey Cup in Hamilton, winning their first ever title.

Let’s jump ahead a bit now, to 1941. With a large number of players heading into armed services during World War II, the Tigers suspended play. This gave room for yet another Hamilton team to take their moment in the spotlight: the Hamilton Flying Wildcats. This team combined a handful of Tigers players who did stay home with a large group of Royal Canadian Air Force personnel, giving them enough talent to win the 31st Grey Cup in 1943 and reaching the final again the next season.

Once the Tigers returned to business in 1945, the two teams began to struggle. While competing for a share of the same market, they couldn’t keep up financially. In 1950 they decided to join forces and form the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, the team the city knows and loves to this day.

Soon after amalgamation, the team quickly became a football powerhouse. After moving into the iconic Ivor Wynne Stadium the year of the merger, the team went on to win 8 more Grey Cups up until 1999, moving Hamilton’s total up to 15 football titles.

Tiger-cats 1954 champions. Credit: The Hamilton Spectator

Since the turn of the century the Tiger-Cats have hit a bit of a rough patch. They reached the final just twice (2013, 2014), losing both. This year they hold the best record in the CFL and things are finally looking to go the team’s way again. On November 17th, Tim Hortons Field (the Tiger-Cats’ home since 2014) will play host to the Division Final and if all goes well, the Ticats may compete for the 107th Grey Cup, hosted in Calgary on November 24th.

More than just football

The Tiger-Cats have the most far reaching history of all the sports teams in Hamilton, but that doesn’t mean they’re alone in this city. There are more teams making history, even if they’re just writing their first chapter.

Take the Hamilton Honey Badgers for example. This basketball team, competing in the newly established Canadian Elite Basketball League (CEBL), made it to the finals in this inaugural season, losing out to the Saskatchewan Rattlers. The team made history in another sense as well, by having coach Chantal Vallée at the helm: the first female to be both coach and GM of a professional men’s basketball team. You can expect to see a lot more from this team in years to come, since, as coach Vallée said in a press release: “We are at an unprecedented time of growth for basketball across Canada.”

Another team that is bound to have a rich history is Forge FC. This newly established soccer team competes in the also newly founded Canadian Premier League (CPL). On April 27th, 2019, they hosted rival York9 FC in the first ever league game played, in front of 18,000 fans at Tim Hortons Field. In this first season the team made it to the final and topped Cavalry FC from Calgary to win the first ever CPL championship title.

We obviously can’t forget about the Bulldogs, Hamilton’s own hockey pride. The former AHL franchise operated in Hamilton between 1996 and 2015, as the affiliate team of the Edmonton Oilers and later the Montreal Canadians. Since the move of the original team to St. John’s, the Bulldogs have come back as an OHL team, starting off in 2015. In the short time since, the team has already won the league title in 2017-18. And on top of that, Bulldog-alumni Robert Thomas got to hoist the Stanley Cup with the St. Louis Blues in 2019, the year after trading in the OHL for the NHL.

Bulldogs celebrating their championship win. Credit: CHL Photos

Unfortunately the efforts of getting an NHL franchise to Hamilton have been futile so far. The closest the city ever came was in 1990, when in just 24 hours, a total of 14,000 fans made a non-refundable downpayment for season tickets. Hamilton was the only expansion bid at that moment that met all the criteria set by the league, but in the end the bid was blocked by the owners of the Buffalo Sabres and Toronto Maple Leafs. These teams have always been scared of losing fans from the Hamilton region if the city should get its own team.

The Commonwealth Games form in Hamilton

In 1891 Englishman John Astley Cooper was the first person to propose a plan to bring together the members of the British Empire for a sporting competition. “A Pan-Britannic-Pan-Anglican Contest and Festival every four years as a means of increasing goodwill and good understanding of the British Empire”, as he put it.

After a few (failed) attempts to set this up, Hamilton Spectator sportswriter Bobby Robinson was present in Amsterdam for the 1928 Olympic Games, where he successfully lobbied to organize the first ever British Empire Games. These games came to take place in 1930 in Hamilton, with the Civic Stadium (later known as Ivor Wynne Stadium) as the center of attention. The games featured 400 participating athletes from 11 countries, competing in 7 different sports, including athletics, swimming, and lawn bowling. At the end of that week’s events, England sat atop the table, with 25 gold medals, beating Canada’s 20.

The Commonwealth Games – as the British Empire Games are now known – have since grown into a sporting event hosting close to 5,000 athletes from more than 70 Commonwealth nations, every 4 years. With the 100th anniversary of the first Games coming up in 2030, a non-profit group named Hamilton 100 is seriously exploring the opportunities to get the Commonwealth Games back to Hamilton, the city where it all started.

Modern-day Hamilton has proven that it’s up to such a task given its solid track record in the 21st century. In 2000, the city hosted the 32nd International Children’s Games – the youth equivalent of the Olympic Games – sanctioned by the International Olympic Committee. A total of 1,950 children between the ages of 12 and 15, from 26 countries, participated across 15 different sports. Then in 2015, Hamilton was one of the co-hosts of that year’s Pan-Am Games. Whilst the majority of the venues were based in Toronto (the host city), Hamilton was appointed to host the soccer, rowing, and canoeing competitions.

Whether this recent track record will prove enough to be selected as the 2030 host of the Commonwealth Games will be an unanswered question for quite some time. At the 2020 CGF General Assembly, the 2026 host will first have to be selected. When the 2030 decision will be made is still undecided.

The City of Championships

Not only has Hamilton played host to multi-sport events, but single sport championships have also come to town. In 2003, the UCI World Cycling Championships were hosted on the streets of Hamilton. An event that, with 500 million television viewers worldwide, was considered to be the third-most watched sporting event in the world at the time, only beaten by the Olympics and the soccer World Cup.

UCI World on the Claremont Access. Credit: Sheryl Nadler / The Hamilton Spectator

For the race a 12.4 kilometre long loop was created through the city, integrating various mountain accesses both uphill and down. The 1.5 kilometre climb up Beckett Drive and 2.5 kilometres up the Claremont Access proved to be too much for many cyclists, especially seeing that the women had to do 10 of these laps and the men 21. At the end of the race the Swede Susanne Ljungskog took home the gold in the women’s road race, whilst the Spaniard Igor Astarloa came out victorious in the men’s race.

Another big championship to which the city has played host is one that was back in town in 2019: the Canadian Open Golf Championship. In total, the Hamilton Golf and Country Club has been host to this event 6 times. The course layout, which is seen as being very traditional, is a favorite of many pros, making it easier for the organizers to attract big names. Past winners include Rory McIlroy in 2019, Jim Furyk in 2006 and in 1919, the first time winner, James Douglas Edgar.

Canadian Open Golf in Ancaster. Credit: Golf Canada

Running your way into the history books

Many will consider it enough to view historical events from the sidelines. For an annual event you can cheer on and still have fun, check out the Around the Bay Road Race.

Every March, a 30 kilometre run starting in the centre of the city takes runners along Burlington Street, the Beach Strip into Burlington, along North Shore Blvd, and back to FirstOntario Centre where you’ll find the finish. As if finishing a 30k run in Canadian March weather isn’t historic enough, finishing this run will give you the chance to say that you completed the oldest long distance foot race in North America.

Many people believe the Boston Marathon is the holder of this title, but that’s not the case. The first Around the Bay run took place in 1894 — three years before the first Boston Marathon. So do you want to be part of Hamilton sports heritage? Registration for the 2020 Around the Bay (March 29th, 2020) is now open!

Runners participating in Around the Bay. Credit: Hamilton Public Library

Hamilton innovations go global

This city has produced some great teams and athletes, but Hamilton’s footprint in the global sports scene is much larger than that. Thanks to several Hamiltonians, there have been a number of important innovations our city is known for.

In 1917, Emil “Pops” Kenesky took a pair of regular cricket pads, modified them slightly and added some width to them. Lo and behold, the hockey goalie pads were born. The pads were a big success from the start and would remain the standard until the 1970s, having been worn by various Hockey Hall of Fame goalies throughout their careers.

Ron Foxcroft used to be a basketball referee, using the traditional whistle, with a cork ball inside it. From time to time this “pea” would jam, preventing Foxcroft and his colleagues from making crucial calls. After this happened to Foxcroft on the international stage several times in the 1970s and 1980s, he decided things had to change. Together with design consultant Chuck Shepard he created a pea-less whistle, which they began to produce as Fox 40 International. The company still makes 40,000 whistles per day, which are being used not just in major sports leagues, but also in search and rescue operations all around the globe.

As a catcher in the MLB, Charlie O’Brien knew he had a dangerous job. After being smacked in the face twice by consecutive foul-tipped balls, he was fed up with it. He took it upon himself to create a new kind of catcher’s mask, based on the design of a hockey goalie’s mask. Whilst playing for the Toronto Blue Jays, he worked with Stoney Creek-based Van Velden Mask Inc. to create said mask. The All-Star MVP mask was approved by the league in 1996, making the life of catchers much more comfortable.

Take in all the action

There is much more sports history out there in the city of Hamilton; simply too much to write about. If there’s any interest in learning more, we challenge you to venture out in the open and experience it for yourself. Support an upcoming and growing team, attend a sport you’ve never been to, visit the Hamilton Sports Hall of Fame, or simply sit down in any sports bar the city has to offer and have a chat with the person next to you. Chances are that he or she will have something to tell you about Hamilton, its teams, and their history.

Lead photo courtesy of Hamilton Tiger-cats

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