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No proof that lacrosseCanada's national gameOTTAWA (CP)—It looks asif the idea that Parliamentonce declared lacrosse to be Canada’s national game is a myth.Certainly, there is no documentary support for the asser-tion in Menke’s Encyclopedia of Sports that 1867 “saw the formal adoption by Parliament as the national game of Canada.”A research study carried out for Jack Roxburgh, Liberal MP for Norfolk and former president of the Canadian Amateur | H o c k e y Association shows there is no record that Parliament ever enacted a law declaring lacrosse to be the country’s national game.The study covered the Journals of the House of Commons, the legal record of proceedings. It took in the weekly Canada Gazette in which all laws passed by Parliament are reported. It went further, intoBritain’s London Gazette on the chance that in the early days of Confederation Canadian laws might be reported in it. There is no mention of lacrosse in the Statues of Canada where It would appear if a bill were enacted into law.(Majesty uniting the provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, into one Dominion, a letter headed Lacrosse — our National Field Game, published by me in the Montreal Daily News, in April, 1867, was printed off and distributed throughout the whole Dominion, and was copied into many of the public papers. . . .“On the day which created the greater part of British North America a dominion, the game of lacrosse was adopted as the national game. . .Possibly what really happened was summed up in 1873 by William K. McNaught, a former president of the National Lacrosse Association of Canada, in Lacrosse and How to Play It.“On the day when the provinces united to form one great Dominion, the patriotic youth of Canada adopted lacrosse as the national game of their native country. This game has on account of its own intrinsic merits been adopted by young Canada as the national game of our rising Dominion.”Another likely factor in the lacrosse belief is that the National Lacrosse Association of Canada was formed in 1867.Why Mr. Roxburgh’s special interest?He plans to introduce a bill in Parliament to declare hockey Canada’s national sport and he wanted to be sure a measure about lacrosse would not stand in his way.The whole study indicates that the lacrosse “myth” originated in a book. Lacrosse, the National Game of Canada, written by William George Beers, a Montreal lacrosse enthusiast, and published in 1869.Mr. Beers wrote:“I believe I was the first to propose the game of lacrosse as the national game of Canada in 1859; and a few months preceding the proclamation of HerALL PROCEEDS FOR RETAIPLAY IN
Newspaper Details
Medicine Hat News
Medicine Hat, Alberta, CA
Thu, May 28, 1964
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Jason P.
USA 18 Dec 2018
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