The Hall of Fame should be a term, that is familiar to each of you. But usually we connect the Hall of Fam with famous stars. This is precisely the same case with the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame. In this kind of Hall of Fame are the most famous Canadian lacrosse stars ever. We have summarized the most important information about the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame for you.
History and Facts
The Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame was established by the Canadian Lacrosse Association, the governing body of lacrosse in Canada in 1965. It all began in 1963 when some lacrosse enthusiasts had the idea to found a Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame in New Westminster. New Westminster had the perfect historical background in national sport, so the Hall of Fame should be founded here. The interested parties applied for a charter in the Canadian Lacrosse Association together with the encouragement of the City.
After a very aggressive campaign, their effort was rewarded and the charter was awarded in November 1964. So the Hall of Fame was incorporated in 1965 as a Societes Act. The comittee met on 19th January 1966 in Montreal, where 48 founding members were added.
On 17th May 1967, the premises of the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame were then opened by Rom Gorden. The Hall of Fame is located in New Westminster’s Centennial Community Centre. Before these gates were opened the Hall of Fame was at the Westminster Museum & Archives on Royal Avenue. In the museum of the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame new championship pictures, sweaters, medals, plaques, trophies and famous lacrosse player’s sticks have been exhibited constantly from November 1970.
In the beginning of the 1980s, several museums were raided in Vancouver and New Westminster. The Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame, the British Columbia Sports Hall of Fame and many other museums were robbed and around 20 irreplaceable objects of inestimable value were stolen. None of these items has ever been found again.
Because of this slump, extensive changes in the security and in the presentation of the products were made. The two top lacrosse trophies of Canada, the Minto Cup and the Mann Cup were undamaged after all.
In the spring of 2014, the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame moved to the Anvil Centre complex in downtown New Westminster. During the preparations, the museum remained closed.The visitors were allowed to enter the halls on September 13, 2014 for the first time and the official opening took place on 8th November 2014.
There is an annual induction of new members. In 1965 the induction was started with three different categories, the field players, players box, builders. The veteran category was added in 1997 and in 1998, the outstanding team category. In 2016 the box player and the field player categories were put together under the player category.
Who has been inducted in the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame?
As mentioned above the first people were inducted into the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1965. The first one was Fred C. Waghorne, Snr. (1866 – 1956) in the category builder. The first field player was Lionel “Big Train” Conacher (1900 – 1954) and the first box player Bill Anthony (1913 – 1978). As the category veteran player then was taken up in 1997,the first man who was inducted was Harry “Tonto” Smith (Jay Silverheels) (1912 – 1980) and as the first team that was inducted was the Caughnawaga team (1976 – 1883) in 1998, .
