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Jacques Amyot, COQ, marathon swimmer, athlete (born 13 November 1924 in Quebec City, QC; died 7 September 2018 in Quebec City). Jacques Amyot won eight national swim titles. He held 47 Quebec records and 16 Canadian records in open-water swimming (see also Marathon Swimming). He was the first person to swim across Lac Saint-Jean and the first Canadian man to swim across the English Channel. He was the inaugural recipient of the Quebec Athlete Gala’s Athlete of the Year award, as well as the Prix honorifique Jacques-Amyot for lifetime achievement, which was named in his honour. He is a member of the Quebec Sports Hall of Fame and the Quebec Swimming Hall of Fame (1998), as well as a Chevalier in the Ordre national du Québec.

Shirley Firth, CM, cross-country skier (born 31 December 1953 in Aklavik, Northwest Territories; died 30 April 2013 in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories) and Sharon Anne Firth, cross-country skier (born 31 December 1953 in Aklavik, Northwest Territories). Twin sisters Shirley and Sharon Firth, members of the Gwich’in First Nation, were among the first Indigenous athletes to represent Canada at the Olympics. They were members of the first Canadian women’s Olympic cross-country ski team and competed at four Olympic Winter Games. The Firth sisters were members of the national cross-country ski team for an unprecedented 17 consecutive years. Between them, they won 79 medals at the national championships, including 48 national titles. They are Members of the Order of Canada and have been inducted into the Canadian Ski Hall of Fame and Canada's Sports Hall of Fame.

Christine Sinclair, OC, soccer player (born 12 June 1983 in Burnaby, BC). Soccer player Christine Sinclair has been named Canadian Player of the Year 14 times. She has scored more international goals (187) and more Olympic goals (12) than any other player in the world. After twice being named the top women’s college soccer player in the United Sates and winning two NCAA championships, Sinclair led the Canadian women’s team to three World Cups (2011, 2015, 2019) and four Olympic Summer Games (Beijing 2008, London 2012, Rio 2016, Tokyo 2020). The team won back-to-back Olympic bronze medals in 2012 and 2016 before winning gold in Tokyo. Sinclair received the Bobbie Rosenfeld Award as Canada’s female athlete of the year in 2012 and 2020 and was named Canada Soccer Player of the Decade in 2019. The first soccer player to win the Lou Marsh Trophy (now the Northern Star Award) as Canada’s athlete of the year, she has been inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame and is an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Joey Votto, baseball player (born 10 September 1983 in Toronto, ON). Joey Votto is a Canadian baseball player with the Cincinnati Reds. In 2010, he won the National League’s Most Valuable Player Award and Hank Aaron Award, as well as the Lou Marsh Trophy for Canada’s outstanding athlete of the year. Two years later, he became one of the highest paid baseball players in major league history. In 2017, he was again awarded the Lou Marsh Trophy. He has also won the James “Tip” O’Neill Award seven times.

Ferguson "Fergie" Arthur Jenkins, CM, baseball player (born 13 December 1943 in Chatham, ON). Arguably the finest Canadian-born baseball player, Jenkins began his major-league career in Philadelphia before joining the Chicago Cubs in 1966.

Vincent “Manny” Churchill McIntyre, baseball player, hockey player, railway porter (born 4 October 1918 in Gagetown, New Brunswick; died 13 June 2011 in Candiac, QC). Manny McIntyre was the first Black Canadian to sign a professional baseball contract — just six weeks after American Jackie Robinson broke the pro baseball colour barrier. McIntyre played as a shortstop for the St. Lous Cardinals farm team, the Sherbrooke Canadians. A multisport athlete, he was also a member (with brothers Ossie and Herb Carnegie) of the first all-Black line in pro hockey, known as the “Black Aces.” McIntyre was inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame, the Black Ice Hockey and Sports Hall of Fame, the New Brunswick Sports Hall of Fame and the City of Fredericton Sports Wall of Fame.

George Dixon, boxer (born 29 July 1870 in Africville, NS; died 6 January 1908 in New York, New York). George Dixon was the first Black world champion in boxing history and the first Canadian to ever win a world championship. Despite his small stature (5 feet 3.5 inches and between 87 and 115 pounds), Dixon amassed several notable accomplishments across a 20-year career and was the first boxer to win championships in multiple weight classes — bantamweight (1890) and featherweight (1891–96; 1897; 1898–1900). A cerebral fighter known as a “pioneer of scientific boxing,” he is credited with inventing various fundamental training techniques, including shadowboxing and the use of the heavy bag. As a dominant Black fighter in the post-Civil War United States, Dixon was subjected to fierce racism. He died in poverty from alcoholism at the age of 37. He was an inaugural inductee into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame and the Nova Scotia Sport Hall of Fame, and was also named to The Ring Magazine Hall of Fame and the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Kaillie Humphries (née Simundson), bobsledder (born 4 September 1985 in Calgary, AB). Kaillie Humphries is the only woman to win three Olympic gold medals in bobsledding. At the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, she and Heather Moyse became the first Canadian women to win gold in the two-woman bobsled. They won gold again at the 2014 Olympic Winter Games. Humphries won the 2014 Lou Marsh Trophy as Canada’s athlete of the year and won a bronze medal at the 2018 Olympic Winter Games. She was also one of the first two women to compete in an international four-man bobsleigh competition. Humphries has alleged that she was “driven off” the Canadian bobsled team in 2019 after filing a harassment complaint against a coach. She obtained US citizenship in 2021 and competed for Team USA at the 2022 Olympic Winter Games in Beijing, where she won gold in women’s monobob. She is the only woman ever to win Olympic gold medals for two different countries.

Jimmy Rattlesnake, baseball player (born 1909 in Hobbema [now Maskwacis], Alberta; died 17 April 1972 in Hobbema). A crafty and durable left-handed pitcher, Jimmy Rattlesnake was one of Canada’s first Indigenous baseball stars. He dominated prize money tournaments in Alberta and Saskatchewan in the 1930s and 1940s. Some reports indicate that he also briefly pitched professionally in the United States. Often compared to African American pitcher Satchel Paige, Rattlesnake was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 2021.

Derek Drouin, high jumper, track and field athlete (born 6 March 1990 in Sarnia, ON). Derek Drouin was the first men’s high jumper in NCAA history to win five national championships. He went on to win a silver medal at the 2012 Olympic Summer Games in London and a gold medal at the 2016 Olympic Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro. He was the first Canadian to win Olympic gold in a field event since Duncan McNaughton in 1932. Drouin also won gold medals at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, the 2015 Pan American Games and the 2015 IAAF World Championships. He is one of only 10 male high jumpers to clear a height of 2.4 m outdoors — the Canadian record. Drouin introduced innovative new techniques to the sport and has been called “the best high jumper of the modern era.”

The RCAF (Royal Canadian Air Force) Flyers was a men’s amateur hockey team comprised mostly of RCAF personnel that was assembled quickly to represent Canada at the 1948 Winter Olympics. After losing exhibition games in Canada, the media declared the team a national embarrassment. Several roster changes improved the team and it won the Gold Medal at the Olympic Winter Games in St. Moritz, Switzerland.

Herbert H. Carnegie, CM, O Ont, hockey player, philanthropist (born 8 November 1919 in Toronto, ON; died 9 March 2012 in Toronto). Arguably the first Black Canadian hockey star, Herb Carnegie is widely regarded as the best Black player never to play in the National Hockey League (NHL). Carnegie played in the 1940s and 1950s, mostly in the Quebec and Ontario Junior A and senior leagues. He was a member of the Black Aces, the first all-Black line in hockey outside the Colored Hockey League of the Maritimes. Following his retirement from hockey in 1954, he established the Herbert H. Carnegie Future Aces Foundation. He was also an accomplished senior golfer. He was made a Member of the Order of Canada and has been inducted into the Ontario Sports Hall of Fame, Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame and the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Stephanie Dixon, CM, swimmer (born 10 February 1984 in Brampton, ON). Stephanie Dixon is one of Canada’s most decorated Paralympic athletes. She won 19 Paralympic medals (seven gold, 10 silver, two bronze), six gold medals at the Parapan American Games and 10 gold medals at the IPC World Championships. She set world records in nine long course swimming events — some more than once — and still holds the world record in the women’s 200 m backstroke. Dixon has worked as a coach since retiring in 2010. She was also Team Canada’s chef de mission at the 2019 Parapan American Games and the 2020 Paralympic Games. She has been inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame and is a Member of the Order of Canada.

Mary Geraldine “Bonnie” Baker (née George), professional baseball player, broadcaster (born 10 July 1919 in Regina, SK; died 17 December 2003 in Regina). Mary “Bonnie” Baker was a catcher and utility infielder in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League for nine seasons. In 1950, she also served as the only regular female manager in the league’s 12-year history. A feisty character on the diamond and a vivacious personality off it, Baker was one of the models for the character of Dottie Hinson, played by Geena Davis, in the Hollywood movie A League of Their Own (1992). After retiring as a baseball and softball player, Baker became Canada’s first female sports broadcaster.

Jacob Wilton (Willie) Littlechild, CM, athlete, lawyer, Cree chief, politician, advocate for Indigenous rights (born 1 April 1944 in Hobbema, [now Maskwacîs] AB). Littlechild formed and coached Alberta’s first all-Indigenous junior hockey team and created the National Indian Athletic Association. He is a member of seven sports halls of fame. In 1976, Littlechild earned a law degree from the University of Alberta. He went on to become the first member of Parliament with Treaty Indian Status in Canada in 1988. Littlechild served as a commissioner of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2009. Throughout his career, Littlechild has promoted Indigenous rights both nationally and internationally.