Minorities | The Canadian Encyclopedia

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  • Article

    Balarama Holness

    Balarama Holness, professional football player, jurist, political activist, social entrepreneur (born 20 July 1983 in Montreal, QC). Balarama Holness put a wayward youth behind him to become a Grey Cup-winning professional football player with his hometown Montreal Alouettes. He then pursued a career as a jurist and political organizer and ran for mayor of the borough of Montréal-Nord in 2017. His community organizing efforts led to two separate reports (in 2019 and 2020) that acknowledged the existence and extent of systemic racism in the province, while also recommending solutions. In 2021, Holness ran to become mayor of Montreal but was defeated.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/media/new_article_images/BalaramaHolness/Bala_H_Web.jpg Balarama Holness

  • Article

    Ben Johnson

    Ben Johnson, track and field athlete (b at Falmouth, Jamaica 30 Dec 1961). In 1976 Johnson immigrated to Canada and was attracted to competitive sprinting, initially in the 100 and 200 m.

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    https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/images/tce_placeholder.jpg?v=e9dca980c9bdb3aa11e832e7ea94f5d9 Ben Johnson

  • Article

    Camryn Rogers

    Camryn Alexis Rogers, track and field athlete (born 7 June 1999 in Richmond, BC). Camryn Rogers won a silver medal in women’s hammer throw at the 2022 World Athletics Championships, making her the first Canadian woman to medal in a WAC field event. She then won gold at the 2023 World Athletics Championships, making her only the second Canadian woman to win a WAC gold medal. She also won gold at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, as well as three NCAA titles. She set the Canadian record in women’s hammer throw (78.62 m) in 2023. At the 2024 Olympic Summer Games in Paris, Rogers won gold with a throw of 76.97 m. She is the first Canadian woman since 1928 to win Olympic gold in an individual track and field event.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/1024px-WKBO3897_hammer_W_final_Rogers_53172501717.jpg Camryn Rogers

  • Article

    Canada's Forgotten Baseball History

    Baseball has much deeper roots in Canada than most people realize. Baseball was once so popular in Canada that there was even talk of making it our national sport. The story goes back far enough. The first game was played in Beachville, Ontario, about 40 km east of London, on 4 June 1838, with a ball of twisted yarn covered in calfskin and a club carved from cedar. In the audience was a battalion of Scottish volunteers on their way to mop up the remnants of the Upper Canada Rebellion. This baseball game took place seven years before the founding of the first American baseball team, New York’s Knickerbocker Base Ball Club.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/media/media/2d38ca7d-a0ff-4d27-bae1-b11a9b19ba43.jpg Canada's Forgotten Baseball History

  • Article

    Charlie Culver

    Charlie Culver, baseball player, coach, factory foreman (born 17 November 1892 in Buffalo, New York; died 4 January 1970 in Montreal, QC). Almost 24 years before Jackie Robinson played with the Montreal Royals in 1946, Charlie Culver, an African American who was misidentified as Cuban, started a Class-B Eastern Canada League game for the Royals. His stint with the team lasted just six games, but Culver remained in Quebec and became one of the best baseball players in the province’s history. He later became a respected manager and a successful junior coach. He was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 2021.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/Charlie-Culver-Black-Panthers-Team.jpg Charlie Culver

  • Article

    Cyle Larin

    Cyle Christopher Larin, soccer player (born 17 April 1995 in Brampton, ON). Cyle Larin is the all-time leading goal scorer for the Canadian men’s soccer team. He was the first Canadian player to be selected first overall in the MLS SuperDraft. In 2016, he was named MLS Rookie of the Year after breaking the record for most goals scored by a rookie. After scoring 43 goals in 87 games in three seasons with Orlando City SC, he was transferred to Beşiktaş JK of the Süper Lig in 2018. Larin helped Beşiktaş JK win the Süper Lig, Turkish Cup and the Turkish Super Cup in 2020–21. He also played for Canada at the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/Kyle_Larin_17.jpg Cyle Larin

  • Article

    Eldridge Eatman

    Eldridge “Gus” Eatman (also known as Eastman), sprinter, soldier, entertainer (born 12 March 1880 in Zealand Station, NB; died 15 August 1960 in St. John, NB). Eldridge Eatman was a Black Canadian athlete. He was one of the fastest men in the world between 1904 and 1908. In 1905, he set a Canadian record in the 100-yard sprint with a time of 9.8 seconds. He also served with distinction in the British Army during the First World War. Eatman later became an entertainer and an activist. He has been inducted into the Saint John Sports Hall of Fame, the New Brunswick Sports Hall of Fame and the Maritime Sports Hall of Fame.

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    https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/images/tce_placeholder.jpg?v=e9dca980c9bdb3aa11e832e7ea94f5d9 Eldridge Eatman

  • Article

    Farhan Zaidi

    Farhan Zaidi, baseball executive, economist, (born 11 November 1976 in Sudbury, ON). Farhan Zaidi is the president of baseball operations for the San Francisco Giants of Major League Baseball (MLB). In 2014, he became the first Muslim and first South Asian person to serve as general manager of an American professional sports franchise when he was named GM of the Los Angeles Dodgers, a role he held until 2018. He also worked for the Oakland Athletics from 2005 to 2014. Zaidi has a degree in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and earned his PhD at the University of California, Berkeley. He was named the MLB Executive of the Year in 2021 after the Giants finished first overall with 107 wins — the most in franchise history.

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    https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/images/tce_placeholder.jpg?v=e9dca980c9bdb3aa11e832e7ea94f5d9 Farhan Zaidi

  • Article

    Hénoc Muamba

    Hénoc Muamba, football player (born 23 February 1989 in Kinshasa, Congo). Defensive lineman Hénoc Muamba was named the best defensive player in Canadian university football in 2010. Selected first overall in the 2011 Canadian Football League (CFL) draft, Muamba has played for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers (2011–13), the Montreal Alouettes (2015, 2018–19), the Saskatchewan Roughriders (2016–17) and the Toronto Argonauts (2021–present). A two-time CFL All-Star and the 2019 Most Outstanding Canadian, Muamba was named both Most Valuable Canadian and Most Valuable Player at the 2022 Grey Cup. He is only the second player in CFL history (after Andrew Harris in 2019) to earn the double honour.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/2022-_10-_Henoc_Muamba_2.jpg Hénoc Muamba

  • Article

    Jean Lowe Butler

    Alice Maud Eugenia “Jean” Lowe Butler, track and field athlete, educator (born 1922 in Toronto, ON; died 11 September 2017 in Mobile, Alabama). Jean Lowe Butler was one of Canada’s most accomplished amateur athletes. She set Ontario records in the women’s 100-yard and 220-yard dash and held the Canadian record in the women’s 100 m sprint (11.9 seconds). An elite college athlete in the United States, she competed in the 100 m, 200 m, long jump and high jump, and won medals in each event at every meet. Her exclusion from the 1948 Canadian Olympic team was controversial. A teacher for 30 years, she was inducted into the Tuskegee University Athletic Hall of Fame in 1985.

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    https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/images/tce_placeholder.jpg?v=e9dca980c9bdb3aa11e832e7ea94f5d9 Jean Lowe Butler

  • Article

    Jimmy Claxton

    Jimmy Claxton, baseball player, stevedore (born 14 December 1892 in Wellington, BC; died 3 March 1970 in Tacoma, Washington). On 28 May 1916, Jimmy Claxton became the first Black person to play Organized Baseball (MLB and all of its affiliated minor leagues) in the 20th century. The left-handed pitcher did so 30 years before Jackie Robinson played for the Montreal Royals. Claxton was also the first Black player to be featured on an American baseball card. He is the only Negro Leagues player from Canada to have his statistics upgraded to major league numbers. He was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 2021.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/Jimmy-Claxton.jpg Jimmy Claxton

  • Article

    Larry Kwong

    Larry Kwong (born Eng Kai Geong), hockey player (born 17 June 1923 in Vernon, BC; died 15 March 2018 in Calgary, AB). On 13 March 1948, Kwong became the first Chinese Canadian to play a National Hockey League (NHL) game. He also had a long career in professional hockey in Switzerland as a player and a coach. Kwong has been inducted into the Okanagan Sports Hall of Fame, the BC Sports Hall of Fame and the Alberta Hockey Hall of Fame. In December 2022, Parks Canada commemorated him for “breaking racial barriers in the National Hockey League.”

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/media/media/09c493e4-84af-4834-8b50-2209cb2c902e.jpg Larry Kwong

  • Article

    Lori Fung

    Donna Lori Fung, gymnast (b at Vancouver 21 Feb 1963). Lori Fung excelled in a sport that at the time was virtually unheard of in Canada's sporting world. She began serious competition at age 21 and soon rose to the top of the ranks.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/media/media/e9f1bc9b-77e9-461b-96af-7053e972a24c.jpg Lori Fung

  • Article

    Manny McIntyre

    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.

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    https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/images/tce_placeholder.jpg?v=e9dca980c9bdb3aa11e832e7ea94f5d9 Manny McIntyre

  • Article

    Patrick Chan

    Patrick Lewis Wai-Kuan Chan, figure skater (born 31 December 1990 in Ottawa,ON). Patrick Chan is a Canadian champion and world champion men’s singles figure skater. A three-time world champion, he has won 10 national championships in the singles competition, breaking the record set by Montgomery Wilson in 1939. Known for dazzling artistry, Chan has repeatedly won major international competitions such as the World Figure Skating Championships and the Skate Canada, Grand Prix, Trophée Eric Bompard, and Four Continents events. He has set world records for points at competitions including the 2011 and 2013 World Championships and the 2013 Trophée Bompard, and has won three medals at the Olympic Winter Games: a silver in the men’s competition (2014) and a gold (2018) and silver (2014) in the team event.

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    https://d3d0lqu00lnqvz.cloudfront.net/media/media/73196176-80d1-4633-96c9-e5cacf5f7886.jpg Patrick Chan