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...........choose your version
of the
history of hockey! The exact origins of ice hockey are unclear. However, it's widely accepted that the British are responsible for bringing hockey to North America. By the 1870's, a group of college students at McGill University in Montreal were organizing games and had developed the first known set of hockey rules. In this version, a puck was substituted for a ball, and there were 9 players each side. In 1885, Montreal became the site for the first national hockey organization. The Amatuer Hockey Association of Canada was founded, and further reduced the number of players each side to seven. The first league of four teams was formed. The first cross-border hockey with the US was played in the 1890's. Although hockey was a Canadian national pastime, the US was the first country to organize a professional league. Formed in 1903, the Pro Hockey League included players from the US and Canada. The league folded three years later, and was replaced by the NHL in 1910. A decade later, hockey was added as an official sport of the Olympic Games. THE History of HockeyUntil the mid-1980s it was generally accepted that ice hockey derived from English field hockey and Indian lacrosse and was spread throughout Canada by British soldiers in the mid-1800s. Research then turned up mention of a hockeylike game, played in the early 1800s in Nova Scotia by the Micmac Indians, which appeared to have been heavily influenced by the Irish game of hurling; it included the use of a "hurley" (stick) and a square wooden block instead of a ball. It was probably fundamentally this game that spread throughout Canada via Scottish and Irish immigrants and the British army. The players adopted elements of field hockey, such as the "bully" (later the face-off) and "shinning" (hitting one's opponent on the shins with the stick or playing with the stick on one "shin" or side); this evolved into an informal ice game later known as shinny or shinty. The name hockey--as the organized game came to be known--has been attributed to the French word hoquet (shepherd's stick). The term rink, referring to the designated area of play, was originally used in the game of curling in 18th-century Scotland. Early hockey games allowed as many as 30 players a side on the ice, and the goals were two stones, each frozen into one end of the ice. The first use of a puck instead of a ball was recorded at Kingston Harbour, Ont., in 1860. Hockey in Canada began just after our country was discovered. Actually it was another country that was discovered, Newfoundland, but that country became part of Canada and now its all the same. The early settlers had little to do. Except for hunting for food and hunting for wood, most of their time was spent trying to keep away from the black flies or trying to keep warm. One innovative early Canadian by the name of Pierre Lapin, invented a distinctly different way to do both. Having seen sleds ride on steel blades on the ice, he decided to try something daring. Strapping a rifle bayonet to each boot, he stepped onto the frozen surface of Lake Bobkeshinwegawigamog and fell flat on his face. Undeterred he got up and tried again. After several such attempts he was successful and soon he was racing across the ice, warm and free of those pesky flies. Ice hockey was invented almost immediately. How could it have been invented so soon you may ask? Well, Pierre got tired of falling down all the time and picked up a crooked stick to help him make his way over the surface of the ice. This stick, now in the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, was the first hockey stick. As Pierre sped across the ice he tripped once again, but this time he tripped over a frozen beaver bladder that another trapper had left lying around. Angered and hurt, Pierre swatted the bladder with his crooked stick. He watched in amazement as the bladder flew across the ice, coming to a stop just past the entrance of a small bay. The dimensions of that small opening are the exact same ones used today for the NHL goal crease. In his later years, Pierre used to joke that if he had kicked the bladder he would have invented football. BTW, the bladder was not able to be preserved as it served as supper for Pierre and his friends that fateful evening. A replica of it is in the Hall of Fame, however, Pierre soon interested his friends in strapping on the blades and grabbing the sticks. In time there were so many trappers on the frozen lakes of Canada that our nation experienced its first recession. It was at that point that the then Prime Minister Stanley Park decided to form a league and offer a prize to the winning team. A frugal man, Park offered a tea pot for the prize. He was later to say that the tea pot had been a particularly loathsome wedding gift and he was glad to get rid of it. Well today that tea pot, the Stanley Cup, is one of the most sought-after trophies in sport. Ancient Field Hockey -The History of Hockey
Buried deep in Egypt’s Nile Valley
lies the village of Beni Hasan, known for its ancient cliff tombs
dating from 2000 BC. A drawing decorates one tomb, showing two men
holding sticks with curved ends and standing over a ball. Add
synthetic turf and shin guards, and it might pass for hockey at the
Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. The modern game we know as hockey - or field hockey, for those distinguishing it from ice hockey - evolved in the British Isles in the 19th century. It was a popular English school game, possibly adapted from the Irish game of hurling. The British army helped spread hockey internationally through the British Empire, its popularity especially booming in India and Pakistan. The London Hockey Association formed in 1886, and rules soon were standardized. The International Hockey Federation (FIH) formed in Paris in 1924, and the International Federation of Women’s Hockey followed in 1927. Men’s hockey first appeared at the 1908 Olympic Games in London. It reappeared in Antwerp in 1920, then returned to stay at the 1928 Amsterdam Games. Women’s hockey waited much longer, finally debuting in 1980. "India won six straight Olympic gold medals while winning 24 consecutive matches between 1924 and 1956, a record likely to stand through the ages. The Indians have won two more gold since then. "One name evokes the memory of their dominance: Balbir Singh. It’s one name, five people. The first Balbir Singh played with the great Indian teams of 1948, 1952 and 1956, his glory peaking at Helsinki in 1952 when he scored five goals in a 6-1 gold medal victory over the Netherlands. The four later Balbir Singhs played with the later Indian champions. Pakistan finally broke India’s hold on the sport in 1960, a decade when the two would keep taking the gold from each other.
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