Criticism:
While large crowds indicated general acceptance, newspaper accounts document that verbal abuse flourished with both crowds and journalists. Reporters were racist in attitude in the first couple of years, more respectful for a few years, and then reverted to racist reporting for a short while - finally ignoring Black games. There is nothing to gain by printing the epithets used, nevertheless, all common ones and some never imagined, appeared in the Maritime press.
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Three Decades of Black Hockeyists:
The relative popularity of Black teams in hockey in the Halifax area was short lived, between 1900 and 1914. In 1906, The Acadian Recorder reported that the games were not as interesting or as popular as previously, with only about 100 mostly Black people attending. Meanwhile, white teams did not play Black teams nor did Black players get to play on white teams. As activity subsided in the Halifax area, new teams were formed elsewhere and in 1920 as the Truro "SHIEKS" beat the New Glasgow "SPEEDBOYS" to capture the "Colored Hockey Championship". In 1921, the P.E.I. West End Rangers defeated the New Glasgow "ROVERS" and retained the Championship for two years. Those three teams continued the tradition until 1928.
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Overview of Integration:
Games between Afro-Canadians which began in Nova Scotia in 1895 were also the beginning of the struggle for Blacks everywhere to be accepted in Canada's National Winter Sport. The gradually increasing level of respect for certain Black families in small towns appears to have played a significant role in this integration as Black players eventually got to play on white teams in the late 1930s.
In Windsor, the Paris and Jackson families lived within town limits through the 1920s and the children attended the public school. John "Buster" Paris and Percy Jackson first played pond hockey with young white friends, followed by junior high school intermural hockey. They went on to play in the Annapolis Valley High School Hockey League as members of otherwise white teams. In 1937, Buster was the only Black player in the Windsor Senior Town League.
In nearby Wolfville, during the 1930s, Mr. Clifford Oliver was a respected employee of Acadia University. His family members were well accepted in Wolfville at church and school where the children were high achievers. When Clifford's son William "Billy" Oliver attended Acadia University, he played in the Acadia "College Band", played on the water polo team and was a forward on the 1934 Acadia Hockey Team.
The Dorrington and Byard families followed a similar course in Truro. Art and Doug Dorrington played for the Truro Sheiks all Black team and went on to play for a white team, the Stellarton Royals in the APC League in the 1949-50 series. Art went to the New Haven Night Hawks and the Boston Americans before retiring from Ice Hockey to become a Sheriff in Alabama.
In the 1950s-60s, Buster Paris's children had become outstanding athletes and key players in the newly formed Windsor Minor Sports Program. Meanwhile, in the nearby rural community of Five Mile Plains there was a segregated Black school, and none of those children got to play with a white hockey team. When the children reached high school age, they transferred to the Windsor Academy, and thus became integrated into the white school system, but, not having achieved early hockey skills, they still did not get to play on white teams.
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Wider Acceptance:
Maritime African Canadian hockey players gradually became integrated onto white teams. Manny MacIntyre of Devon, N.B. played on the incredible Sherbrooke Saints all-Black line in Quebec during the 1950s along with Herbie and Ossie Carnegie of Ontario, one of the greatest lines ever to play Ice Hockey in Canada.
1960- John Paris Jr. was playing for Windsor Royals Midget team when scouted by Scotty Bowman and taken to Quebec to play and later coach in Quebec Hockey Leagues and scout for the NHL.
In 1964, John's brother Percy played for King's College School in Windsor as the team won the Nova Scotia Headmaster's League Championship for the first time ever. He played on an all-Black line for Saint Marys University with Robert "Bob" Dawson of Dartmouth, N.S. and Darrel Maxwell (Chook Maxwell's younger brother) of Truro, N.S., a noted baseball and hockey player who was scouted by Punch Imlach along with Willie O'Ree of Frederickton to the Boston Bruins organization in 1955, and played in the WHL and the IHL for a decade. Willie O'Ree was accepted as first Black player in NHL for Boston Bruins in 1957.
Mike Paris, son of John Paris Sr. played with brothers John and Percy in Windsor, N.S. Minor Hockey Program in the 1960s.
Two decades followed before another Black player was admitted to the NHL. Bill Riley of Amherst joined the Washington Capitals of the NHL in 1974-1980. Eldon "Pokey" Reddick of Halifax became the first Black Goalie in the NHL when he joined the Winnipeg Jets in 1986, moving to the Edmonton Oilers from 1988-91. Then in 1994 John Paris Jr. of Windsor, Nova Scotia become the first Black coach in professional hockey with the Atlanta Knights, leading the team to the IHA Championship.
2001 March 3, 2001 John "Buster" Paris was inducted into the Birthplace of Hockey Hall of Fame as a "Builder".
There is an old adage which says "Walk a mile in another man's shoes to know what life is like for him." I fear we'd have to skate a long time on old-fashioned Starr Skates to know what life was like for the hockeyists in the "Colored Hockey Championship of the Maritimes", as well as all African Canadian players who have followed their lead.