Who Is Really Hockey's Dad?
Antonina Cartwright
2025-04-21 22:16:22
Count answers: 5
We know that hockey does not have a “father” like basketball does with its inventor, James Naismith.
Here's where it gets confusing.
Three different Canadian cities lay claim to being the birthplace of ice hockey as we know it.
One story is that hockey began in the Maritime city of Halifax, Nova Scotia, where the Mi’kmaq, a First Nations people, had been playing games with sticks and balls on frozen ponds.
Montréalers beg to differ.
Kingston, where the mighty St. Lawrence stems from Lake Ontario, also has a legitimate claim to hockey’s fatherhood.
That takes us to the man who goes down in the sport’s murky history as “the Father of Hockey.”
Still, you won’t find many contemporary chroniclers of the history of hockey who regard Sutherland as the father of hockey.
Perhaps he was more like a very supportive uncle.
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