The Icelandic Canadian - 01.12.2002, Page 10

94
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Vol. 57 #3
winter sports of the Antwerp Games, ice
hockey and figure skating did not become
any less official or Olympic. Prior to 1924,
there had been no differentiation between
summer and winter sports at the Olympics,
because there was just one festival in each
four-year Olympiad. Therefore, the later
use by writers of terms such as "demon-
stration" or "unofficial" to describe the sta-
tus of the Falcons is incorrect. The proper
characterization of the two Canadian teams
in question is really quite straightforward.
The Toronto Granites were the first win-
ners of ice hockey in the Winter Olympics,
but the Winnipeg Falcons were the gold
medal winners of the first official Olympic
ice hockey tournament, and that distinc-
tion cannot be changed simply by rewriting
the past.
Barbara Schrodt is the Sport Historian
at the University of British Columbia
REFERENCES:
Bryden, Wendy. Canada at the Winter
Olympic Games. Edmonton: Flurtig
Publishers, 1987.
Buchanan, Ian and Mallon, Bill.
Historical Dictionary of the Olympic
Movement. Lanham Maryland: The
Scarecrow Press, Inc. 2001.
Howell, Nancy and Howell, Maxwell.
Sports and Games in Canadian Life.
Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1069.
Killanin, Lord and Rodda, John (eds.).
The Olympic Games. Barrie and Jenkins
Ltd., 1976.
Official Report o the 1920 Olympic
Games, Antwerp.
Podnieks, Andrew. Canada's Olympic
Hockey Teams. Toronto: Doubleday
Canada Ltd., 1997.
Renson, Roland. The Games Reborn:
the Vllth Olympiad Antwerp. Antwerp:
Pandora, 1996.
Roxborough, Henry. Canada at the
Olympics (3rd ed.). Toronto: McGraw-
Hill Ryerson Ltd., 1963.
Wallechinsky, David. The Complete
Book of the Olympics. Boston: Little,
Brown and Co., 1992.
Charlie Thorson, circa 1933
Over the years Charlie Thorson had
befriended the Icelandic Canadian hockey play-
ers. He had often provided caricatures of the
players for local newspapers, especially the local
Icelandic newspapers. He also provided some
drawings for postcards too. He is credited with
the design of the Falcon team uniforms, which
was a sweater with a falcon in flight. His clever
caricatures also depicted the players as fierce
fighters of the 223rd Battalion, where most of the
team served in France.
Charlie was known as an extremely clever
and talented illustrator. His colourful character is
thoroughly captured in the book Cartoon
Charlie: The Life and Art of Animation Pioneer
Charles Thorson by Gene Walz. (see Icelandic
Canadian Volume 55#3) It appears that the Wevil
Cafe, on the corner of Sargent Ave. and Victor
was a great meeting place, especially for Charlie.
One can only imagine the stories that would have
followed the hockey games of the Falcons. The
pride was palpable.