Sporting tales explore our history

This columnist could be described as a book collector, but a more accurate description might be book accumulator. For example. The Society for International Hockey Research maintains a publication database for its members and my list currently shows 1,534 books.

Have I read every one? Of course not.

If you go to the Manitoba Hockey Hall of Fame website and search under the History tab, you will find a bibliography I produced that lists more than 175 publications and videos with a connection to hockey in our province. I guarantee you will be surprised by some of the subjects and individuals covered. If you search library catalogues and online, you will find books about Manitoba baseball, boxing, cricket, curling, cycling, figure skating, football, golf, horse racing, paddling, rugby, skiing, softball, track and field, and volleyball, as well as books on local subjects such as Indigenous, Jewish and Ukrainian sports organizations and personalities.

The advent of self-publishing in recent years has led to budding authors publishing books on subjects and people that would have been of interest to traditional publishers. The majority can best be decribed as labours of love; perhaps written to relate to a specific event or timeline. For example, in 2005 when The Pas TeePees were being inducted into the Manitoba Baseball Hall of Fame, I wrote and self-published a small book titled Baseball in The Pas, the Polar League and The Pas TeePees. A copy was presented to every team member at the induction in Morden and copies have been placed in related libraries.

In checking my personal collection, I found more than 50 books written about Manitoba sports and/or by Manitoba authors.

In this, the first of a two-part series, the focus will be on several books that recently came to my attention. In the follow-up column, other books you might be able to track down in libraries, used bookstores, or thrift shops will be featured. Some may still be available at McNally Robinson Booksellers. A book is always an excellent Christmas present for the sports lover.

A perfect example of a labour of love is Rick Sparling’s latest book, Manitoba Senior Baseball South Central & Westman. Among the leagues covered are the Neepawa & District, Santa Clara, South Central, Yellowhead and the Manitoba Senior. The massive, 674-page book had a small run with the profits going to junior baseball in Neepawa. Sparling earlier produced books about amateur hockey in Neepawa from 1894 to 1989 and public-school hockey in the town from 1938 to 1968.

I Paid to Play the Game was written by retired Winnipeg information technologist Russell Rosen. The best way to tell the reader about this book is to crib from the cover blurb and the introduction. The timeframe is 1950 to 1965. At age 18, when he attended a baseball camp in Missouri, Rosen had played only one game of organized baseball. He spent the next four years attending baseball camps and was invited to attend the Minnesota Twins minor league spring training camp. Rosen suggests that his book might the first dedicated to baseball camps.

Duane Yerex from Eden was inducted into the Manitoba Baseball Hall of Fame in 2003. In 2010, he self-published his book, Baseball Memories, partly for his family to read down the road and partly for anyone interested in bygone days. He began playing baseball at age 16 in 1946 in Eden and the left-handed pitcher tells many stories about playing in leagues and tournaments in the Neepawa district for 12 years, and later managing in Neepawa.

A very different type of book is Small Town Baseball: Friendships and Friction, by retired educator Doug Muir, who grew up on a farm near High Bluff. He calls the book set in rural Nebraska a work of fiction. However, if you know the story of junior baseball in the early ’60s in Portage la Prairie, and some of the players of that era, you will see what Muir based his story upon and will be able to guess who the fictionalized players are. That Portage lineup included catcher Dave Shyiak and first baseman Ed Gilroy, both members of the Manitoba Softball Hall of Fame, hockey stars Dennis Hextall, Dave Janaway and John Vopni, and Aubrey Ferris, who later served as athletic director at the University of Winnipeg, Muir and Larry Owens played senior A fast pitch in Winnipeg.

The Everyman Curler: Oh! The Stories We Could Tell is by Rae Kujanpaa, who writes that you don’t have to be a pro to be rewarded by the game. He promises that the book will introduce the reader to memorable real-life characters, intense rivalries, and the life-long quest to climb the competitive ladder. Kujanpaa began curling in Rorketon at age 10 and played in what he wrote would be his final competitive event in the Canada 55+ Games, where he finally got to wear the buffalo and represent Manitoba. In the foreword, reporter/broadcaster Resby Coutts writes that through this book you’ll understand yourself or the curler in your life a little better.