Do the London Olympics inspire you to learn more about the history of the evolution of sports in Canada?  If so, a great place to begin your research is at Library and Archives Canada. We hold the records of the national bodies for the following sports:

• Football
• Hockey
• Swimming
• Synchronized Swimming
• Rowing
• Badminton
• Curling (men’s)
• Curling (women’s)
• Cricket
• Cycling
• Field Hockey
• Figure Skating
• Golf
• Track and Field
• Water Skiing
• Weightlifting
• Archery

You will also find more information in the Fitness and Amateur Sport Branch records of the former Department of National Health and Welfare (now Health Canada); this is the main source for learning about the federal government’s involvement in the area of sports. It includes over 40,000 photographs documenting the performance of Canadian athletes at national and international competitions (including the Olympics) during the 1960s and 1970s.

For more information on sports, please visit our other websites:

• Backcheck: A Hockey Retrospective
• Backcheck: Hockey for Kids
• Bonspiel! The History of Curling in Canada
• Celebrating Women’s Achievements
• Sporting Lives: Images of Canadian Athletes (archived site)

Please remember that not all of our material is available online; however, it is possible to order archival material through our online Request for Retrieval of Documents Form, or by telephone at 613-996-5115 or 1-866-578-7777 (toll-free).

Questions or comments? We would love to hear from you!

With the London Olympics well underway, it is fitting to remember the past Canadian accomplishments at the Games and to get acquainted with Canada’s relationship with sports throughout history.

For those interested in a visual history of Canada’s participation at the Olympic Games, Library and Archives Canada’s (LAC) Canadian Olympians database and web pages consist of more than 10,000 images of athletes from the 1904 St. Louis Olympics in the United States to the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Greece.

Some of the early important events in Canada’s Olympic history documented at LAC.

• The first winner of an Olympic gold medal as member of a Canadian athletic club, Étienne Desmarteau, of the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association, in 1904. The same club would also produce the first double gold medal winner, swimmer George Hodgson*, at the 1912 Olympics and the first two Stanley Cup champions in 1893 and 1894. The records of the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association are held by LAC.
• The creation and performance of the first Canadian Olympic team in 1908 through files found in the Jack Davies fonds.
• The two gold medals of Percy Williams and the achievements of the first Canadian women athletes Ethel Catherwood, Fanny Rosenfeld, Myrtle Cook, Ethel Smith and Jean Thomson at the 1928 Olympic Games.
• The Winnipeg Falcons, the first gold medal winner in hockey, at the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp, Belgium. LAC holds photographs and films of the activities and of the players at the Games taken by Konrad Johannesson, a member of the team.

*For more information on George Hodgson and other athletes, visit Sporting Lives: Images of Canadian Athletes (archived site).

Please remember that not all of our material is available online; however, it is possible to order archival material through our online Request for Retrieval of Documents Form, or by telephone at 613-996-5115 or 1-866-578-7777 (toll-free).

For more photographs from past Olympics, visit our Images of summer sports and leisure activities Flickr set.

Enjoy the London Games!

Questions or comments? We would love to hear from you!