Canadian Indians taught ‘father’ of modern game

— Named the “Father of Modern Lacrosse,” Montreal-born William George Beers was just 19 when he wrote the rules for the game in 1860.

As a youngster, he grew up watching Akwesasne and Kahnawake Indians. These men played “mainly by instinct,” he observed, “but the Indian never can play as scientifically as the best white players.”

So, he applied rules (“science”) to this game that “employs the greatest combination of physical and mental activity white man can sustain in recreation.”

He became a renowned dentist and at his death in 1900 had amassed the greatest library of books on the subject in the nation. He was also a musician and A-list orator who used his talents to champion Canadian nationalism at a time whenmany thought Canada the next great U.S. acquisition. “Canada is not for sale,” he famously told an American conference of dentists.

History bore him out on Canadian sovereignty, but on lacrosse he was wrong. White nationals were influenced by what he considered Indians’ “instinct.” Not European order.

“They smack more of the ungoverned and ungovernable than the games of the Old World, and seem to resent the impost of regulations.”

ActiveStyle, Pages 34 on 05/30/2011

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