Serie - Athletic Clubs

30 cm of primarily textual records

Series consists of records of Nahjus and Reipas Athletic Clubs including a listing of northwestern Ontario Finnish-Canadian sports clubs including club name, affiliation, active years and type of sport, photographs, newspaper articles of events, activities of the Club, membership lists and attendance records from the Nahjus Minute Book. A few booklets of Regulations on the 11th World Championship of Modern Gymnastics at Prague, 1965 and booklet on Army Physical Training Centre, Gymnastics Camp Borden,1959, are of particular interest.

These two athletic Clubs had very different beginnings. The Finnish Labour Temple was home for the Nahjus Athletic Club and this club made quite the mark in the community during the club's lifespan from 1920 to the mid-1950s. The club was an affiliate of the Canada Tyovaen Kannatus Litto (CTKL), a worker's organization using the Big Finn Hall (Labour Temple) as its branch headquarters in Port Arthur. In the Temple on Bay Street, the club had all the necessary apparatus for gymnastics, such as mats, a pommel horse, parallel bars, rings that hung from the ceiling, and a trampoline. Every year Nahjus presented its Annual Gymnastic Display. Property for outdoor sports, such as track & field was eventually leased from the City of Thunder Bay and is known today as George Burke Park.

Reipas Athletic Club was started in 1955 by Finnish immigrants who were looking for ways to maintain physical fitness, socialize and compete in sporting events. Primarily known for their activities outside the Big Finn Hall, including such sports as running, skiing, hockey, broomball, the Reipas Club maintained an affiliation with the Hall up until their disbandment in 2011.

The Minute book for the Nousu Athletic Club in Finnish is also included. This athletic club was active in the 1930s.

Nahjus 1920-1939; Reipas 1960-present; Nousu Athletic Club, Alppila, Ont. 1930s.