Massey, Ontario

gushing waterfall

2,333 miles

May 15 – Massey is a little hamlet just outside of Chutes Provincial Park, which is full of recreational opportunities like biking, birding, fishing, hiking, & swimming.  The park was named after a logging chute that was used to divert logs around the waterfall on the Aux Sables River.  This waterfall and the Seven Sisters Rapids upstream are the main attraction at the park, although, sadly, the waterfall does not have a name of its own.

Massey claims to be the hometown of broomball.  Broomball is a Canadian ice game played in a hockey rink, either indoors or outdoors.  There are 2 teams of 6 players: a goaltender and 5 others.

corn husk broomsticks

Players hit a small ball around the ice with a stick called a "broom."  The “broom” originated as a traditional bundle of corn stalks tied to a stick, worn out or with the bristles cut off. 

Now the broom has a rubber-molded triangular head with a similar shape.  (In the Canadian sport of curling, too, a “broom” is used, in that case to scrape the ice smooth.)

Players wear special rubber-soled shoes instead of skates, and the ice is prepared in such a way that it is smooth and dry to improve traction.

The object of the game is to score more goals than the opponent by using the broom to hit the ball into the opponent's net. Tactics and plays are similar to those used in sports such as ice hockey, roller hockey and floorball.

The exact origin of broomball is murky, just as with most sports.  Some think it came about by trying to play ice hockey without ice skates. The first recorded broomball games in North America were in Perdue, Saskatchewan on March 5, 1909, although people claim that broomball was being played here in Massey as early as the 1890s. From Canada the game spread south to the United States, becoming especially popular in Minnesota, where by the 1960s a broomball community was thriving.  Broomball spread internationally, and by the 1980s, organized broomball was being played in Australia, Japan, Sweden, Italy, Germany, and Switzerland.

info: Wikipedia.com

images:  Google Images