For biographical information and details on the sporting
achievements of the inductees please click a picture below
or the link to the "Full Story".
ATHLETE
Garry Dorchester
Garry
Dorchester was the eldest son of the legendary Tom Dorchester and grew
up traveling the professional chuckwagon circuit with his parents and
siblings. During his relatively short 13 year career as a chuckwagon
driver from 1966 to 1979, Garry won 14 races, a Central Alberta
Chuckwagon Championship, a World Chuckwagon Championship and placed
inside the top 10 in the world standings nine times. Throughout his
chuckwagon career, Garry competed with a sense of skill, energy,
emotion, courage and ...
Don
Duncalfe is being inducted into the Wetaskiwin and County Sports Hall of
Fame for being the first graduate of the Wetaskiwin High School Sabre
Football program to have a professional football career. In 1958 Don
played for the London Lords of the Ontario Rugby Football Union
and for five seasons from 1959 - 1963, Don was a member of the Edmonton
Eskimos Football Team of the CFL. Don played high school football for
the undefeated 1954, 1955, 1956 Wetaskiwin Composite High School Sabres,
teams that won three league championships and went 23 games without a
loss. In his grade 12 year Don was invited to attend the Edmonton
Eskimo Rookie Tryout Camp and subsequently...
Born and raised in Wetaskiwin, from an
early age Ross participated and excelled in community and school sports
including hockey, ball, football, basketball and curling. At University
Ross played hockey and football for the University of Alberta
Golden
Bears. He continued his participation in sports into adulthood by
playing Senior Hockey and ball. After graduating in 1964 from the
University of Alberta, Ross started his thirty-two year lifework as a
physical education teacher. As such he shared his expertise and
enthusiasm by coaching young people and becoming involved in the
administrative aspects of amateur sport, all in his home community of Wetaskiwin. Ross’s hockey playing career spanned forty-eight years
(1948-1996)...
Al
Sandahl played football and basketball and participated in track
but football was what he pursued. After a successful
football career at the Junior and College levels, Al became involved in
coaching. He spent 34 years coaching football, basketball and
track at high schools and colleges in the USA as well as spending one
year coaching in the NFL. Al successfully coached many individuals
in high school and college who were able to receive scholarships or NFL
or CFL contracts. Many of the teams where Al was a member of the
coaching staff were conference champions, involved in state
championships, or “Bowl” champions.
Bill
Milnthorp has been dedicated to recreation and sport in the Wetaskiwin
area for most of the 52 years that he has lived in Wetaskiwin. He has
served on many recreation committees, organized many fund raising
ventures, initiated some sporting activities, was Chairman or President
of numerous sports-related organizations, coached teams in various
sports and at many levels and through his varied and extensive
involvement has made significant contributions to the citizens of our
community. Bill’s involvement began in 1961 when he supervised and ran a
Junior High football program on Saturday mornings. In 1962 when
Wetaskiwin opened a new arena...
In
1952 the Wetaskiwin City Council set up the Wetaskiwin Recreation
Commission and Bill Bell-Bathgate was hired in 1956. He was 32 years
old and held the position for twelve years. Although he had
no formal training he had been involved in sports in Wetaskiwin (coached
hockey, refereed hockey, started a football team), knew there was a lot
of sport talent in the city and had the leadership qualities necessary
for the job. When Bill became the Recreation
Director, the Kinsmen outdoor swimming pool had just opened, the city
had approved money for improving the Recreation Hall and under Bill’s
leadership the Recreation Commission took over ...
The
1986 Sabres were one of those special, strong and talented teams, League
Champions that played in the Provincial Championships at the Tier I
level even though Wetaskiwin High School was classified as a Tier II
school that year. They were able to shake off a 27-0 loss to the
Stettler Wildcats in their opening game and finished the remainder of
the season undefeated. Statistically, the Sabres ranked highly in
offense, defense and special teams. Most impressive was the Sabre’s
passing game...
