On August 28, 1954, the British Columbia Lions made their debut in the Western Interprovincial Football Union narrowly losing to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers 8-6 at Empire Stadium in Vancouver.
Winnipeg halfback Tom Casey (#91) was a key player in the Bombers’ victory.
The game attracted a crowd of 20,606.
In 1993, the CFL expanded into the United States with the addition of the Sacramento Gold Miners. Here is an ad that appeared in the Sacramento Bee hyping the Gold Miners’ home opener at Hornet Field vs. the Calgary Stampeders.
The ad features a comparison of Sacramento quarterback David Archer to Calgary quarterback Doug Flutie.
Calgary won the game 38-36 in front of a crowd of 20,082.
In 1970-71, Hamilton’s Civic Stadium was heavily rebuilt to meet the needs of a modern professional football stadium. Originally built in 1928 for the British Empire Games (the forerunner to the Commonwealth Games), the stadium was dated and considered one of the worst stadiums in the country.
A new north grandstand was built, bringing the capacity to about 35,000. New lights were added – much to the delight of television broadcasters. And, all-season AstroTurf was installed, the first stadium in Canada to have it.
In 1971, the stadium was renamed Ivor Wynne Stadium in honour of the former chairman of the Hamilton parks board and athletics director at McMaster University. Ivor Wynne had died a year earlier.
The new state of the art stadium would host the 1972 Grey Cup the following year and continued to be Hamilton Tiger-Cats’ home until it was replaced by Tim Horton’s Field in 2014.
Here’s an interesting snippet of some facts about the 1910 Grey Cup final held in Hamilton, including the team rosters for the Hamilton Tigers and the University of Toronto.
The above article appeared in the Hamilton Spectator on the eve of the 2nd Grey Cup. The Hamilton Tigers were preparing to host the University of Toronto at the A.A.A. Grounds in Hamilton.
Note the new cheer being introduced:
O-S-K-E-W-A-W-A
W-H-I-S-K-E-We-We
H-O-L-Y M-A-K-I-N-A-W
T-I-G-E-R-S E-A-T E-M R-A-W
W-O-W!
A variation of the Oskee Wee Wee cheer is still performed at Hamilton Tiger-Cat games today.