Congratulations are in order for Alexander "Red" Sangster as the Thompson Community Foundation named him Sept. 28 as the recipient of the third annual Order of Thompson award. Hats off, too, to the foundation for both instituting the award in 2010 and choosing such worthy recipients to date.
A selection committee, acting on the foundation's behalf, is charged with coming up with an annual recipient who exemplifies the criteria of building Thompson through philanthropy, business, recreation, volunteerism, community spirit, and ambassadorship. Volker Beckmann, owner of Design North, but perhaps best known for his involvement throughout the community, including acting as project co-ordinator and staunch advocate for Spirit Way, won the inaugural award, followed last year by Gail and Arnold Morberg.
The Morbergs founded Calm Air in 1962 in Stony Rapids, Sask. to move guests and supplies to the Morberg's fishing camp on Black Lake in Saskatchewan. In 1969, the Morberg's bought Fred Chupka's Northern Manitoba airline operation based in Lynn Lake where they operated for the next 16 years before moving their head office to Thompson in 1985. Arnold died in 2005 and Gail sold Calm Air to Exchange Industrial Income Fund (EIIF) in 2009.
It's always a bit hard to gauge at first how a new anything will go over in Thompson. An "Order of Thompson" struck a few as a tad high falutin sounding for the nickel mining Hub of the North three years ago, but time has proved it a valuable mark of recognition for those who have demonstrated their long-term commitment to Thompson through their perseverance and staying power, qualities that are needed here now more than ever.
And if ever there were a down to earth deserving guy, Red Sangster, the face of Thompson baseball for half a century and a member of the Manitoba Baseball Hall of Fame, would surely be him. The Order of Thompson is just the latest in his long list of achievements and accolades. He was inducted into the Manitoba Baseball Hall of Fame in 1997, while the Thompson Reds, also named for Sangster, from the period between 1968 and 1973 were inducted in the special team category in 2003.
As far back as 44 years ago in 1968, Sangster was named Minor Hockey Volunteer of the year by the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association. In 1970, he won a Manitoba Historical Society Centennial Medal with the citation reading, "For his great contribution to sports and recreation in Thompson." In 1983, he was named Citizen of the Year Award by the Thompson Lions Club.
Born in 1924 on a farm near Walkerburn, Sangster, told the Thompson Citizen in a March 2010 video interview he started playing baseball when he was 15. He first came to Northern Manitoba by way of Snow Lake and later Thompson in 1960 as an employee of Paddy Harrison, working as a mechanic underground at the Moak Lake site. He returned to Thompson in 1961 when Inco began production, and worked as a mechanic at the mill for six months.Soon after, he would begin working the Local Government District of Mystery Lake as a grader operator, grading roads in the summer and plowing snow in the winter. He did that for 18 years.
He was already in Thompson when the original C.A. Nesbitt Arena was constructed. At the grand re-opening of the refurbished facility more than 40 years later, he told the assembled crowd that it took 133 train cars to bring the disassembled aircraft hangar that became the arena from Bird on the Bayline, near Fox Lake, where it had previously served as part of the Mid Canada Line, a string of military sites along the 55th parallel, designed to detect enemy aircraft that had penetrated into the heart of North America. Arena construction began in 1964 and took a little over a year, with the official opening taking place Jan. 29, 1966.
Sangster also revealed how he had it named it after former local government administrator Carl Nesbitt during his three-year term as recreation director, which started in 1967. Sangster even erected a sign with the new name three weeks before he had permission and was forced to cover it with paper when government officials came for a visit.
"No one right from day one did as much as Red to make sure we had facilities to play," said Mayor Tim Johnston at the re-opening of the C.A. Nesbitt Arena.
Sangster's named is so synonymous with baseball in Thompson, the Red Sangster Ball Field, constructed in 1968, was named after him in 1992. The ballpark was built mostly by hand and required clearing trees that were then used to make a fence for the Thompson Zoo, which Sangster had paired up with Hawley Duncan and Len Fenske to start.
Even so, Sangster Red faced a big curve ball less than three years ago when the University College of the North (UCN) wanted to build its new campus student housing behind the Thompson Regional Community Centre, which would have meant the ball field would have to be obliterated in its current location and moved elsewhere.
For a five-month period between October 2009 and March 2010, UCN, the City of Thompson and Province of Manitoba were intent on moving Red Sangster Ball Field. Johnston, in fact, said the city's hand were tied: ""Our challenge as a council is how to balance off the diamond and the university," said the mayor. "It's very hard to make everyone happy all the time."
Indeed. Following a public outcry, UCN backed off and relocated its student housing slightly to the southwest, saving the Red Sangster Ball Field, and showing Sangster to be a pretty fair clutch hitter in the bottom of the ninth.
Well done, all around, Red. Congratulations.
