Caledon Sport Hall of Fame welcomes eight, plus championship team, as Class of 2025

By Jim Stewart

Eight athletes and builders, along with a championship hockey team, were enshrined in the annual Caledon Sport Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony on Wednesday evening at the CECC Banquet Hall.

The 2025 Inductees in the Athlete Category were triathlete Lisa Bentley, synchronized swimmer Beverly (McKnight) Holden, field hockey Goaltender Zoe MacKinnon, NHL Power Forward Keith McCreary, and pole vaulter Douglas Wood.

Wood was also enshrined in the Builder Category as a pole vaulting coach.

Two other Builders were inducted: Nordic Skiing Coach and High School Sports Coach Angus Doughty; and Triathlon Coach Barrie Shepley, who multi-tasked seamlessly and masterfully as the event's emcee for the second consecutive year.

Caledon's Town Crier Andrew Welch clanged his brass hand bell to bring the sold-out crowd to order.

With the traditional booming voice that goes with his ceremonial role, Welch brought greetings from the Town in classic 19th-century formality.

He introduced Ward Four Councillor Nick deBoer who brought greetings on behalf of Mayor Annette Groves who sent her regrets. 

deBoer offered “Congratulations from the Town of Caledon to all the recipients for all your achievements” and encouraged all attendees “to visit the Hall of Fame exhibits on the second floor.”

Lori Dupuis, Chair of the CSHOF Selection Committee, thanked “five local sports organizations that bought tables for tonight's event—the Cavaliers Rugby Football Club, the Coyotes Girls Hockey Association, the Caledon Soccer Club, the Golden Hawks Hockey Club, and the Dorado Stars Swim Club.”

Dupuis praised the inductees for being “role models for the youth of Caledon.”

“The highlight of tonight,” began Shepley, “will be the induction of the 1967 Bolton Kinsmen Juvenile ‘C' hockey squad in the Team Category.”

The emcee announced the inductees connected to the Ontario Hockey Champs: Don Casey, Jim Casey, Bill Clements, John Deachman, Jim Farquharson, Eugene Fewster, Perry Ford, Wayne Kirby, Karl Koper, Dale Lemon, John Lostchuck (manager), Chris Markey, Peter Markle (trainer), Bruce Matson, Roy McKay (coach), Henry Newlove, Ted Praught, and Rob Salvian. 

After the congenial Shepley introduced the ‘67 Ontario Champion Juvenile C Bolton Kinsmen, he reminded the audience about “something else that happened way back in 1967” – eliciting groans and cheers from the Leafs fans in attendance. 

Assistant Captain Jim Farquharson acknowledged his “great coach Roy McKay who was a stone mason.

Roy employed many of us on the team in the summer – slinging stone kept us in great shape for the season.” 

Eugene Fewster promised to speak for one minute and proceeded to offer a series of anecdotes that took him into “quadruple overtime” much to the amusement of his audience.

Fewster made an opening pitch for his alma mater Colgate University as a great place to play hockey and then acknowledged his “connection to Keith McCreary in 1967 and what a thrill it was to meet an NHL player in such a fine dressing room.”

He remembered fondly his role “as a member of the Kid Line—how we would tire out the other team's top lines with our young legs so our older players could do the damage against tired players.”

He brought the house down when remembered telling Coach McKay to cut his post-game speech short one night because “I had a cool car outside with a hot woman in it.”

Shepley marveled at the team's good health and wished that his rec hockey team had some of the Kinsmen on their side during a Wednesday morning game.

In a skillful transition from ice hockey to field hockey, Zoe MacKinnon's career highlights were presented by Shepley, including backstopping Canada's national squad at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles and winning the gold medal at the Canada Summer Games while still a student at Mayfield Secondary School.

MacKinnon's enshrinement was done posthumously and Zoe's sister, Fran Singer, brought greetings on behalf of her appreciative family.

“On behalf of Zoe, I wanted to thank the Town of Caledon for the great honor of being inducted into the Caledon Sports Hall of Fame.”

Beverly Holden was accompanied to the stage by her grandson, Jake, who spoke on behalf of his grandmother. Holden delivered a heartwarming tribute to his “Mimi.”

“Bev and her family have called Caledon home since 1921. My grandmother just recently celebrated her 90th birthday and she continues to bring the vitality, passion, and grace to life that she brought to her synchronized swimming career. She'll always be a legend to us for her resilience as well as her determination and grit. We're a multi-generational family of athletes because of her.”

Beverly Holden won Canada's first international medal in synchronized swimming when she captured bronze at the 1955 Pan-Am games. With her swimming partner Diane Ferguson, Holden won the Ontario Duet and Canadian Duet Championships in 1954.

Left winger Keith McCreary played in the NHL for parts of ten seasons with Montreal, Pittsburgh, and Atlanta from a playoff appearance with the Canadiens in 1961-62 to his final season with the Flames in 1974-75.

McCreary's most productive season was in 1968-69 when he fired 25 goals and 23 assists for the Penguins.  The power forward scored 131 goals and earned 112 assists in his 532-game career.

He had three 20+ goal seasons—two as a Penguin and he scored 20 as the Captain of the Atlanta Flames in their inaugural season in 1972-73.

McCreary's daughter, Wendy, spoke on behalf of her father who passed away from pancreatic cancer in 2003. Wendy engaged the audience with a series of anecdotes and noted, “Dad's in really good company and his memory lives on in so many stories, many of which I can't share with you since we had a rule around the kitchen table about not sharing dad's stories that he would bring back from the rink.  He was known for his loyalty off the ice and his tenacity on the ice. His life unfolded in two parts:  as a dedicated NHL player playing for Montreal, Pittsburgh, and being the first captain of the Atlanta Flames. He carried on with the same dedication in the second part as a Regional Councillor for ten years—he was the voice for the residents of Bolton.  Our family offers a humble and heartfelt thank you to the Selection Committee.  Success is best when it is shared.”

Shepley marveled at “tiny Caledon's capacity to generate so many world class athletes” and introduced Lisa Bentley who has “won eleven Ironman Triathlon races, including one during which she suffered from an appendix rupture.”

Shepley also acknowledged that the indefatigable Bentley has earned all these athletic accolades while battling Cystic Fibrosis.

The 16-time ½ Ironman Triathlon champion spoke glowingly of her hometown: “The Hills of Caledon were my playground.”

The international top tier elite athlete—whose inspirational life story is encapsulated in her book An Unlikely Champion – noted that “Sport gave me a gift” and she made an impassioned plea for the community to see the value of sports.

“Please embrace sports. It will change your life and your world.”

In 2006, Bentley finished 3rd at the Hawaii Ironman World Championship and 2nd at the ½ Ironman World Championships. 

Angus Doughty was introduced by Shepley as an “influential and dedicated coach for three decades whose Nordic ski teams at Mayfield won 30+ medals and three of his skiers represented Canada at the World Championships and Olympics.”

Doughty, whose coaching duties included high school rugby, flag football, and swimming, thanked “the administrators at Mayfield who supported extracurricular activities as well as the dedicated coaching staff, but most of all I want to thank the athletes for their energy and enthusiasm which gave me so much joy and made it all so memorable.”

Similar to Bentley's impassioned plea for the community to embrace sport, Doughty called for the public to “support extracurricular activities in the schools” in the light of recent cutbacks to the education system.

Douglas Wood was presented as a double-inductee by Shepley who noted that the pole vaulter represented Canada at the 1992 Summer Olympics and earned a silver medal at the 1991 Pan-Am Games.

The emcee praised Wood for being “the founder of Bolton Pole Vault, which had grown the Town into the Pole Vault Capital of Canada.”

Shepley pointed to “the success of Caledon's Alicia Newman whose bronze medal at the 2024 Olympics was the first-ever medal won by a Canadian in the sport.”

Wood noted that he was “very honored to be inducted with this group of athletes and builders.”

“I've been involved with pole vaulting for 45 years. A single word to describe my connection to my sport would be: Grateful. My family supported me ridiculously because pole vaulting is not lucrative”—eliciting much laughter from attendees. 

Wood acknowledged the importance of his high school coach with whom he “learned the sport together with Super 8 movies of pole vaulters.”

The current pole vault guru added, “in closing, with Alicia's success, we hope to build a training facility at Humberview Secondary School since there hasn't been any new infrastructure spending on track and field facilities in the GTA since the training centre was built at York University. It's time for a second training facility for our athletes.”

To close the highlight reel evening, OPP Officer Andrew Yorke enshrined Triathlon Coach Barrie Shepley as a Builder.

Officer Yorke praised Shepley for his coaching abilities and for turning him into as Shepley described “the all-time fastest OPP officer ever.”

Officer Yorke also lauded Shepley's significant contributions to community, most notably “being the driving force behind the James Dick Quarry recreation facility in Caledon that includes the Karen Shepley Dog Park” named after Shepley's late wife.

Yorke added that “it's the best dog park in Canada” and applauded the transformation of a decommissioned sand quarry into a flourishing “C3 facility—a place for a swim, canoeing, paddle boarding, and lots of other water sports.” 

The emcee amused the gathering by opening with, “I should have had Eugene Fewster deliver my speech – if we had more time.” 

After the laughter died down, Shepley acknowledged that “I was a dreamer as a kid and I was lucky to have a family that encouraged dreaming. My dad often asks me, ‘What is it that you actually do?'”

After thanking his family, his C3 family, his business partner Sheldon, and his late wife Karen for their support of his many endeavors, the gracious Shepley offered a metaphor to close the festivities.

“A rocket can't get off the ground without rocket fuel. Two people provided my fuel: Sheldon and Karen.”

Shepley closed the second annual Caledon Sports Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony by turning to the eternally-youthful 1967 Ontario champion Bolton Kinsmen.

“My highlight of the day was to meet you guys, to see the love of sport that exists in 75-year-olds, and to see the joy you created by gathering with us here tonight.”