Sam Jacks

Who was Sam Jacks?

Samuel Perry Jacks was the Canadian inventor of the sport of ringette and floor hockey. He was posthumously inducted into Canada's Sports Hall of Fame in 2007.

Jacks moved to Canada with his family in 1920 and his first exposure to sport was in 1935 when he was the assistant physical director at the West End YMCA in Toronto. One year later, he would invent floor hockey. He created the first set of rules for floor hockey, an achievement later recognized by the United Nations.

From 1940 to 1945, he served with the Canadian Forces as a member of the 1st Parachute Battalion. After his military service, he met Agnes and they were married. They had three sons, Barry, Bruce and Brian. They lived in Toronto and Jacks worked at the West End YMCA in Toronto. In 1948, he was asked to become director of parks and recreation for the city of North Bay, Ontario. He was instrumental in developing the first Northern Ontario Playground Hockey Association which encouraged youth to play hockey on outdoor rinks. He then invented the sport of ringette because for a long time he saw that females needed a team sport to play on the ice rink.