• Age: 15
• Grade: 10

Jim Coleman saw the Victoria Cougars win the Stanley Cup in 1925 and the Team Canada-Russia hockey showdown in 1972. He saw Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth slam homers in training camp and was there when Jack Dempsey KO'd Jack Sharkey. He interviewed a young man named Jackie Robinson who wistfully dreamed of the day when black men might play in baseball's major leagues. And he won his greatest fame as a chronicler of the characters of horse racing's shedrow--Johnny Needle-Nose, the Blow-Back Kid, Knifey, the Good Kid, Sir Benjamin Stockley and many more.

From 1939 until his death at 89, Coleman covered every sport imaginable with eloquence, wit and an unfailing love that earned him a position as Canada's first nationally syndicated sports columnist, membership in five Canadian Sports Halls of Fame, the Order of Canada and status as the country's most beloved sportswriter. Sports columnist, Jim Taylor discovered Coleman's columns in an old filing cabinet after Coleman's death and assembled the finest pieces. The result is The Best of Jim Coleman, an insightful, fall-down funny, lump-in-the-throat history from the man who was there to witness the great moments and characters of North American sport.

Born in 1911, Jim Coleman grew up in the 1920s criss-crossing North America to attend hockey games and horse races, thanks to his father's job with the CPR. Coleman's newspaper career began with the Winnipeg Tribune, but he spent most of his career in Toronto where he eventually wrote a syndicated column for Southam News. Later, he wrote a sports nostalgia column for the Vancouver Province. He wrote three previous books: Hockey is Our Game, A Hoofprint on My Heart and Long Ride on a Hobby-Horse. Jim Coleman passed away in 2000.

Jim Coleman's profile page

Born on March 16, 1937 in Nipawin, Saskatchewan, Jim Taylor of West Vancouver was B.C.'s most widely-read sports columnist. Taylor began his newspaper career in 1954 as a part-time sports reporter at the Daily Colonist in Victoria and later wrote for the Vancouver Sun, the Vancouver Province and the Calgary Sun. He became a nationally syndicated sports columnist, author, and broadcaster. His 1987 chronicle of Rick Hansen's wheelchair journey, Man In Motion, reputedly had a record first printing for a B.C. book. In addition to Taylor's books on Wayne Gretzky, entitled Gretzky:The Authorized Pictorial Biography with Wayne Gretzky, and B.C. Lions` Jim Young, entitled Dirty Thirty. Taylor is credited with the re-write of a Soviet journalist's biography of Igor Larionov. In 2004, he compiled The Best of Jim Coleman: Fifty Years of Canadian Sport from the Man Who Saw it All. A member of the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame and the Canadian Football League Hall of Fame, Taylor was awarded a lifetime achievement award by Sports Media Canada in 2000. He began his writing career as part-time high school sports reporter, drank beer from the Stanley Cup, saw Paul Henderson score "The Goal" in 1972, predicted rookie placekicker Lui Passaglia wouldn`t last with the BC Lions more than one season and wrote more than 8,000 newspaper columns. He recalls his half-century as a sports writer in Hello, Sweetheart? Gimme Rewrite!

Jim Taylor's profile page

"From Coleman's 2,500 columns, Taylor has selected stories about King Clancy, and Robinson before baseball's integration, about war ending and fish tales and bear tales and discovering, in 1943, that 1908 heavyweight champion Jack Johnson was on display in a freak show. Coleman's columns are a Canterbury Tales of sports as he introduces readers to colourful, odd characters, themselves often the storytellers in his columns."
- Iain MacIntyre, Vancouver Sun

Praise from the Vancouver Sun

"A brilliant collection of Coleman's work, his wit and his humour."
—Stephen Knight, Quill & Quire

"Coleman covered them all - from Canadian pro football to Canadian-Russian hockey exploits - that's evident"
"He writes of both four and two-legged racing characters with an insider's appreciation, wonder and wit."
"Many of his tales are not only tale, they're also high, wide and handsome. This is affectionate, entertaining sports nostalgia..."
—Stewart Brown, The Hamilton Spectator

"A must-read for all sports fans is a collection of columns by Jim Coleman, who spent more than 50 years at the absolute top of this sportswriting dodge in Canada."
- John Short, Edmonton Journal

Praise from the Edmonton Journal

The Best of Jim Coleman: Fifty Years of Canadian Sport from the Man Who Saw It All