Wilfred 'Boomer' Harding

Wilfred "Boomer" Harding (6 August 1915 – 14 September 1991) was a Canadian multi-sport athlete. He was best known as a baseball player with the Chatham Coloured All-Stars, and was the first Black player in the International Hockey League.

Biography Harding was born in Chatham, Ontario, to parents Sarah (Holmes) Harding and Andrew "Bill" Harding. He had seven siblings: Carl, Georgina, Florence, Beulah, James Leonard ("Len"), Andrew, and Wanda. Harding played baseball and ice hockey, while his abilities were also recognized in track as well as basketball and soccer.

Baseball career While he was a teenager, Harding joined the Chatham Coloured All-Stars, which was a local baseball team in Chatham, Ontario. His position was first baseman, and he was known to be on the bases regularly due to his hitting capabilities. The team was noticed by a local business owner, Archie Stirling an Ontario Baseball Amateur Association (OBAA) representative, who brought them to play in the league. Being an all-Black team, this was quite significant but also led to many challenges for the team regarding discrimination. Harding was one of the team members who faced this discrimination head-on, which brought him the respect of many people around him. Harding may also have been the first Black player to skate at the Detroit Olympia.

As the Chatham Coloured All-Stars had come to an end, Harding played on and managed a new baseball team that was formed in 1946 called the Taylor ACs, later known as the Taylor AC Panthers and Kent Panthers. These teams had many of Harding's former teammates, and years later the legacy carried on with the team containing children of the original All-Star members.

Later years Harding retired from working at the Chatham Post Office in 1975. As a veteran of World War II, he was also part of the Royal Canadian Legion in Branch 628 where he played soccer in the 1940s.

In 2015, Harding's daughter-in-law, Pat Harding, had a chance encounter with University of Windsor history professor Miriam Wright and spoke about scrapbooks she created with news clippings kept by Harding's mother. This led to a collaborative project between the Harding family, the University of Windsor, and the Chatham Sports Hall of Fame, preserving the history of Harding and the Chatham Coloured All-Stars. The project is titled "Breaking the Colour Barrier: Wilfred 'Boomer' Harding & the Chatham Coloured All-Stars (1932-1939)".