DIDSBURY -- Didsbury's own Herman Dorin was inducted into the Alberta Sports Hall of Fame at a special ceremony in Red Deer on May 31 as a pioneer in wrestling.
Dorin, who lives in Didsbury with his wife Shirley, began wrestling in the late 1940s.
He was honoured at a celebration held at Bethany Care Didsbury by the Rec Therapy Adult Day Program staff on June 5.
At the event, Didsbury mayor Rhonda Hunter said that people like Herman Dorin are what makes Didsbury such a great community.
"Didsbury is certainly very proud of you," said Hunter. "I just returned from a conference in Quebec City. The theme of the conference was building better lives. It's so fitting. People like Herman do build better lives for the people they touch."
Dorin competed in the light-heavyweight and heavyweight categories and was undefeated in provincial competition for 15 years, from 1951-1966. He also competed at three national championships and placed second in 1957.
Dorin told the Gazette it was an honour to be selected to the hall.
"It felt really great," said Dorin. "Wrestling has played such a very big role in my life."
Dorin said the induction ceremony was very nice. Several members of his family came from near and far to attend the prestigious event.
"It was really quite good," he said. "Every one of the inductees went up and made a little speech. I enjoyed it a lot. My whole family filled one table of eight. My one daughter came up from Las Vegas."
Dorin wrestled at the University of Alberta in Edmonton in the late 1940s and early 1950s. He also became the head coach after the coach died in the Korean War.
"In 1950-51 I basically took over the big responsibility of keeping the team alive," he said. "I coached it until 1954. At that time I married my wife and we went to Germany for a year."
In Edmonton, Dorin created a city-wide system for wrestling and founded the Edmonton Amateur Wrestling Federation. He became a teacher and formed wrestling clubs at each school where he taught. During the 1970s he taught wrestling at Didsbury and coached the Olds College team.
He also recruited several young wrestlers from this area and took them to the Alberta Games in 1980, 1982 and 1984 where they took home two gold medals and two silver medals in total.
