The North Bay Sports Hall of Fame induction dinner series began in 1980, three years after the Hall's founding in 1977. The first dinner was simply an induction affair, to honour the newly named members of the Hall. In 1982, the committee behind the USAF Sports Achievement Award asked that the second induction dinner be used as the vehicle to recognize the recipient of the USAF Trophy and that tradition has continued to this day. In 1984 the winners of the Reynolds (hockey), Mitchell (football), Brennan (coach/ executive) and Martyn (basketball) awards also came on board and two years later the Knapp (softball) recipients began to be honoured in this fashion as well.

In 1988 the Palangio (sportsperson) committee turned that award over to the North Bay Sports Award Committee and the NBSHF. In 1995 the newly created Britt Jessup Award winners (male and female athlete to provincial level) were recognized at the Hall of Fame affair. In recent years two other new awards were added to the dinner roster- the Kelly for Team of the year and the Handley Friend of Sport. Both of these were instituted from within the Hall Board itself. The NBSHF dinner, which began as an induction event, has become an Induction and Awards evening, a vehicle by which the recipients of all of the major city wide individual sports awards as well as the newest members of the Hall of Fame, are recognized and feted in a public forum.

The 29th Annual Induction and Awards Dinner for the North Bay Sports Hall of Fame was held with a capacity crowd on hand, Saturday, April 25, 2009 at the Best Western on Lakeshore Drive.

For further information, contact: Pete Handley (472-3573), Bill Jacko (476-1429), or Dave Saad (476-3421).

To download a copy of the program (in adobe pdf format) from past Induction dinners, click on the appropriate year: 2004 2005 2007 2008 2009