Carl Bruce, born in Wilmot, Nova Scotia, excelled as a junior in both hockey and baseball, being a smooth-skating centre on the ice lanes and a slick-fielding shortstop on the baseball diamond.
Following graduation from Middleton’s Macdonald School, Carl performed as a hockey and baseball Axeman during the academic years 1938-1941 and 1940-1941, starring with the powerful Middleton baseball Cardinals during the summer seasons.
During his initial season with the hockey Axemen in 1938-1939, he performed creditably as the team defeated St.F.X. and St. Mary’s College to win provincial intercollegiate honours. In May of that season the strong Middleton baseball team defeated the Axemen 6-3 with Carl Bruce being one of the game’s individual stars.
During the historic season of 1939-1940 when the hockey Axemen captured their first Maritime Inter-collegiate title, Bruce centered for wingers Johnny Wilson and Jack Murdock to form a potent trio. Playing on a team that was destined for induction to the Acadia Sports Hall of Fame this Middleton-area athlete enjoyed many fine moments.
In the final game for the 1940 Valley League championship against perennial rivals the Wolfville Cohorts, this smooth-skating stick-handling ‘whiz’ played his best contest of the season scoring a goal and assisting on another as the Axemen registered a 3-2 overtime victory.
In baseball that spring, the Acadia campus boasted such Nova Scotia senior stars as Jimmy Gray, Wilf Anderson, Gordon Troke, Guy Titus and Carl Bruce, the latter soon joining the senior Cardinals for the summer.
In his senior year, Bruce described in the Athenaeum as “veteran centre and captain” was considered the hockey Axemen’s spark plug, feeding accurate passes to line mates Theakston and Wilson, as the team defeated the Wolfville Cohorts to win the coveted R.G. Callendar Trophy. Individually, that winter in a 10-4 triumph over Windsor, Bruce notched a hat trick.
As a fitting tribute to this gifted performer he climaxed his Acadia experience as a recipient of the highly prized Cox Cup for best combining excellence in intercollegiate athletics extra-curricular activities and a high scholastic standing.
What a pleasure it is to welcome for induction to Acadia’s Sports hall of Fame Carl Bruce, one of the Axemen ‘ s most gifted hockey stars and one of the province’s premier baseball performers.
