Tony Techko Collection

Accession Number 03-008

Techko Collection Finding Aid (PDF 318 Kb)

Anthony (Tony) Techko lived his life immersed in Windsor and Essex County sport. As an athlete, Techko played in two Windsor Federation Baseball League Championships in the 1940s and signed a professional contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team in 1948. He would later become a teacher and administrator at Forester, Herman, Riverside and Walkerville high schools in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. Techko coached baseball and basketball, and was President of the Windsor Coaches Association and Windsor Secondary School Athletics, Secretary for South West Ontario Secondary School Athletics, a panel member for the University of Windsor Christmas Basketball Tournament, and an administrator at Windsor's International Coaches Clinic. Included in Techko’s legacy is his position as a founding member of the Windsor/Essex County Sports Hall of Fame. He was born in 1931 and died in 2000.

Techko co-authored the book The Olympians Among Us in 1995 with Carl Morgan. He regularly published articles pertaining to Windsor area sport heroes in Windsor This Month, a local magazine, and contributed numerous other works to publications such as the Financial Post. Some local sports heroes and events Techko wrote about include Assumption College’s double victories over the Harlem Globetrotters, baseball legend Justin Clarke, track great John Loaring, the Ford V8's and a piece titled “Assumptions Almighty Five” included in William Humber and John St. James’s book All I Thought About Was Baseball. Techko also served as the local sports authority on CBC Radio’s Morning Watch.

This collection contains files created by Tony Techko consisting of newspaper articles, photographs, correspondence, and memorabilia pertaining to athletes, organizations, and all facets of sports history in Windsor and Essex County. A biography section includes over one-thousand files pertaining to various sports figures and Windsor/Essex County sports hall-of-famers. Also present are Techko’s supporting notes and numerous files demonstrative of his passion for his work and the organizations to which he was a member. An extensive collection charting the history of high school sport and a set of Walkerville Collegiate Vocational Institute Blue and White yearbooks dating back to the opening of the school in 1927 until 1983, highlight the value of this collection. Personal memoirs and effects from local sport personalities such as Elmer Skov and Bert Foote add a personal touch to the history of sport in Windsor and Essex County.