When he lived in Weyburn, James Chrones actively supported semi-pro baseball and junior hockey. He moved to Saskatoon in 1930 (1929?) and continued his interest in softball and baseball by sponsoring women’s and men’s teams.

In 1950, James and his son Jack entered a financial arrangement with the Bentley brothers (Bev, Doug, Max, Reg, and Roy) of Delisle. The Bentleys were well-known hockey players, but in the off-season, they were also baseball players. Under the arrangement with the Chrones family, the Delisle team was initially renamed the Delisle Gems and played in the Northern Saskatchewan Senior Baseball League. By 1952, the team was known as the Saskatoon Gems.

James Chrones, and his son Jack, celebrate the baseball ownership arrangement with the Bentley family.
Left to right: Max Bentley, Reg Bentley, Doug Bentley, James Chrones, Roy Bentley, Bev Bentley, and Jack Chrones.
Source: Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, May 10, 1950, p. 25

By the mid-1950s, the team was owned by the Saskatoon Gems Baseball Club and played in the Western Canadian Baseball League.   In 1955, the team was the pennant winner in this League’s regular season and runners-up to the Edmonton Eskimos in the playoff championship series.

Saskatoon Gems, 1955

Back row, left to right: George Nesbitt (vice-president), Flo Wenzel (secretary), Don Kirk, Len Breckner, Gordon Johnson, Charlie Bogan, Lew Hobson, Jackie McLeod, Benny Griggs, Percy Trimont, Earl Huffman, Segio Fabre, Jim Chrones (president)

Middle Row: Bobby Reid (trainer), Joe Kretschmar, Jack Motley, Cliff Pemberton (captain), Ralph Mabee (general manager), Jose Valladarez, Mario Herrera, Jim Shirley

Front Row: Michael Pemberton and Kenny Robertson; Missing from Picture: Bob Jones and Reg Pendleton

Source: Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, September 15, 1955, p. 17

James Chrones and Spero Leakos were among 30 shareholders who had committed to covering the team’s annual operating deficits of the Saskatoon Gems Baseball Club. In 1957 for example, the team incurred a yearend deficit which required each director to personally pay $240 to cover the shortfall.

A tray of money was collected from team shareholders (at $240 each) to cover the 1957 losses of the Saskatoon Gems Baseball Club.
Left to right: Bill Horborenko, Jim Chrones, and Wilf Johnston
Source: Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, November 13, 1957, p. 19.

In 1958, the Leakos family took over ownership of the Saskatoon Gems; Spero Leakos became the team’s manager and coach. The team’s name was changed to Saskatoon Commodores.

The Leakos family owners of the Saskatoon Commodores
Left to right: Spero Leakos (general manager), Steve Leakos (president), and Jimmy Danabassis (secretary)
Source: Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, June 9, 1958, p. 15.

Spero’s teams mostly consisted of young American college players, who mentored a few Saskatchewan players – most notably, Terry Puhl from Melville who was later recruited by and played for the Houston Astros from 1977 to 1990. According to Spero, major league baseball scouts paid particular attention to the young talent that he recruited for the Saskatoon Commodores:

“The major league teams used to send kids here because we played 72 games and it was a major league-type schedule. In other words, with that type of schedule, they could assess pretty well if a kid had major-league potential. There is no question that this was a stepping stone to the majors. You could see it was major league talent you were looking at every day” (Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, September 11, 1982, p. F2).

Spero considered the 1961 Commodores to be his best team. The team lost only eight games that year and nine of the ten spots on the all-star teams were secured by Commodores’ players. Five players from that team later played in major league teams – catcher John Boccabella (Chicago Cubs, Montreal Expos, and San Francisco Giants), shortstop Ernie Fazio (Houston Astros and Kansas City Royals), pitcher Dan Schneider (Milwaukee Brewers, Atlanta Braves, and Houston Astros), infielder Darrell Sutherland (New York Mets and Cleveland Indians), and infielder Tim Cullen (Washington Senators).

The Saskatoon Commodores played in the Western Canada League in 1963 when Spero moved the team to Medicine Hat. The team returned to Saskatoon in 1964 and played in the Northern Saskatchewan League and the Southern League until 1972, after which the team ceased operations.

Researched by Ken Pontikes, June 2, 2024.

Spero Leakos’ Deep Connections to Saskatoon’s Baseball Scene

Spero Leakos is never far away from a baseball diamond.  To be honest, Leakos thinks there hasn’t been a summer in at least 37 years that he wasn’t involved with a baseball team at some level.  And even when the Western Canada Baseball League, a high-profile league which hired American college players in the summer and spawned some major leaguers, decided to take a year away from its normally-solid operations in 1962, Leakos turned his attention to coaching at a minor level.

Leakos has enjoyed a long-standing love affair with the baseball partly because he admires the game but mostly because “of the people, the lasting friendships, the knowledge that young players want to play the game and are prepared to work for it, and the hope that somewhere along the line, you can help some young people.”

Leakos says his love for sports was inherited from his father, Steve, a longtime Saskatoon restauranteur, “who never played the games but was active as sponsors of softball, baseball, and basketball teams, and as a youngster, I travelled with the teams he sponsored.  It was part of his commitment to the community and, in those days, our restaurant became the place for athletes to meet.”

Spero played basketball, soccer, baseball, and track and field at Nutana Collegiate; played basketball and soccer during the one year he attended the University of Saskatchewan.  Later, he played basketball for Dorns and the Olympics and coached the Osler Monarchs to the provincial softball finals in 1953.  His brother, Jim, played softball, basebball, basketball, track, and soccer before becoming a prominent horseman in later years.  His sister, Evangeline, played with Jack Adilman’s Aces in women’s basketball.

For two years, Leakos and the Bentley brothers, Doug and Max, operated the Saskatoon Quaker junior hockey franchise but when he became part of the Saskatoon Gems as a community-operated baseball team in 1957, he had to make a choice betwen sports.  He liked baseball’s shorter season.  Then, a year later, he was approached to keep the baseball franchise alive and introduced the team as the Commodores.

Saskatoon’s Cairns Field (1914 – 1963) on Avenue A North (later Idywyld Drive)

Source: Saskatoon Public Library, Local History (A-2122-1), photo dated July 4, 1950.

“I think the game was so popular because of old Cairns Field, its central loczation on Avenue A [now Idlywyld Drive North], its 1,200 seats under a roof, the good atmosphere.  And we gave them good baseball, too.  The American college players would come up for the summer, they’d play a 75-game schedule, hardly ever a day off, and the majors looked at our league kindly because it helped them decide which youngsters were suited for the long schedules in the majors,” says Leakos. “We were like a feeder system.  Everybody on our 1961 team signed a major league contract, with a bonus, and quite a few from the 1963 team made it. ”  He’s never liked to single out one team as being any better than the other “but both the 1961 and 1963 tams ran away and hid hid from the other teams in the league.  They were so good. “

The 1961 names are the most familiar to Saskatonians.  They included John Bocccabella, who eventually went to the Chicago Cubs and Montreal Expos; Ernie Fazio, who signed with Houston; Dan Schneider, a lefthander who got a $100,000 signing bonus with Milwaukee; Tim Cullen, who played with Washington and Oakland; and Darrell Sutherland, who played with Philadelphia.

“When Cullen finished his career, he was playing second base for the Oakland Athletics but he got hurt during the American League pennant race, lost the job to Dick Green, and never did get a chance to play in the World Series.  An that was the first of those three straght world chamionship teams with Reggie Jackson, Catfish Hunter, Vida Blue, Rollie Fingers.”

The 1963 Commodore names were less familiar to Saskatonians because, after nine games in the new park at Gordon Howe Bowl, Leakos moved his franchise to Medicine Hat in what became a costly move due to broken promises “and absentee ownership”.  “We had some great players like Ron Theobald, Ray Lamb, Buddy Hollowell, and Paul Edmondslon, who lost a chance to be a star with the Chicago White Sox, when he was killed in a car accident one year in spring training.  We would have been even better but we sent Cullen and Nelson Briles, later a proven major leaguer, to Calgary at a time when Calgary said they’d need help or they would drop out.”

Leakos won’t spell out any financial figures for semi-pro days but admitted top-line players like Len Tucker and Pete Estrada “earned somewhere between $1,000 and $1,500 a month and we always based our budget on the hope that we’d draw 1,200 a night to Cairns Field.  An most of the time we did.  We dropped out in 1962 when we didn’t have a park available and it wasn’t the same when we opened at the new park in 1963.  The fans didn’t like the new location and they didn’t like sitting in the cold concrete stands.

After the Western Canada League folded, his development of the Commodores at the North Saskatchewan League level became the major challenge.  And success came quickly.  They reached the Canadian finals in 1970, later played in national tournaments in 1974 and 1975.  “The tournament at Brandon in 1970 was to deternue a Canadian team for the world championship and the Pan American Games.  We’d gone through undefeated and allowed only five runs.  It came down to a sudden-death final and we lost, 3-2, to British Columbia.  We gave up three run s in the ninth.  Because of rain delays officials decided on a sudden-death final when, in reality, we should have been entitled to a chance to be beaten twice because we were undefeated.”

“I can’t say enough about the dedication of those Commodore teams of the 1970s.   Gary Brandon used to drive in from Prince Albert for games and practices.  That was dedication. It was a treat to manage those guys.  You’d write their names in and know they’d do the job.”

Among his key players on the first team were Randy Munch, Ken Haanen, Bobby Brown, Ross Stone, Don McLeod, the Mitchell brothers, and Fred Maxsimiuk; on later teams, another key was Larry Lazecki.  “We go to tournaments as nobodys, sometimes as ragamuffins because other teams had provincial uniforms, but we’d always wind up as  fan favourites”

After the prime years in the North Saskatchewan League, Leakos became a charter membe of the Saskatoon Senior Baseball League.  His team, the Dodgers, is a good one, ossessing seven young men who havbe gone away to attend American colleges on baseball scholarships.  The Dodgers will be hosts for what is considered the Western Canada intermediate championships in Saskatoon, August 17-17-18.

He’s wiorked with all ages, “not always beause I had sons growing up.”  One of his sons, Tom, plays for the Dodgers; another, Michael, plays for the Cubs.  Another son, Steve, was prominent in track and field.  Leakos recalls summers where he’s run as many as three teams at a time, but he shlowed down to one team a year after being sevefely hurt in a car accident in July, 1985. “I always wear No, 13 because I consider it my lucky number.  I was in the accident on July 13 and I was luck to come out of it alive.  When they took me to hospital, I stayed in room 1313.”

Leakos and his wife, Georgia, have been married for 28 years and Leakos laughs that “Georgia even got her engagement ring while we were on our way to Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.”

Source: Ned Powers, “Leakos built success on diamonds”, Then & Now: A Sports Feature, Saskatoon Sun,  July 7, 1991, p. 18.

The Shasta Black Hawks were a women’s basketball team that played in the Saskatoon Ladies Basketball League from 1940 to 1942.  During those years, the team won the city title and the provincial championship.

Shasta Black Hawks Basketball Team (1941)

Saskatoon Public Library, Local History (LH-6082)

Ted Gardener of the Shasta Cafe sponsored the team and also purchased the trophy, the Gardener Trophy, that would be awarded by the League’s city champions.  Jack Nesbitt was the manager and Ivan King was the coach.

The following article in the September 29, 1982, edition of the Saskatoon Commentator newspaper provides profiles on the players and the team:

“A member of the [Saskatoon Black Hawks] was Jean Kemp, now Mrs. Gil Strumm.  She [said], ‘This was a fun team.  Sure we were winning but we had a lot of fun and we played as a team and didn’t worry who did the scoring’.

Jean had played basketball at Bedford Road [Collegiate in Saskatoon], finishing off in 1939.  That fall, she joined the Collegians of the city league, then played two seasons with the Black Hawks.

In 1940-41, there were three other teams in the loop along with the Hawks.  The Collegians, with Kay McMillan; the Varsity Co-eds, Charlotte Early was on this club; and the Ramblers, Marion Heasman (nee Bryce) was the sparkplug of that team.

Games were played at the Nutana [Collegiate] gym and crowds were very good.  Jean can’t recall if admission was charged, but if it was, it was probably ten cents.

According to Jean, many of the 1940-41 Hawks are still around.  Edith (Wheaton) Stockan is in Langham, Margaret (Roper) Waite is living at Blackstrap, Bobby (Grummet) Smith is in Vancouver, and Bea (Palmer) Tyler makes her home in Stroud, Ontario.  Jean Hill (nee Littlejohn) is in Regina.  She had married hockey-soccer star Mel Hill.  Reta (East) Thompson is still in Saskatoon.

In 1941-42. Jean who played guard won th city scoring title, picking up 95 points in 13 games.  She also captured the Most Valuable Player award.  At the time in the men’s division, a member of the Grads was duplicating the same feat.  He was named the MVP after winning the scoring race.  His name was Gil Strumm. [Gil and Jean were married in 1942.]”

Source: Paul Hack, “Hack’s Happenings”, The Commentator (Saskatoon), September 29, 1982, p. 11.

The Spartans Basketball Team was one of six teams which competed in the Saskatoon YMCA House Basketball League during the 1930s.  In 1931, the team’s players were drawn entirely from the Saskatoon Greek community. The team’s roster in October 1931 consisted of Harry Terzakis, Sam Sinis, Jack Zouboules (a student at City Park Collegiate who also played on his high school’s basketball team), Louis Kelles, and W. Manos; J. Howell was the coach.

During the first half of the 1931-32 schedule of games, the Spartans and the Go-Getters Basketball Team moved quickly to the top of the league’s standings. Terzakis was among the team’s top scorers. By the end of November, the Spartans replaced some of its Greek-community players with players from the broader Saskatoon community, with Terzakis, Zouboules, and Kelles remaining on the roster. By January, only Terzakis and Zouboules were identified as players from the Greek community.

By the end of the first half of the scheduled games for the 1931-32 season, the Spartans were in a three-way tie. The playoff  games resulted in the Spartans being league champions. The deciding game against the Toilers was described as “fast” and punctuated with “plentiful” personal fouls (Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, March 5, 1932, p. 11).

Jack Zouboules
Source: City Park Collegiate Yearbook, 1930

During the second half of the 1931-32 schedule of games, Zouboules and Terzakis continued to represent the Greek community on the Spartans lineup of players. The team again beat the Toilers in the playoff games and won the YMCA House Basketball League championship.

By 1934, Zouboules had joined the Junior Toilers in the Men’s Senior Saskatoon Basketball League. The Spartans continued to play in the YMCA House League and in February 1935, Irvin Hoidas was the only player with connections to the local Greek community. By early 1938, the Spartans no longer had any Greek-community players.

Researched by Ken Pontikes, June 12, 2024
Sources: Various editions of the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix.

 During the Saskatchewan Hockey League’s 1933-34 season, the Saskatoon Quakers Hockey Team (sponsored by Quaker Oats Company, a major employer in Saskatoon) went to Europe to represent Canada in the 1934 International World Amateur Ice Hockey Championship in Milan, Italy.  To finance the cost of travel to the competition, the Quakers embarked on a tour consisting of exhibition games in Canada and thirteen European countries.  The Quakers won the competition in Italy and became the 1934 World Amateur Hockey Champions by defeating Switzerland’s team in the semi-final and then, the United States team in the final. This was Canada’s seventh consecutive world championship.

The Girgulis brothers, through the Elite Café, had been significant sponsors of the Saskatoon Quakers and provided the venue for many meetings and gatherings of the hockey community in Saskatchewan. Sam Girgulis served on the Quakers’ executive committee.

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, April 15, 1933, p. 19

In order to compete in the 1934 world championship, the Quakers missed most of the provincial league’s 1933-34 season. Jimmy and Sammy Girgulis saw an opportunity to sponsor a replacement team, the Saskatoon Elites, to represent Saskatoon in the Saskatchewan Hockey League, a league of senior amateur players that operated with northern and southern divisions. The Girgulis brothers recruited players for the team, some moving up from junior teams and others being attracted from other teams, including members of the Quakers team who were not selected to travel to Europe. (An attempt was made to field a team with the remaining Quakers’ players, thereby creating a local competitor for the Elites. However, the Quakers’ players soon abandoned the effort and left the Elites as the sole Saskatoon senior amateur hockey team in 1934.) Harry Cameron was appointed as the team’s first coach. He would be replaced in January 1934 by Norman (“Heck”) Fowler, former coach of the Quakers.

According to the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, most of the team for the first games of the season consisted of “newcomers” to Saskatoon’s hockey scene:

“Bert ‘Mutt’ Gardiner, who tends goal for the blue and white sweatered outfit, has been the leading figure with the Calgary Jimmies in the past couple of seasons while that club was in search of western and dominion hockey honors. Last year he was rated as the best goalie in junior company in western Canada. Unknown to the majority of fans, [Saskatoon-born] Bert played his first hockey with Victoria School in the local public school league.

Jack Broadbent, former Crescent Northern League defenceman and regular candidate for the same position with the Quakers; Jim Haight, ex-Crescent, Wesley, and Tiger defenseman; and ‘Pat’ Paterson, mainstay of Delisle defenses, will alternate in front of Gardiner on defense.

The first-string forward line will consist of Les Cunningham, former Regina Pat at center, with Earl Nicholson, ex-Regina Aces at right wing, and Johnny Beattie, former Regina Vic, at left. Dick Dickinson, former Wesley and Varsity player is slated for center on the second forward line with ‘Vesty’ Quinn, Montreal Vics and Royale product, at right wing, and ‘Bliff’ Smith, ex-Wesley junior and Quaker at left. With the player limit dropped for the [exhibition] game, Les Edwards and Frank Stewart, former Tiger Juniors, and Jack Bentley of Delisle and Charlie Rudd of the Quakers will be given a chance to show their wares. (Saskatoon StarPhoenix, December 15, 1933, p. 18).

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, April 26, 1933, p. 16.

The Girgulis brothers also established an executive committee for the Saskatoon Elites consisting of local business leaders and hockey supporters. Jimmy Girgulis, as the club’s “sponsor”, served as president. Norman Couch was vice president; Harold K. Wright was secretary; and Paul Schwager was treasurer. The other members of the committee were Harry Keough, Sam Fose, Reg Scarrett, Percy Keane, and Sammy Girgulis. James Stevenson (of Bence, Stevenson, McLorge & Yanda Barristers) was the honorary president; R. M. Cantlon (of the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix), Ben Hoeschen (of the Saskatoon Brewing Company Limited), and Al C. Moffat (of Drewrys Ale and Standard Lager) were honorary vice presidents (Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, December 11, 1933, p. 11.)

The name of the team being associated with a commercial firm (The Elite Café) attracted criticism. Some considered this name as challenging the amateur status of its players – notwithstanding that in previous years, the Quakers were not challenged for being named after a business. The Star-Phoenix reacted to the controversy in the following way:

“It looks as if someone was anxious to stir up a bit of trouble in the provincial hockey world. As the Elites have been represented at two meetings of the [Saskatchewan Amateur Hockey Association] and no attempt has been made to have them change their name, it would seem they had the approval of the governing body. . . . There seems to be enough trouble in amateur ranks now without anyone starting any more, but one can’t help but suppose that it wouldn’t be amateur sport unless there were more squabbles. . . . It would be a mighty poor brand of hockey that would be dished up for the fans if someone did not come to the aid of the clubs. At times, a little criticism is in order but why don’t some of these lads come to the aid of the clubs financially” (Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, December 1, 1933, p. 16).

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, March 5, 1934, p. 11.

During the 1933-34 season, the Saskatoon Elites finished second in the Northern Saskatchewan Hockey Division. (Prince Albert Mintos won 3 of 4 games over the Saskatoon Elites in the final playoffs.) However, despite a respectable on-ice season in its first year of operation, the team was not a financial success and the team did not continue for another season.

For the 1934-35 season, teams were not allowed to continue playing in the Saskatchewan Amateur Hockey League under their commercially-linked name. The Quakers, therefore, returned to play in the Northern Saskatchewan Senior Hockey League under the name, the Saskatoon Standards Hockey Club, which it used for two seasons.

Researched by Ken Pontikes, June 18, 2024

Sources: Saskatchewan Sports Hall of Fame; Saskatoon Star-Phoenix (various editions).

The first community centre for Saskatoon’s Greeks was a rented room in the Borrowman Block (101 Twenty-first Street East), above the Commodore Café.  From 1938 to 1944, it served as a gathering place for conversation and fellowship and a meeting space for Dominion Chapter No. 9CJ of the Order of AHEPA (also known at that time as the Greek Benevolent Society).  

 In 1946, the Dominion Chapter purchased a building at 117 Twentieth Street East and was the first chapter in the Order of AHEPA to own such property in Canada (Cleo Girgulis, p. 4).  When purchased, the building was known as the Stewart Block.   (It was built in 1910 by Saskatoon’s pioneer doctor and surgeon, Peter Donald Stewart, who also constructed the building on Second Avenue South which was occupied in 1939 by the Girgulis Brothers’ Elite Café.)  Dominion Chapter changed the Stewart Block’s name to the AHEPA Block and later to the AHEPA Hall.   The members of Dominion Chapter who were responsible for purchasing the building were:  James Chrones, George Karabelis, Jimmy Girgulis, Bill Geatros, Steve Leakos, Paul Kortes, Thomas Kortes, Anthony Pelehos, Joe Gardiner, Gus Golf, Sam Girgulis, Arthur Kranias, Theo Gardiner, Ted Gardiner, Charlie Kallops, and George Chitsas (Cleo Girgulis, p. 13).  

 The building was purchased as a rooming house and Dominion Chapter continued to operate it in this manner until the early 1950s.  During the latter part of the 1940s, chapter meetings were relocated from the Bowerman Block to the I.O.O.F. (Independent Order of Odd Fellows) Hall (416 Twenty-first Street East).  

AHEPA Block, 117 Twentieth Street East (1945)
Source:  Saskatoon Public Library, Local History Room (LH-6048) 

A meeting space, with a small kitchen, was created in the western half of the main floor of the AHEPA Block in 1954. This space became the centre of Greek social life in Saskatoon from the mid-1950s and into the early 1980s.  It was regularly the site for Greek dinners, dances, and community and family celebrations.  Greek language classes for children were held here on Sunday afternoons.  It also served as a place where members of the Greek community could visit for a few hours “to enjoy conversation and coffee and a friendly game of cards or tavli (backgammon)” (Cleo Girgulis, p. 4).  During the 1950s, Greek-language films were shown; historic dramas and comedies were favourites. The building’s upper floors continued to be rented as suites which provided accommodations for newly arrived immigrants, particularly single men without a local family. 

AHEPA Building, 117 Twentieth Street East (1982)
Source:  Saskatoon Public Library, Local History (LH-6049) 

The mortgage for the building was burned in 1956.  The building was expropriated in 1983 for redevelopment by the City of Saskatoon.  The terms of the City’s expropriation were that Dominion Chapter received $162,500 cash from the City, plus a vacant property located on Louise Street which was valued at $67,500 (Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, September 27, 1983, p. 3).  The building was demolished in 1985. 

Demolition of the AHEPA Block
Source: Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, February 23, 1985, p. 1. 

 A new AHEPA Hall/Hellenic Cultural Centre was constructed at 3042 Louise Street.  The building was designed by local architect, Tinos Kortes, son of Chris and Helen Kortes.  It was opened in 1985.  The building had a commercial kitchen and could accommodate banquets of up to 450 people. 

AHEPA Hall/Hellenic Cultural Centre, 3042 Louise Street
Source:  Greece Then, Greece Now: The Hellenic Community of Saskatoon, Community Memories, Museum of Antiquities, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon. 

In the late 1980s, the Order of AHEPA District No. 24 organization (consisting of Order of AHEPA chapters in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta) agreed to designate part of the building as the archives for the Greek communities of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, but this was not realized. The Ukrainian Museum of Canada (located on Spadina Crescent) was consulted for advice on how to create an archives and museum in the building.  

 However, the AHEPA Hall/Hellenic Cultural Building could not be financially sustained by the Dominion Chapter and was sold in 1992.  

 Researched by Ken Pontikes, October 2024  

Sources:  Saskatoon Henderson Directories, various editions; Saskatoon Public Library, Local History; Cleo Girgulis, “Greek Immigrants in Saskatoon”, Saskatoon History Review, No. 6 (1991), p. 1 – 13.  

The Saskatoon Greek Society was established in the 1920s.  George Chronis was the first president.  The Society’s purposes were to preserve pride among Greeks in Saskatoon for their cultural heritage and to provide the general public with an awareness of the Greeks living in Saskatoon and their traditions.

The Society established a Greek language school in 1927, with Persephone (Foni)  Kortes and Nymfodora Domnas as teachers.  The school operated until 1930.  Parents subsequently made arrangements directly with newcomers and university students from Greece to provide weekly language instruction for their children.  In 1974, there were a sufficient number of children for a language school to be re-established by the Hellenic Orthodox Community of Saskatoon.

Persephone (Foni) Kortes, Saskatoon’s first Greek language teacher

Researched by Ken Pontikes, October 30, 2025.

Sources: Saskatoon’s Greek Community — The Pioneers (1901 – 1949); Cleo Girgulis, “Greek Immigrants in Saskatoon”, Saskatoon History Review, Number 6 (1991), p. 8.