The Swastikas Hockey Team

Posted by Alex in Pictures, Sports on October 13, 2007 at 1:23 pm


That’s The Swastikas, a Canadian girls’ hockey team from Edmonton circa 1916. Before it became associated with the Nazis, swastikas had been used for hundreds of years as a symbol of good luck and prosperity:

For many millenia, before it was appropriated by the Nazis, the swastika was a symbol of good luck and prosperity. Almost every race, religion and continent honored the swastika — a perfect example of the universal spread of a symbol thru the collective unconscious used by American Indians, Hindus, Buddhists, Vikings, Greeks, Romans, Celts, Anglo-Saxons, Mayans, Aztecs, Persians, Christians, and neolithic tribes. There are even Jewish swastikas found in ancient synagogues side-by-side with the star of David!

The swastika was associated with the hammer of Thor which returned to him like a boomerang, the footprints of Buddha, the emblem of Shiva, Apollo, Jupiter, and even Jesus Christ! The swastika was the first Christian symbol and is found in the catacombs in Rome. Hindus and Buddhists to this day still revere the swastika as their sacred sign. Jains make the sign of the swastika similar to the Christian sign of the cross.

In the early part of the twentieth century Rudyard Kipling used the swastika as his coat-of-arms, Coca Cola made a swastika-shaped lucky watch fob,American pilots used it on their planes when they fought for the French in World War One, it was the symbol for the Ladies Home Journal sponsored Girls’ Club and the Boy Scouts. A town in Ontario was named Swastika in 1911 because of a lucky gold strike.

Gentle Swastika at ManWoman.net has a large collection of such swastikas: Link

Previously on Neatorama: "I am Not a Nazi" Swastika | Swastika Town Refused to Change Name


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COMMENT

16 comments to "The Swastikas Hockey Team"

  1. Ali S.
    October 13th, 2007 at 1:57 pm

    It's a bit sad that the swastika in mainstream is now considered a symbol of evil due to the Nazi's.

  2. biltmore
    October 13th, 2007 at 4:07 pm

    Yeah, it's very sad. The symbol has been around for such a very long time ... and then some Nazi bitches have to go and fucking ruin it. It's a damn shame if you ask me.

  3. Nora
    October 13th, 2007 at 5:08 pm

    Give us 300-400 years or so and we'll probably feel better about re-claming the symbol. I think Nazi's just put such a huge stink on it that its going to take longer to fade away.

  4. Miss Curly
    October 13th, 2007 at 5:09 pm

    I doubt the swastika will ever overcome its negative connotations, even though it was used for centuries before the Nazi's adopted it.

  5. Phos....
    October 13th, 2007 at 11:22 pm

    Too weird.

    I JUST finished posting (and fixing, and fixing, and fixing) an entry on my Blogspot. I finally finished, then came here and see this article.

    Why do I think this is so weird?

    I got a 1944 Deutsches Reich 5 pfennig piece in change last week. From a convenience store. In Lancaster PA.

    Just discovered it yesterday when I was doing laundry.

    http://sparkbox.blogspot.com/2007_10_01_archive.html

  6. Justin
    October 14th, 2007 at 12:40 am

    You think that's bad think of all the people who's last name was Hitler!

    I know of a few cases where people had to change their name.

  7. friki
    October 14th, 2007 at 4:45 am

    Isn't the orientation of the "tentacles" on Nazi swastika contrary to the same on "lucky" swastikas?

  8. BikerRay
    October 14th, 2007 at 6:01 am

    Carlsberg beer had a swastika as a logo. I have one of their antique beer bottles (pre 1930) with a swastika molded into the bottom.
    Also a picture of their factory with the swastikas on the elephants out front.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlsberg

    (friki - I think the bad guys reversed the swastika and rotated it 45 degrees)

  9. aaron
    October 14th, 2007 at 11:15 am

    BikerRay is right. The Nazi symbol is reversed and rotated 45 degrees. In Asia, the original swastika is still used as a Buddhist symbol (esp. to show the location of temples on maps). When in Korea, I saw a man with a Nazi flag hanging from his vending cart. Just as I was about to give him a piece of my mind, my Korean friend reminded me that the man probably didn't realize it was actually a Nazi flag.

    Swastikas also appear prominently as architectural ornamentation on buildings constructed before the late 1930's in my part of the country... Western South Dakota.

    I certainly hope the symbol loses its evil connotations and is re-instated as a sign of peace and prosperity in the not too distant future...

  10. Lasse
    October 14th, 2007 at 1:34 pm

    Its the same thing with Hitles moustache. No one can ever wear that moustache againg. except Mugabe of course.

  11. Sid Morrison
    October 15th, 2007 at 8:48 am

    1. The Nazi's swastikas has the same arm "spin direction" as is shown on these chicks' uniforms.
    2. While the Nazis often rotated their swastika 45 degrees (as aarron notes) from what is shown in this pic, that is not a hard and fast rule. They also frequently had it in banners oriented just like it is shown in this picture. If you've ever watched Leni Reifenstahl's "Triumph des Willens (Triumph of the Will)" you'll have seen LOTS of banners in the non-rotated orientation. This wiki page has a picture of one at an SA (Brownshirt) Rally:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmabteilung

  12. Sid Morrison
    October 15th, 2007 at 8:49 am

    oops. That should be "Leni Riefenstahl" . My German is (slightly) better than my typing... honest.

  13. Ekke
    October 16th, 2007 at 7:58 am

    I'd like to see them in action

  14. Dan P
    October 17th, 2007 at 3:26 am

    Reminded me of this story, about a US-military swastika-shaped building. Oops.

    http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-swastika26sep26,0,2973328.stor y?coll=la-home-center

  15. Andrius
    November 2nd, 2007 at 12:39 pm

    everyone like swastika.

  16. josh
    January 11th, 2009 at 11:23 pm

    yeah to bad the Nazi's had to go ruin it for everyone else. I get sent home and suspended from high-school all the time just for drawing them. Sucks to have a mega liberal school.


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