Figure skater took winding path to Games
PYEONGCHANG, SOUTH KOREA— That part about his great-great-grandfather jumping off a ship in the 19th century and swimming to the British Columbia coast — probably folklore, an exaggeration as often happens when stories are passed down through the generations.
Keegan Messing won’t vouch for the tall tale. But Manzo Nagano was indeed his greatgreat-grandfather and indeed the first official Japanese immigrant to land in Canada.
The year was 1877 and, according to the Canadian Encyclopedia, Nagano arrived on a British steamer that made port in Victoria. Worked a salmon fisher on the Fraser River, then loaded lumber in Victoria. Eventually made quite a success of himself, opening a dry goods store. “The shop burned down and he went back to Japan,” says Messing.
Great-great-grandpa lost everything and died a couple of years after returning to Japan. But he’d had two wives in Canada — not simultaneously, of course — and his descendants would produce an Olympian figure skater in Keegan Messing.
“We kept full Japanese blood until my mom,” explained Messing, tracing his family roots for reporters.
On the centenary of great-greatgrandfather’s stepping foot on Canadian soil, a mountain peak in remote northern B.C. was named for him: Mount Manzo Nagano.
Grandfather from Newfoundland, Japanese grandmother from B.C., mom born in Edmonton, married to an American she met in Alaska — whence Messing came howling into the world, hence his dual citizenship.
From Anchorage to a skating club in Alberta to the Olympics in Pyeongchang — with the same coach he’s had all along, the long-haired ever-hippie Ralph Burghart, who’d competed for Austria at the Albertville Olympics — and a respectable 12th-place finish in the men’s event on Saturday at his debut Winter Games.
Doing it for Canada, which was always the plan, though Messing lost two years — and ultimately a bid for Sochi — because he’d accepted an invitation to an event in Italy following the U.S. Novice national championships, where he landed the first clean triple Axel ever in his age group. Discovered only after the jaunt to Italy, representing the U.S., that he would have to spend a couple of seasons on the sideline before he could qualify as a Canadian athlete at international assignments.
“Not knowing the rules, we got caught in a bit of a trap.”
Messing earned an Olympic berth, at the rather ripe age of 26, by coming second to Patrick Chan at Canadians last month. The cowboy hat he usually sports is a tribute both to Alaska and Alberta. He lives in Alaska still, but his heart is in Canada.
“I can’t be more proud to wear the Maple Leaf,” Messing says. “I don’t think I’d be where I am today without Canada. They have supported me from the start and given me room to grow.”
His Charlie Chaplin routine Saturday was a hit with the crowd and he nailed both quads, though doubling down on one of his triple Axels.
“The Olympics is everything and more I had been told about. It has touched me in way that I never thought it would. It’s a magical feeling.”
His one-word assessment of the whole experience: “Wow.”
Manzo-san would be proud.