The Mi'kmaq practice of playing ice hockey appeared in recorded colonial histories from as early as the 18th century. Since the nineteenth century, the Mikmaq were credited with inventing the ice hockey stick. The oldest known hockey stick was made between 1852 and 1856. Recently, it was sold for US$2.2 million. The stick was carved by Mikmaq from Nova Scotia, who made it from hornbeam, also known as ironwood.

In 1863, the Starr Manufacturing Company in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, began to sell the Mic-Mac hockey sticks nationally and internationally. Hockey became a popular sport in Canada in the 1890s. Throughout the first decade of the 20th century, the Mic-Mac hockey stick was the best-selling hockey stick in Canada.

By 1903, apart from farming, the principal occupation of the Mikmaq on reserves throughout Nova Scotia, and particularly on the Shubenacadie, Indian Brook and Millbrook Reserves, was producing the Mic-Mac hockey stick.The department of Indian Affairs for Nova Scotia noted in 1927 that the Mikmaq remained the "experts" at making hockey sticks. The Mikmaq continued to make hockey sticks until the 1930s, when the product was industrialized. ABOUT Mi'Kmac hockeysticks