Antoine Craan

M. Antoine Craan^[1] ((1931-01-17)17 January 1931 – 12 January 2010(2010-01-12))^[2] was a Haitian-Canadian soccer player and one of the first black professional soccer players in Quebec province.^[2][3]

Life

Antoine Craan was born in Port-au-Prince and in 1955 moved to Montreal to play soccer for Le Tricolore de Montréal. Craan was one of the first two black players to play professional soccer in Quebec. In the 1960s he began work in the Ligue de Soccer Mineur in Montreal. Later he became technical director for the Fédération de Soccer du Québec and trained referees. Craan was inducted to the soccer federation’s hall of fame in 2001.^[2][3]

In the 1980s Craan embraced Raëlism and later became a Raelian Guide Priest.^[1] Craan had lived in Montreal’s Le Plateau-Mont-Royal and Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie boroughs and had seven children, including Caroll-yn Craan and Dany Craan.^[2]

In the mid-1990s Craan moved to Port-au-Prince in Haiti, where he worked as the director of the École fédérale de l’arbitrage de football. He also accompanied many Haitian youth soccer teams to tournaments abroad.^[1][3] He also was active in the Raelian movement in Haiti and became president of the Mouvement Raëlien Haïtien.^[1] On 24 December 2008 he married his second wife, Gertha Daquin-Craan, who had a daughter Mihalove. On 12 January 2010 a magnitude 7.0 M_w earthquake struck Port-au-Prince. Craan was at his office when the quake hit and was able to evacuate the building, but he was then struck by a piece of falling concrete and killed instantly. He was buried in a cemetery near his office. Both Craan’s wife Gertha and grand daughter Mihalove were among the thousands of missing following the earthquake.^[2][3]

References