Jim Robson, whom many people know as the voice of the Vancouver Canucks, has died at the age of 91.
Robson’s daughter, Jennifer Butler, confirmed to CBC News on Tuesday that her father died after a short illness.
Robson called more than 2,000 NHL games over his 47-year career in broadcasting, but is best remembered for announcing Canucks games for more than 30 years — starting with their very first major league game, as an expansion team, on Oct. 9, 1970.
According to the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame, Robson “never missed a broadcast due to illness” right up until his retirement in April 1999.
Current Canucks play-by-play announcer Brendan Batchelor wrote in a post on X that “the word legend isn’t enough” to describe Robson.
“He is the standard to which all BC based play-by-play broadcasters have aspired to, and will never reach,” his tribute reads.
Robson, speaking with CBC Radio’s On The Coast to mark his 90th birthday on Jan. 17, 2025, said he was always thinking about doing the best job possible calling the games.
“Every time I hear those clips, I think how I could make them a little better,” he told guest host Amy Bell.
He said he wanted to be a hockey announcer ever since he was a young boy growing up in Prince Albert, Sask., listening to hockey games on the radio every Saturday night.
He recounted how he thought that dream was dashed when he and his family left the frigid winters in Saskatchewan for the milder weather of British Columbia’s Lower Mainland in 1943.
But that wasn’t the case.
He started his sportscasting career in 1952, when he was just 17, at a radio station in Port Alberni, B.C., before moving on to Vancouver radio stations CKNW and CKWX, covering baseball, football and hockey.
Along with calling play-by-play for the Canucks for three decades, Robson also appeared regularly on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada, covering four Stanley Cup Finals and five NHL All-Star Games.
Joe Bowen, a fellow play-by-play announcer for the Toronto Maple Leafs for 44 years, said it is “a sad day in the NHL broadcasting booth” upon learning of Robson’s death.
“The voice of the Vancouver Canucks was iconic and thousands of fans hung on his every word. Condolences to the family, so many friends and thousands of listeners,” he wrote in a tribute posted on X.
Veteran Vancouver broadcaster Jody Vance described Robson as her idol and her friend.
“The measure of a man. Rest well, kind sir,” she wrote on X.
Dave Sheldon, the senior manager of lacrosse operations for the Vancouver Warriors, which is owned by Canucks Sports and Entertainment, said Robson “was and is the standard by which all are and should be measured in broadcasting.”
“He was never about promoting himself, only about calling what was in front of him and being the perfect conduit to allow all of us listening the theater of imagination when we tuned in,” he said in a social media post.
Robson had four children with his wife, Beatrice. They were married for 68 years, until her death in September 2025.
