Mountie in ‘Most Canadian Photo Ever’ Humbled by Reaction to Image

Cpl. Shaun Begg/RCMP(NEW YORK) — When Royal Canadian Mounted Police Cpl. Shaun Begg got the opportunity to play hockey on a rink high up in the Purcell Mountains in British Columbia, he jumped at the chance.

And because Begg, 40, is proud of being a member of the RCMP, he got permission to take his iconic uniform with him. Begg told ABC News he’d hoped to get a photo for his screen saver or for the wall of his office at the RCMP’s detachment in Kaslo, a small, picturesque village in B.C.

What he got was a quintessentially Canadian image that went viral and is now being dubbed the “most Canadian photo ever.”

Begg told ABC News that he and his local hockey team, the Kaslo Afterburners, played hockey atop the mountains on Wednesday and, during a break, he donned his Red Serge — his scarlet uniform — his hat and hockey blades, and took to the ice against a goalie.

His friend snapped a photo of him and Begg shared it with his superiors, who, in turn, shared it further. The province’s RCMP tweeted it on Thursday with the message “We may be Mounties, but we are all still kids at heart with @NHL dreams.”

As of Sunday night, the photo had been retweeted more than 3,000 times, with posters musing about whether the photo could get “any more Canadian.” The RCMP’s tweet was even retweeted by the NHL.

“It’s humbling…it’s overwhelming,” Begg, whose father is a retired Mountie, said of the reaction to the photo. “It’s just — I never thought that this would happen.”

At first, Begg, who says he doesn’t know how to use Facebook very well and can’t use Twitter at all, didn’t realize that the image had been so widely shared.

He got an inkling the following day when people started sending him text messages saying, “’Hey, is that you in that photo?’ Because my name wasn’t out there at that point,” he said. “It was like ‘Did you see that Mountie playing hockey on the glacier?’ And then I’m like, ‘Whoa,’ and it just took off.”

While Begg wasn’t seeking fame, he’s happy to represent Canada and his fellow Mounties.

“Honestly, I think that being a Mountie…is a symbol for Canada, in my view, and playing hockey is near and dear to a lot of Canadian’s hearts. I obviously didn’t think it would go viral,” he said.

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