In the sleepy village of Port Williams, N.S., there’s no obvious sign that this is home to a local soccer hero. There’s not a blast of red smoke or soccer scarf in sight. But inside the Georgian farmhouses, the steepled white church and the local school, Jacob Shaffelburg is all anyone is talking about.
At the low-slung brick elementary school, Team Canada’s Shaffelburg is front and centre. In the entranceway, a massive brown paper banner reads “Port Williams Proud” emblazoned with his number, 14, to celebrate him playing in the FIFA World Cup.
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The town of Port Williams is all in on Shaffelburg, including kids at the local elementary school whose “Port Williams Proud #14” adorns the hallway.Dan Froese/The Globe and Mail
“I just can’t believe it that someone from Port Williams made it to Canada’s national team,” said 10-year-old Hailey Thompson, who created the banner and took it to school for all 240 students to sign.
Other kids gushed about his very presence as a former student at the school: “We could actually be standing on the floor and walking the halls that he did,” said 10-year-old Gabby MacMillan.
“He may have sat at one of the desks we’re sitting at right now,” said nine-year-old Byron Judd.
Lately, the 26-year-old soccer star’s fame has even caused a stir at the local Anglican parish, where elderly church ladies are also fawning over his success, said Jacob’s grandmother Margery Shaffelburg-Miller.
“One lady said, ‘I watched the first soccer game in my entire life!’” she said.
The picturesque village of Port Williams is known for its farming dykelands and sweeping views of the Bay of Fundy tides from the local bridge, about an hour northwest of Halifax.
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Port Williams sits on the Cornwallis River, which empties into the easternmost inlet of the Bay of Fundy.The Globe and Mail
Founded by New England Planters in the 1760s, the village was once a bustling global export hub that shipped sweet Annapolis Valley apples and lumber overseas from the dock at high tide. Local villagers called it “the Biggest Little Port in the world.”
Today, it’s still lush with orchards and blueberry and egg farms, giant weeping willows and towering scotch pines. For many in the village, Jacob is the wholesome kid with the crinkly eyes and curly blonde hair, the youngest child of Linda and Mike Shaffelburg, a dermatologist at the hospital in town. But he’s also the biggest soccer star to ever spring from the Maritimes, let alone this tiny community in “the Valley,” as Nova Scotians call it. His electric speed on the field and rapid rise to fame earned him the nickname Maritime Messi, after his idol, Lionel Messi.
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Randall Gates, owner of The Soccer Store in New Minas, N.S., is friends with the Shaffelburgs and was a part of the soccer community where Jacob got his start.Dan Froese/The Globe and Mail
Soccer was always the sport in the Shaffelburg family – his parents and siblings Zachary and Jessica played – but there was something about Jacob that local soccer coach Randall Gates spotted when he saw him playing against older kids at a training facility almost two decades ago.
“He was half a foot shorter than everybody and he was just bombing around everybody,” Mr. Gates said. At the time, coaches were zeroed in on his brother Zachary, he added. “I said, ‘You wait and see Jacob when he comes up.’”
His childhood bedroom tells the story of his lifelong passion for the game and his own meteoric rise. Painted in red and gold, the colours of his favourite English Premier League team Manchester United, it’s wall to wall with time-worn soccer jerseys, scuffed child’s cleats, a cluster of medals and posters of Mr. Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. There’s an official match roster from his first game playing for Major League Soccer’s Toronto FC in 2019 and a poster of him on the pitch, his powerful arms outstretched.
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Soccer jersey and child sized cleats on the wall in Schaffelburg’s childhood bedroom.Dan Froese/The Globe and Mail
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Barbara Messom looks up fondly at a poster of her grandson on a wall in his childhood bedroom.Dan Froese/The Globe and Mail
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Shaffelburg’s wife Robyne and children Daisy, 21 months and Baker, 8 months cheered him on at Toronto Stadium.Melissa Tait/The Globe and Mail
The mementos drop off after that – a clear signal he’d moved out of the house – but he went on to play three years for the MLS’s Nashville FC and competed against Mr. Messi in the 2024 Copa América semi-final. He currently plays for the powerhouse Los Angeles FC.
Quiet and unassuming, when he’s home, he joins in local teams’ training sessions, showing up like a regular Joe without a team logo in sight, Mr. Gates said. “I’m like, ‘Do you want to have a Q and A with them? He’s like, ‘No, I just want to come play.’”
While Jacob’s rural upbringing is not unique to fellow Nova Scotians, it stands out next to the other Team Canada players who were raised in Edmonton, Montreal, Greater Toronto Area and Greater Vancouver.
Jacob grew up in a quaint subdivision in a Cape Cod-style home next door to his paternal grandparents. His house has a backyard sunken pool and mini soccer pitch, where he kicked balls so deep into the woods, his step-grandfather is only now unearthing some of them.
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Marvin Messom and Budd Miller play soccer on Shaffelburg’s childhood backyard turf wearing a Team Canada soccer jersey.Dan Froese/The Globe and Mail
His maternal grandparents live just up the road, in a grey farmhouse with horses and an apple orchard on 50 acres of land. It’s where Jacob picked beans from their vegetable garden and sold them at the side of the road, where his grandfather Marvin Messom still sells firewood and his handmade poplar benches.
Mr. Messom easily tears up when he talks about his grandson. He says Jacob inherited the trait from him and is also quick to show his emotions. (Sure enough, after the landslide win against Qatar last week, Jacob could be seen in the Team Canada huddle rubbing tears from his eyes.)
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Shaffelburg’s maternal grandparents Marvin and Barbara Messom proudly wear their Canada jerseys when they’re watching Jacob play.Dan Froese/The Globe and Mail
“He’s just a normal kid,” he said, removing his glasses to wipe his eyes. “I tell him he’s a Valley boy.”
In their sunny living room, his grandmother Barbara Messom explains how she watches on game day. She sits in her red recliner in front of the television and, just in case, she also pulls up the game on her iPad. When Jacob subs in and the announcer calls out his name and home village, she and her husband feel a flush of pride.
“He certainly has brought soccer to the world and to know that Port Williams, Nova Scotia exists on the map,” she said.
Now apples and lumber are no longer Port Williams’s most famous international export – it’s Jacob Shaffelburg, playing soccer on the world stage.
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Shaffelburg celebrates with teammates during a match against Qatar on Thursday.SIMON FEARN/Reuters