Conrad Poirier

the cat came back

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The diminutive right winger Johnny (Black Cat) Gagnon played most of his hockey for the Montreal Canadiens in the 1930s, often on a line with Howie Morenz and Aurèle Joliat, but midway through the 1939-40 NHL season, Montreal sold his contract to the New York Americans. He and his new team were back at the Forum on Saturday, March 2, 1940. As seen here, there were gifts for him, pre-game, including this handsome cellarette (a liquor cabinet) presented by a deputation of fans from Gagnon’s hometown, Chicoutimi. That’s Le Canada journalist Paul Parizeau on the right, lending a hand, holding his hat.

Once the furniture had been cleared from the ice, New York surged to a 2-0 lead before Montreal tied the game, then went ahead in the second on a goal by Louis Trudel. It was left to Gagnon to come through as the spoiler and tie the game. Set up by Pat Egan and Tommy Anderson, he beat Montreal goaltender Mike Karakas with a slapshot, no less, as described by Montreal’s Gazette.

Ten minutes of overtime solved nothing and the game finished in a 3-3 tie. In fact, the overtime went on longer than it meant to, with the bell failing to chime to end the game, and referee Mickey Ion oblivious to the time. Finally, New York coach Red Dutton jumped on the ice to signal that it was all over.

The following night in New York, the teams met again. By the end of that night, it was almost over for the Canadiens, as the Americans prevailed 3-0 to push Montreal to the brink of mathematical elimination from the playoffs with five games to go in the regular season. Montreal would be the only team to fail to make the post-season grade that year, as they finished dead last in the seven-team NHL, nine points adrift of the Americans.

Johnny Gagnon died on a Wednesday of today’s date in 1984. He was 78.

(Image: Conrad Poirier, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

howie night in montreal

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Son of the Father: Ten-year-old Howie Morenz Jr. stands by Canadiens’ captain Babe Siebert on the night of November 2, 1937, when NHLers paid tribute to young Howie’s late father and namesake in the Howie Morenz Memorial Game. Morenz’s sweater, skates, and stick were auctioned off in aid of the effort to raise money for the Morenz family. Second from left is Maroons’ GM Tommy Gorman. Second from the right is Canadiens’ coach Cecil Hart with (I think) Maroons’ winger Earl Robinson next to him. (Image: BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

“No tone of mourning attended the game,” Ralph Adams wrote next morning in the Montreal Daily Star. “True, a sad feeling filled he heart as Howie Morenz Jr. skated about the ice prior to the match. The image of his father, young Howie gave an indication he may carry on his father’s great talents on the ice.”

It was 85 years ago today, on Tuesday, November 2, 1937 that the Howie Morenz Memorial Game was played at Montreal’s Forum in memory of the Stratford Streak, who’d died eight months earlier at the age of 34.

A team of NHL All-Stars beat a team that mixed Maroons and Canadiens: 6-5 was the final on the night. The winners got goals from Charlie Conacher (Toronto), Dit Clapper (Boston), Cecil Dillon (Rangers), Sweeney Schriner (Americans), Johnny Gottselig (Chicago), and Marty Barry (Detroit). Scoring for the Montrealers were Morenz’s old linemate Johnny Gagnon with a pair, along with Canadiens’ captain Babe Siebert and Habs Paul Haynes and Pit Lepine. Normie Smith (Detroit) and Tiny Thompson (Boston) shared the All-Stars’ net, while Wilf Cude (Canadiens) and Bill Beveridge (Maroons) handled the gosling for the Montreals.

The only penalty of the game was called on Toronto defenceman Red Horner, for a hook on Pit Lepine. Former Canadiens d-man Battleship Leduc had taken up as referee and made the call; when Horner was in the box, Leduc apologized, saying that he’d actually intended to sanction Schriner.

“In the heat of the grand display where speed, speed, and more speed gave the game all the excitement of a regular game, no one forgot Howie,” Ralph Adams wrote. “He was there. He was in the thick of the fastest rush, in the wildest scramble in front of the goals. All that Howie represented in hockey was in the game.”

Towards the end of November, it was announced that a total of $26,595 had been raised for the Morenz family.

All The Excitement of a Regular Game: That’s Detroit goaltender Normie Smith on the deck, defending the goal of the NHL All-Stars at the Morenz Memorial game on November 2, 1937. As for his teammates in white, it’s hard to tell who that is at far left, but closer in is (crouched) Toronto’s Hap Day and (possibly) Art Chapman of the NY Americans. Obscured is #6, Boston’s Dit Clapper. For the Montrealers, #10 is Earl Robinson (Maroons) and (helmeted, #8) Pit Lepine. (Image: Fonds Conrad Poirier, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

home for a test

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The Montreal Canadiens will be taking a glass-half-full view of things into Friday night’s Stanley Cup final game, you have to think, and they were hoping to be doing it in an arena filled to 50 per cent capacity. Too. Down two games to the Tampa Bay Lightning, the hopeful Canadiens will host games 3 and 4 at the Bell Centre tomorrow and Monday. The team had asked the Quebec government for permission to allow as many as 10,500 fans in the building, but after discussions with provincial public health officials, that request was denied, and so Montreal’s efforts to even the series will be seen by the same number of fans, 3,500, that cheered the deciding game of their semi-final win over the Vegas Golden Knights last week. 

Depicted here, a Stanley Cup final of a whole other era, in a whole other Montreal arena: these fans are watching the opening game of the NHL’s 1947 championship series, which saw the Canadiens host the Toronto Maple Leafs on a Tuesday night in April of that year. The crowd at the Forum was overflowing on the night, with 12,320 eager fans on hand to witness Montreal down Toronto by a score of 6-0. Bill Durnan posted the shutout, with Buddy O’Connor scoring the winning goal. A good start for Montreal, but it was one that didn’t last: Toronto roared back to take the series, and the Cup, in six games. 

(Images: Conrad Poirier, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

leafs + canadiens, 1938: laying on a licking, avoiding a sand trap

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Net Work: Canadiens threaten the Leaf net on the Sunday night of March 6, 1938, with Leaf goaltender Turk Broda down at left with teammate Gordie Drillon (#12) at hand. That’s Montreal’s Toe Blake with his back to the goal, while Toronto’s Red Horner reaches in with his stick. Canadiens Johnny Gagnon (deep centre) and Paul Haynes are following up, along with an unidentified Leaf. (Image: Conrad Poirier, Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Quebec)

The Maple Leafs meet the Canadiens in Montreal tonight, which is as good a prompt as any to cast back to a Sunday night in 1938, March 6, to revisit another meeting of the two old rivals.

The NHL was an eight-team affair then. That year, like this one, there was a Canadian division, though for balance it included the New York Americans as well as the Leafs, Canadiens, and Montreal Maroons. Toronto was top of the section at that late-season juncture, with Montreal in second. Saturday night the Leafs beat the Maroons 2-0 at the Forum, with Turk Broda getting the shutout. The goals came from rookie winger George Parsons and centre Syl Apps.

Sunday night the Leafs and Canadiens played to the biggest crowd to gather that season at the Forum: “11,000 fans banked solidly up the Forum’s sloping sides,” the Gazette’s Marc McNeil reported, and as seen in the photographs here.

McNeil wasn’t so impressed by the Canadiens. To his eye, they came up with “one of their shoddiest and most impotent displays of the campaign.” The Leafs licked them 6-3, in the end; “to make matters worse they didn’t even score a goal until the game had been hopelessly lost, 6-0.”

The Leafs were led by winger Gordie Drillon, who scored a pair of goals, and would end up as the NHL’s top scorer by season’s end. App, who finished second in league scoring, had a goal on the night, along with Bob Davidson, Busher Jackson, and Buzz Boll. Scoring for Montreal were Toe Blake, Pit Lepine, and Don Wilson. Wilf Cude was in the Canadiens’ net.

Other highlights of the night:

• Toronto scored four goals in the second period to pad their lead, but the game was also delayed four times while (as Marc McNeil told it) “sand, thrown on the ice in small bags which burst, was scraped from the surface.”

• A Montreal fan tried to make his way to the ice. Identified as “head of the Millionaires,” the devoted followers who occupied the rush seats in the Forum’s north end, this would-be interloper was apparently intent on making a case to referees John Mitchell and Mickey Ion. He was stopped before he got to the ice — by none other than Frank Calder, who was aided by several ushers in apprehending him as he passed near the NHL president’s rinkside seat.

• Late in the third period, Montreal’s Georges Mantha lost his helmet in the Toronto end. “He finished the contest without it,” McNeil noted, “because Turk Broda picked it up and wore it for the rest of the game. Afterwards, the Toronto goalie returned it to the speedy left-winger.”

 

Banked Solidly Up The Forum’s Sloping Sides: A look at Wilf Cude in the Montreal goal on March 6, 1938, with Toe Blake (#6) chasing Toronto’s Gordie Drillon (#12) into the far corner. A good view here of the Forum’s seating here. Notice, too, the goal judge caged behind Cude. (Image: Conrad Poirier, Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Quebec)

witnessing a walloping

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Hurrah For Habs: A contented Montreal Forum crowd watches their Canadiens trounce the visiting Boston Bruins by a score of 11-3 on the Saturday night of January 27, 1945. Contemporary accounts say that 12,000 were on hand to watch Montreal’s eighth consecutive win.  Elmer Lach led the way, adding  a goal and four assists to his NHL-leading scoring statistics, while the wingers just behind him on the league ladder — and his linemates — did what they could: Maurice Richard collected three points on the night  and Toe Blake two.  Montreal forwards Ken Mosdell, Dutch Hiller, and Ray Getliffe each put two goals past Boston reminder Paul Bibeault. If not for him, a consoling Boston Globe writer advised, Montreal’s tally would have been twice what it was. Too bad for Boston, but the teams met again the following night at the Garden. The size of Montreal’s Sunday win was 4-1. (Image: Conrad Poirier, Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales du Québec)

on a line called broken bone

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Damaged Goods: Tony Demers, Elmer Lach, and Maurice Richard line up on Forum ice in 1942. (Image: Conrad Poirier, Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Quebec)

When Elmer Lach first stepped up to centre the Montreal Canadiens’ powerful Punch Line in 1943, his wingers were Maurice Richard and Toe Blake. The combination was a new one, though not the name. Going back at least as far as the 1939-40 campaign, the Montreal Royals of the Quebec Senior Hockey League had a Punch Line of their own, with Buddy O’Connor flanking Pete Morin and Gerry Heffernan. All three of them, of course, would eventually graduate to play for the Canadiens, with O’Connor going on to win Hart and Lady Byng trophies as a New York Ranger. Then in 1942-43, when O’Connor and Heffernan were both skating for Montreal, the team’s top trio was a Punch Line featuring Lach down the middle with Blake and Joe Benoit as his wingers. Maurice Richard took Benoit’s place the following year when the latter enlisted to serve with the Canadian Army.

Born on a Tuesday of this date in 1918 in Nokomis, Saskatchewan, Lach had made his NHL debut during the NHL’s 1940-41 season, during part of which he played on a line with left winger Tony Demers and, on right, (the other, non-Detroit Red Wings) Jack Adams. The following year, ’41-42, Lach and Demers combined with rookie Richard to form the line shown posing in the photograph here. All three players having been injured during the previous year — Lach and Richard on the ice, Demers in an automobile accident — they were dubbed, naturally, the Broken Bone Line.