Maurice Richard

a headline history of the 1955 richard riot: destruction et pillage (couldn’t happen in toronto)

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March Madness: Montreal’s Sainte-Catherine Street bore the brunt of the rioting (and a flood of toe-rubbers) on the night of Thursday, March 17, 1955.

March went out with a roar in Montreal in 1955 after NHL President Clarence Campbell suspended Canadiens’ superstar Maurice Richard for the remainder of that NHL season and the playoffs after a melee in Boston in which he fought with Bruins’ defenceman Hal Laycoe and knocked down a linesman, Cliff Thompson. The rest, of course, was history, wherein the events of the week that followed are remembered as the Richard Riot. A review from those eventful days 68 years ago this week by way of headlines culled from newspapers of the day, from across North America and around the world: 

Monday, March 14

Richard Goes Insane
Boston Daily Record

Richard Stick Duels Laycoe, Fights With Official
Boston Daily Globe

Rocket Goes Wild At Boston, Clouts Laycoe, Linesman
Gazette 

Richard’s Boston Rampage May Hit Habs’ Playoff Hopes
Montreal Star

Tuesday, March 15

Boston Brawl Principals Meet Here Wednesday Morning
Gazette

‘Rocket’ Is Rushed To Hospital For Head X-Ray, Stomach Upset
Toronto Daily Star

Les éliminatoires débuteront à Montréal et Détroit mardi le 22

Montréal-Matin

Punish The Rocket? Decision Tomorrow
Globe and Mail

Wednesday, March 16

Hockey Hearing To Start Today: Richard of Canadiens Will Leave Hospital to Attend Investigation of Fight
New York Times

Décision attendue aujourd’hui dans le cas de Maurice Richard
La Presse

‘Dead’ By Weekend Threat To Campbell
Ottawa Journal

Vive Le Rocket: Montreal fans protest Richard’s suspension in March of 1955.

Thursday, March 17

Richard Banni Par Campbell
Montréal-Matin

Campbell Bans Richard From Playoffs
Detroit Free Press

Ban Against Richard Severe Blow To Canadiens’ Hopes
Montreal Star

Suspension De Richard: Campbell Est Menacé De Mort
La Patrie

Richard May Retire From Hockey
Ottawa Journal

Rocket Not Likely To Retire
Ottawa Citizen

Richard Faces Bleakest Era Of His Colorful Career
Ottawa Journal

Réaction multiples en marge de la suspension de M. Richard
L’Action Catholique

Had Fans Are Bitter; Threats Of Violence
Globe and Mail

La punition jugée trop forte: Le maire Drapeau espère une revision du verdict
La Presse

Ired Fans Threaten Reprisal
Gazette

Forum Warns Spectators
Ottawa Journal

Trouble And Fame Have Gone Hand In Hand For Rocket
Ottawa Journal

Adams Says Rocket Got Light Deal
Montreal Star

School Sports Head Praises Campbell
Gazette

‘Pas d’appel,’ dit Selke; Campbell au Forum ce soir
La Presse

Friday, March 18

La foule s’attaque au président Campbell
La Patrie

Campbell Chassé Du Forum
Montréal-Matin

Émeute sans précédent
La Patrie

Pire Émeute Depuis La Conscription, À Montreal
Le Droit

U.S. Tear-Gas Bomb Sold Here In 1941
Montreal Star

74 arrestations, 46 vitrines brisées pendant l’émeute
La Patrie

Défi Et Provocation De Campbell
La Presse

Montreal Mayor Criticized In Riot
Ottawa Citizen

Destruction Et Pillage
La Presse

Couldn’t Happen Here
Ottawa Citizen

‘Couldn’t Happen In Toronto,’ Smythe
Ottawa Journal

A Disgrace To Canada
Toronto Daily Star

‘Never … Anything So Disgraceful’ Jack Adams Says
Ottawa Journal

‘It’s Unbelievable’ Says Bruins’ Boss
Ottawa Journal

Seven-Hour Rampage By Ice Hockey Fans
Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)

New York Papers Front Page Hockey Riot
Ottawa Journal

Jail 100 Hockey Fans
Boston Evening Globe

Bullets, Eggs Fly At Riot In Montreal
St. Petersburg Times

‘Our Population Is Enthusiastic,’ Montreal Official
Ottawa Journal

A Disgraceful Spectacle
Gazette

Innocent Storekeepers Pay Huge Toll In Vandals’ Wake
Montreal Star

Ottawa Russians Peeved As ‘Rocket’ Under Suspension
Toronto Daily Star

Councillor Seeks Warrant For Arrest Clarence Campbell
Ottawa Journal

Hooliganism In Montreal
Ottawa Journal

Good For President Campbell!
Ottawa Journal

New York Rangers Not Scared
Ottawa Journal

Campbell démissionnerait
Le Devoir

Collared: Press photo of an unidentified demonstrator apprehended on March 17, 1955 by Montreal police constables (from left) Charles Hynes and Jacques Belanger.

Saturday, March 19

This Isn’t Montreal
Gazette

Majority Of Fans Sickened By Riot
Ottawa Journal

Selke Blames Few Hooligans Not Real Fans
Toronto Dailey Star

Montreal Rioting ‘Premeditated’
Times (U.K.)

Montreal Cops Amazed No One Killed In Mad Violence After Game
Toronto Daily Star

Firm Says Bomb Not Sold To Public
Gazette

Council Lauds Police For ‘Preventing’ Riot
Gazette

Police To Prevent New Riots
Ottawa Journal

Richard Begs Fans Behave
Boston Daily Globe

Richard, Mayor Ask For Orderly Game
Gazette

Stores Rush Mop-Up; Loss Set At $50,000
Gazette

Rioters Allowed Bail On Various Charges
Gazette

Campbell Right In Suspending Rocket, Richard’s Cousin
Lethbridge Herald

Montreal Riot Latent Hostility To Law, Order
Gazette

Riot May Have Sobering Effect, Says Campbell
Globe and Mail

Campbell Announces He Won’t Attend Game Tonight
Gazette

Riots Could Happen Anytime, Anywhere Says Specialist
Lethbridge Herald

Police Ban Parades, Public Assemblies Near Forum
Gazette

Hockey Players ‘Spring Lambs’ Compared To Fans
Ottawa Journal

Tuesday, March 22

Boston Writers Travel By Pairs In Montreal
Boston Daily Globe

Friday, March 25

Campbell Says Forum Riot Could Have Prevented
Ottawa Citizen

Wednesday, March 30

Campbell Finds Solace In Vilifying Mail, Wires
Globe and Mail

Campbell Squashes Proposal To have Rocket Play In Britain
Globe and Mail

Thursday, April 7

27 Men Fined $25 to $100 For Forum Demonstrations
Gazette

Friday, April 15

Wings Beat Habs 3-1, Retain Stanley Cup
Gazette

We Can’t Work It Out: Montreal Gazette cartoon from March 19, 1955.

 

let my rocket go

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In the aftermath of Maurice Richard’s extraordinary suspension in March of 1955 and the riotous tumult that followed, the Montreal Gazette reported on one resourceful Canadiens fan who sought the intervention of Canada’s own Queen, Elizabeth II. She had, it’s true, met the Rocket in Montreal in October of 1951, and with her husband, Prince Philip, watched him play in a game at the Forum against the Rangers, wherein he almost fought New York’s Steve Kraftcheck. (Prince Philip apparently wished he had.) Did the Queen have jurisdiction in cases of NHL discipline, and if so, would King Charles III now consider absolving Jordan Binnington of the St. Louis Blues, do you think? Good questions. In 1955, there’s no indication that Her Majesty ever saw the petition seeking her pardon of the Rocket.

rocket richard riots, 1955: the view from boston

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March 13 fell on a Sunday in 1955 and as the NHL season wound down, the first-place Montreal Canadiens paid a visit to Boston to play the Bruins. The third was when all hell broke loose. With six-and-a-half minutes remaining and Boston leading 4-1, the Bruins’ Warren Godfrey took a holding penalty. Montreal coach Dick Irvin pulled his goaltender, Jacques Plante, and Canadiens went to the attack. It was then that Bruins defenceman Hal Laycoe, 32, high-sticked Canadiens’ superstar Maurice Richard, 33. Tom Fitzgerald of the Boston Globe gave it a decidedly more passive spin in his description: “Laycoe’s uplifted stick caught Richard on the side of the head.”

In the fight that ensued, blood flowed as both players swung sticks and threw fists, and in the chaos of it all, Richard punched linesman Cliff Thompson. “Thompson tried to pop Maurice right back,” Fitzgerald wrote, “but landed short, and meanwhile Laycoe flung his red-drenched towel at [referee Frank] Udvari, earning his misconduct.”

The coverage next day in Boston also included the headline above in the Daily Record and the artist’s impression below, from the Boston American. NHL President Clarence Campbell wasted no time in suspending Richard for the remainder of the season and the playoffs, a sentence that would have consequences in Montreal four days later.

phil factor

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Happy 50th To You: A birthday today for the inexorable Phil Esposito, who was born in 1942 on a Friday of today’s date in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario: happy 81st to him. He made a habit, on birthdays past, of scoring milestone goals: on this date in 1971, as he was turning 29, he scored for his Boston Bruins in a 5-4 loss to the Kings in Los Angeles to became the fourth player in NHL history (after Maurice Richard, Bernie Geoffrion, and Bobby Hull) to score 50 goals in a season. (He would finish, that year, with 76.) Three years to the day later, on his 32nd birthday, Esposito became to first NHLer to register four 50-goal seasons in a row as he notched a hattrick (the 21st of his career) in a 5-5 Bruins with the North Stars in Bloomington, Minnesota. That regular season he scored 68 all in. Esposito had one more landmark season left in him: the following year, 1974-75, he scored 61 goals.

brakeman bill

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Beast On The Beat: A son of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Bill Juzda served in the air with the RCAF during the Second World War and, before, during, and after his NHL career, on the rails for the Canadian Pacific Railway — hence one of his nicknames, “The Honest Brakeman.” He died on a Sunday of this date in 2008 at the age of 87. On the ice, Juzda’s jarring bodychecks helped the Toronto Maple Leafs secure a pair of Stanley Cup championships, in 1949 and ’51. He was a New York Ranger before that, as seen here during the 1947-48 season, railroading  Detroit’s Jimmy McFadden. The linesman on scene is (I think) Butch Keeling. As both a Leaf and a Ranger, Juzda was known, too, as a pastmaster in the fine art of goading Maurice Richard.

the nokomis dandy

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Fulll Wool: Born on a Tuesday of today’s date in 1918 in Nokomis, Saskatchewan, Elmer Lach centred Montreal’s famous Punch Line, when he was healthy, skating between Toe Blake and Maurice Richard. He’s pictured here (in glorious woolens) in October of 1945. Lach died in April of 2015 at the age of 97. (Image: Fonds La Presse, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

hockey players at home: behind the eight-ball with connor mcdavid + maurice richard

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Cue The Rocket: Maurice Richard lines up a shot in his basement pool room at home in north-end Montreal. Late 1960s? The photo isn’t dated, so that’s a guess. Another one: that’s his youngest son, Jean, at the table with him. Richard and his wife Lucille raised their seven children at the house on Péloquin Avenue. (Image: Antoine Desilets, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

Jimi Thing: The set-up for pool at the house in Edmonton that Connor McDavid shares with girlfriend Lauren Kyle, circa 2021. (Image: Architectural Digest)

On The Couch: McDavid and his Bernedoodle, Lenard. As per Cap Friendly, McDavid is earning a base salary of $12.5-million for the 2022-23 season. His career earnings over his eight years in the NHL amount to more than $71-million. (Image: Architectural Digest)

Home Front: Richard in his living room in the late ’60s. When his playing days were done, Richard stayed on with Montreal as a team ambassador, until he tired of that, quitting to concentrate on his home-based fishing-line business. In his final year on the wing for Montreal, 1959-60, he’s said to have taken in a base salary in the region of $14,000, earning a further $100 in bonus money for each of the 20 goals he scored in the regular season and playoffs. In 2022 terms, he made about $160,000 all told that year. (Image: Antoine Desilets, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)

canada’s captain clutch

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Embed from Getty Images

Marie-Philip Poulin is the winner of the Northern Star Award as Canada’s top athlete, so here’s a sustained flourish of a Bauer Vapor 1X Composite stick to her. The 31-year-old forward, who hails from Beauceville, Quebec, captained Canada to golden finishes this year at both the World Championships in Denmark and the Olympics in China.

The Northern Star is the former Lou Marsh Trophy, of course; the name change happened in November. Poulin is the tenth hockey player to win the award since its inception in 1936, and the first woman among those. She joins an august company: since Maurice Richard won it in 1957, the others have been Bobby Orr (’72), Phil Esposito (’70), Bobby Clarke (’75), Guy Lafleur (’77), Wayne Gretzky (’82, ’83, ’85, ’89), Mario Lemieux (’93), Sidney Crosby (’07, ’09), and Carey Price (’15).

cleveland’s dr. no

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Stitch Up: Crusader goaltender Gerry Cheevers looks out from the cover of an Edmonton Oilers program from November of 1975. “Cleveland’s Dr. No” the accompanying story was headlined. On the ice, the Oilers won the game, 4-1.

A judge in district court in Boston was considering whether Gerry Cheevers still ought to be a Boston Bruin on a Wednesday of this same date in 1972, but that didn’t keep the 31-year-old goaltender from strapping on his pads for the Cleveland Crusaders as the upstart WHA dropped the puck, 50 years ago tonight, for the first games of its seven-year history.

Cheevers had won a pair of Stanley Cup championships with Boston, including one in the spring of ’72, but when Cleveland came calling that summer, he’d signed a seven-year, $1.4-million contract and headed west. His was one of several WHA getaways that the Bruins attempted to block in court: as hockey season rolled around, they were also doing their best to reel back Derek Sanderson and Johnny Mackenzie from the Philadelphia Blazers.

Cheevers, for one, had judicial permission to play on, and so was able to open his WHA account with a 2-0 home win over the Maurice Richard-coached Quebec Nordiques, stopping 21 shots to record the new league’s first shutout. “I’ve played seven years with the best club in hockey,” Cheevers said after it was all over, “but this was the easiest shutout I’ve ever had.”

Boston’s lawsuit failed to bring Cheevers back; he went on to win 32 of the 52 games he played for Cleveland, securing the Ben Hatskin Award as the league’s best goaltender. His WHA adventure lasted not quite four seasons as he made his return to the Bruins in 1976, playing a further five NHL seasons before he retired at the end of the 1979-80 campaign.

Pictured here in 1975, his famous mask was designed and built by a former plumbing superintendent in Boston, Ernie Higgins, though it was Bruins trainer Frosty Forristall who gets the credit for its famous decoration. Here’s Cheevers telling the tale in Unmasked, the 2011 memoir he wrote with an assist from Marc Zappulla:

The protection the mask afforded me gave me more time on the ice and less time in the locker room getting stitched up, which was nice. However, I hated the color of that thing. It was white. I hated white. I seldom even wore white socks. And if I happened to look down when I did, I felt a fright as if I was exposed to something with ill consequences. Call it what you want: a phobia, or outright disdain for this wholesome shade. The sight of this glimmering, shiny, white mold engaged to my facial pores drove me nuts. The color itself is a sign of purity and that wasn’t me. I was quite the opposite. In fact, I was driven by an unconventional thought process and a wayward nature my whole life; the white had to go.

And so?

One morning I tried to get out of practice, which, again, was the norm for me, not the exception. I was in net when a puck flipped up and grazed mask. The puck’s force was so softly propelled, that, had I not been wearing the mask I seriously doubt I’d have so much as a scratch on my face. It was weak, but I faked like it wasn’t. I winced in pain, came off the ice, and headed into the dressing room. I sat down and sparked up a cigarette when [Bruin coach] Harry Sinden came in and said, “Get your ass out there, you’re not hurt!”

So, before I collected myself and got back on the ice, Frosty the trainer said, “Here, hold it.”

Frosty broke out a sharpie and drew in four or five stitches where I had undoubtedly been hit, right above the eye, I believe it was. Everyone got a kick out of it, so I told Frosty, “Fros, every time I get hit with a puck, or the stick comes up, take care of it.” He did, and all the marks were legit.

 

4thought

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It was this week in October, 69 years ago, that Jean Béliveau signed his first contract with the Montreal Canadiens, putting pen to paper in managing director Frank Selke’s Forum office on Saturday, October 3, 1953. Later the same day, the 22-year-old Béliveau joined his new teammates on the ice as the reigning Stanley Cup champions an array of NHL all-stars in the league’s seventh annual showcase. Detroit’s Terry Sawchuk foiled the Canadiens, mostly, as he led his team to a 3-1 victory, with New York Rangers’ winger Wally Hergesheimer scoring a pair of goals on Gerry McNeil into the Canadiens goal. Maurice Richard scored Montreal’s goal, rapping in a rebound of a shot by Béliveau that the Montreal Gazette qualified as smoking.

Béliveau had worn number 9 while starring for the QMHL Quebec Aces, but that was already claimed in Montreal by the Rocket. In the five games Béliveau had played previously as a call-up, he’d tried 17 and 20 (a game each in 1950-51) and 12 (three games in 1952-53). It was in September of ’53 that he posed, above, with Canadiens trainer Hector Dubois to commemorate his switch to number 4.

There was nothing specially to it, apparently. “Big Jean,” the Gazette duly noted, “said the number he wears is immaterial to him.” Pre-Béliveau, it had been passed around: Ivan Irwin, Reg Abbott, Eddie Litzenberger, and Calum Mackay had all taken a turn with Montreal’s 4 before he made it his own. There’s an argument to made that it should have been plucked from circulation before Béliveau ever arrived on the scene: 4 was the number that the great Aurèle Joliat donned when he joined the Canadiens in 1922, and the only one he wore throughout his 16-year career in Montreal. Canadiens did eventually get around to recognizing Joliat’s tenure as number 4, adding him as a “co-retiree” in 1984, 13 years after the team honoured the number in Béliveau’s name.

(Image: La Presse)

in it to bin it

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One-On-One: Born in Nynäshamn, Sweden, on a Thursday of this same date in 1950, Ulf Nilsson is 72 today, so a tip of the Jofa to him. Here he is in February of 1977, when his WHA Winnipeg Jets beat the visiting Calgary Cowboys 6-4; Gary Bromley is the goaltender here. This was a big night for Nilsson’s linemate, right winger Anders Hedberg, who scored a hat trick and made some history: his final goal (assisted by Nilsson) was his 51st of the season. This was Winnipeg’s 49th game that year, which meant that Hedberg had outdone Maurice Richard’s 1945 fest of 50 goals in 50 games. Hedberg had actually only played 47 of this games, having missed a pair of games with a cracked rib. He finished the 1976-77 season with 70 goals in 68 games to lead the Jets in scoring with 131 points. Nilsson wasn’t far behind: he finished with 39 goals and 124 points. After four seasons with the Jets, Hedberg and Nilsson made a move the NHL, joining the New York Rangers in 1978.  (Image: University of Manitoba Archives, Winnipeg Tribune fonds)