where the tables were set out with silver branched candlesticks. The servants waited on tables in heavy fur coats and caps and the silver vases on the tables were filled with sprays of spruce and fir.

       Our first winter introduced us to the delights of Canadian winter sports. It seemed to be a little disconcerting for our Canadian friends at first to find they had unearthed a Governor-General who was quite at home at curling and skating, and who had often used a sleigh at home.

       But hockey on the ice was new to us and our children, and the staff entered into this sport with enthusiasm as also into the tobogganing from the high slide erected in the Government House grounds and leading right down to the Ottawa River.

had to be gone through with. Under the children's careful tutelage I risked it time and time again and, in the end, enjoyed it as much as anyone.

a very gay and merry one, blanket coats and costumes with belts of many colors woven by the French 'habitants' being the correct attire, together with soft woolen caps and long woolen mitts.

       Chocolate, piping hot, with whipped cream was considered one of the necessary accompaniments to these entertainments where everybody met and fraternized.

The most famous vice-regal booster of hockey as a national sport was Lord Stanley, whose two sons learned to play the game on the rinks of Rideau Hall. Lord Stanley sponsored the Rideau Rebels from 1889-1891, when the team challenged the Ottawa City Hockey Club for the championship of Canada. The Rebels lost to the City Club, which then went on to defeat a Queen's University and an Osgoode Hall team for the Cosby Cup and Dominion Championship. Meanwhile, The Rebels made a viceregal tour of Ontario promoting the game in Kingston, Lindsay, Toronto, and Kitchener. Lord Stanley's great claim to hockey fame is, however, his donation of The Stanley Cup in 1891.

As reported in The Ottawa Citizen, Lord Stanley, through his proxy Lord Kilcoursie, proposed the idea of a challenge cup for the champion hockey team in the Dominion during an awards banquet honoring the Ottawa City Hockey Club, as reported in the local papers:

THE CHAMPIONS DINED

An Enjoyable Gathering of Admirers

of the Hockey Team

The members of the Ottawa Hockey Club will always hold dear to their memory recollections of the banquet tendered them last evening in the Russell House. It was under the auspices of the Ottawa Amateur Athletic Club. About seventy-five of the team's most enthusiastic admirers were seated at the table. The president of the association, Mr. J.W. McRae, presided with Mr. Russell, captain of the team, at his right, and Mr.Jenkins at his left. The vice-presidents' chairs were occupied by Mr. P.D. Ross and Mr. Desbarats. When all appetites had been satisfied, Mr. McKay proposed the health of the Queen.

      Mr. Ross next proposed the toast of the Governor-General Lord Stanley, and in a few remarks referred to the great interest manifested in hockey by His Excellency.

      Lord Kilcoursie responded, and read the following letter from His Excellency:

        I have for some time past been thinking that it would be a good thing if there were a challenge cup which should be held from year to year by the champion hockey team in the dominion.

        There docs not appear to be any such outward and visible sign of championship at present, and considering the general interest which the matches now elicit, and the importance of having the game played fairly and under rules generally recognized, I am willing to give a cup which shall be held from year to year by the winning team. *

        I am not quite certain that the present regulations governing the arrangement of matches give entire satisfaction, and it would be worth considering whether they could not be arranged so that each team would play once at home and once at the place where their opponents hail from.

Lord Kilcoursie then stated that Capt. Colville, who was at present in England, had been commissioned by the Governor to order the cup. It would be held here by trustees till the end of next season, and then presented to the champions. The reading of the letter was greeted with enthusiastic applause.

       The president proposed the health of the Ottawa hockey team, which was drunk by their friends, who stood upon their chairs. The first of the team to respond was the amiable captain, Mr. Russell, who did great honour to his team in a speech that was full of humour, and which was heartily appreciated by all present. The other members of the team then spoke in the following order: F.M.S. Jenkins, H. Kirby,J. Kerr, W.C. Young, A. Morel, and C. Kirby. The last mentioned delivered his oration while mounted upon the table ...

       The president here read a telegram received from the Quebec team as follows: "Quebec regrets that she cannot send a delegate and do honour to the finest hockey team in Canada." The toast of the ladies, proposed by Mr. Russell, was responded to by Mr. Stowe and by C. Kirby and C. Bethane.

       After the toast of the press had been disposed of, Mr. J.W. de C. O'Grady proposed the toast of the O.A.A.C, which brought the president and Mr. P.B. Taylor to their feet.

       Speeches followed by Mr. Clarence Martin and Mr. Palmer, of the Rebels.

Ottawa Seconds, New Edinburghs, a hard-hitting crew that sometimes came up The Valley from Buckingham, and a team bearing the banner of Garland's Wholesale and Drygoods House. The Garlands boasted some formidable young hockey players-in-training, such as Harvey Pulford, Forester McKinnon, Tom McNichol, and Tom Brown, The Young Caps produced such outstanding athletes as Bill Powers, Eddie and Paddy Murphy, and Bob Mulhall. Bob Mulhall also brought fame to the sporting city as a bike-rider in the days when bike-racing was at its peak and crowds surged through the gates of the old Metropolitan grounds at the east end of Pretoria Avenue to watch the race on one of the finest clay tracks in the country.

There was nothing funny about it. In those days we played nearly two hours at a stretch without any relief. Few of the trams carried

any spares and when a fellow went out to play a game he had to . make up his mind that, barring serious incident, he was out there to the finish. The games weren't as strenuous as the brand of hockey we see now, but the long steady grind told on the players. Then, too, if there was any rough stuff we felt the full force of it because heavy padding was unknown. Even the goalkeepers had very little protection against flying pucks.

The Electrics ruled the Junior Hockey roost in Ottawa during the early nineties. The team was organized in 1892, the players for the most part being drawn from employees of the Chaudiere Electric company, forerunner of Ahearn's Ottawa Electric Company. Though their existence was short lived, old-timers and hockey buffs always maintained that they were "the smartest collection of junior players that ever came down the pike." They won almost every game they played against other members of the Junior League at that time, the Ottawa Juniors and the Aberdeens. That they vanquished the Ottawa Juniors was impressive since that team boasted such outstanding players as Percy Butler, Charlie Spittal, and Martin Rosenthal.

       During their first winter the Electrics won challenge games against both local and outside teams, including Perth and Carleton Place. In the winter of 1893-94 they joined the Ottawa City League and won the championship without losing a single game. The following winter the Electrics advanced by joining the Junior Amateur Hockey Association, then comprised of Montreal Hawthornes, Victoria Juniors of Montreal, Ottawa Juniors, and Montreal Maple Leafs. With Alf Smith on right wing they went on to become champions of the City League and champions of the Junior Amateur Hockey Association. Alf Smith turned pro with the Ottawa Senators and was with them for two Stanley Cups.

Smith continued on Silver Seven Stanley Cup teams when he played right wing with the great scorer Frank McGee at center.

      Another team which served as seed ing-ground was Enright's Boarders, later the Victorias, a team which in 1900 arose out of the enthusiasm of a group of ambitious youngsters who made the old Victoria Rink their rendezvous on winter evenings after working hours. They decided to organize themselves into a legitimate hockey team playing games against other Junior Sevens, both within the city and in outlying districts. They elected officers and decided to call themselves "Enright's Boarders," in honor of Jimmy Enright, owner of Victoria Rink and an active worker with and promoter of young sportsmen, particularly hockey players.

    Jimmy Enright's first connection with hockey was in the sea-and promoter of young sportsmen, particularly hockey players.

Dolly Durkin, "Bunty" Templeton, Jimmy Egan, Joe Gorman, and Sam Armstrong.

       In the season of 1897-98 Jimmy Enright was president of the Columbia Hockey club. It was during the season of 1900-01 that his "Boarders" began to make their presence felt in Junior hockey league circles, and three years later that they entered the Junior City League in competition with teams representing the ymca, the W.C. Edwards Lumber Company, the Beavers, the Emmetts, and the Rialtos. At this time they changed their team name from "Enright's Boarders" to the Victorias.

       Prior to entering the Junior City League, "Enright's Boarders" had made their presence felt up and down the Valley in games with Junior teams in Renfrew, Pembroke, Perth, Arnprior, Rockland, Carleton Place, winning the majority of these out-of-clinched the championship with relative ease. That same year, 1903-04, they entered the Canadian Amateur Hockey League playdowns and won the cup in competition with Buckingham and Montreal teams. The following season they were again victorious, winning the same championship against Loyola College at the Montreal Arena by a score of 11-3. The Loyolas were considered to be the best of many Junior teams in Montreal, but Harrison, Throop, Young, and Shouldis, it was said, literally skated "rings around them and dazed them with their clever combination plays."

        Other notable players, joined the championship Victorias in later years: Tommy Smith {Alf's brother), Jim McMullen, Billy Allen (more renowned as a boxer). Bob O'Leary, Fred Poereira, Eddie Hawken.

         In time the Victorias got so full of self-confidence (perhaps so uppity) that they challenged the famous Silver Seven to a practice game in Howick Pavilion at Lansdowne Park. They didn't win but it is recorded that they put up "stiff competition" for the world famous Ottawa Senators.

The Bronsons epitomize the history of early junior hockey in the Capital City. Although not officially entered in any league they played against such "snappy outfits" as the Chaudieres, Mount Sherwoods, Dan McDonald's Hillsides, Aylmer Juniors, and the formidable Columbias, which boasted none other than Clint Benedict on its line-up, as well as Roy and Earl Rickey, both of whom played professional hockey later in Western Canada.

        The Bronson's rink was at the corner of Somerset Street and Bronson Avenue in the spacious backyard of alderman James Peterkin, and one of its Juniors on his way up was a lad named Harry "Punch" Broadbent. On Peterkin's rink Broadbent developed the fine art of "elbowing" his way through opposing lines to become one of the speediest and most colorful forwards of the Ottawa Senators.

        One night in the winter of 1903 the Bronsons decided to challenge the Columbias on their own rink on McLeod Street where the Museum of Man stands today. "Elbows" Broadbent flashed two hot ones into the net and the Bronsons defeated the highly touted Columbias. Broadbent and Benedict were to play together in professional ranks for the Ottawa Senators but that night on McLeod Street in 1903 they were pitted against each other as only young hockey players of ambition and motivation could be.

        During the season 1902-03, when The Bronsons won every game they played, the parents and the neighbors of the victorious Juniors gave a splendid banquet in Peterkin's Hail, a means of showing their pride in the team and encouraging them forward to greater triumphs.

During this era, Ottawa University took its hockey very seriously, fielding usually six teams, each team adopting the name of its captain and equipping itself according to its own financial means. In the 1900s it was said that the Varsity frays attracted very little outside interest other than protest from nearby residents about the noise of the battles. But internally the hockey teams garnered the support of every student and every faculty member; and the rivalry was described as "so intense" that innumerable donnybrooks were enacted in the snowbanks surrounding the rink.

         In the season of 1901-02 the Varsity team, captained by W.A. "Billy" Richards and having on its roster no less than Harry Smith of future Silver Seven fame, carried off the championship with a game played on Rideau Rink.

     The equipment worn by these players was, to say the least, unpretentious and at the most innovative. The goalkeeper wore a very narrow pair of pads and perhaps an old baseball catcher's protector; the boys "at the front" stuffed university scribblers into their stockings, their only protection against flying pucks and sticks. Often there was only one precious puck per game and often good ice time was spent digging around in the snowbanks for the elusive puck. Sometimes more valuable time was spent while digging lost hockey players out of the snowbanks. The boards around the rink were only one foot high and many a "bodied" player literally flew into the surrounding snowbanks and had to be dug out.

       From Ottawa University's championship team of 1901-02 two players, Billy Richards and W.A. Callaghan, were chosen for the Ottawa University team represented in the City League championship the following season. Of the pool of players on Ottawa University teams at the turn of the century, the majority entered the priesthood. Billy Richards, W.A.Callaghan, and J.J. Cox were also outstanding on some of the great football Varsity teams of that period; they were on the team that won the Dominion Football championship for Argonauts and, after he left Ottawa University in 1902, Richards also played hockey for McGill University. Harry Smith was the only one who moved from Varsity to Professional rank with the Old Senators.

In an article in the Evening Citizen of May 1935, Harry Smith, in his later years, told how he was given a "leave of absence" from Ottawa University:

       I would rather play hockey than eat in my younger days. One game a night wasn't enough; I yearned for more. Often I would play for one of our college teams between seven and eight o'clock at night, dash into my room and lock the door, pretending that I was settling down to my studies. But, as soon as the way was clear, I would jump out of the window and hike over to Dey's arena in time to play a City League game for the Aberdeens.

      The college authorities got wise one night, had me up on the carpet and threatened dire consequence if the offence was repeated. It was and I got my walking orders.

The Silver Seven and Montreal Victorias ended up the regular season tied and played off in a two game, total goals series which opened in Montreal on March 7th. This game ended in a tie. They played the second match in Ottawa on March 10th and Ottawa won 8-0. The ice was slushy and in no condition for a hockey game and was even worse when the Rat Portage (Kenora) team arrived in Ottawa to challenge for the Cup. The two game series opened on March 12th with ice conditions so bad that at one point in the game, the puck fell through a hole in the rink and could not be found. The teams stood around while 1500 screaming fans impatiently waited for another puck to arrive. The rotten ice did not stop Ottawa who won 6-2 and again defeated Rat Portage 4-2 on March 14th.

M. H. McGilton, trainer; 

H.L. "Billy" Gilmour, left wing; and Frank C. McGee, center. 

Inset — Frank C. McGee 

scored 14 goals in a 23-2 

Stanley Cup victory over 

         In 1904-05, The Silver Seven successfully defended The Stanley Cup from challenges by the Winnipeg Rowing Club, the Toronto Marlboros, the Montreal Wanderers, and the Brandon Wheat Kings, with Frank Patrick starring. Patrick's heroics could not overcome The Silver Seven, and before an audience of Lord and Lady Minto, at the Aberdeen Pavilion, the Ottawa team won the two-game series. That year The Silver Seven played in the Federal Hockey League, losing only one game, to Brockville.

and snow to play Dawson City on its home ground. The fatigue suffered by the Dawson City team was compounded by bad ice conditions. The Ottawa ice-maker, it has been said, slowed down the Dawson City team by flooding the ice with an inch of water, even though the temperature was well above freezing. Like race horses who do better on mud, The Silver Seven plodded through the slush to win The Stanley Cup for the third year in a row.

         With this third consecutive Stanley Cup victory, the Silver Seven Senators set a record which stood alone until the Toronto Maple Leafs won three consecutive Cups in the late 1940s and the Montreal Canadiens, led by Maurice "Rocket" Richard, won five consecutive N.H.L. championships in the late 1950s.

Bill Westwick, a relative of the "Rat," became one of the best sports-writers in hockey, covering the exploits of The Senators during the 1920s and 1930s as they struggled to match the achievements of The Silver Seven.

The 1906-07 Stanley Cup was won by the Kenora Thistles in a challenge match against The Silver Seven, and the Montreal Wanderers in turn challenged for the Cup in 1907-08, defeating Kenora. However, the Ottawa Senators reclaimed the honors in 1908-09, easily defeating the Wanderers, with a young Fred "Cyclone" Taylor and legendary center Marty Walsh leading the team. The Senators lost the Cup again in 1909-10 to their old rivals the Montreal Wanderers, only to regain it the next season in 1910-11, with a team boasting the likes of Marty Walsh, Percy LaSeur, Jack Darragh, and Captain Bruce "Hod" Stuart. The Senators not only regained The Stanley Cup from the Wanderers, they defended it from further challenges by teams from Galt and Port Arthur. And at the end of the season, The Senators toured New York City with the Montreal Wanderers, playing several exhibition games in front of appreciative fans. The Renfrew Millionaires followed this same circuit, with the "hi-jacked" Fred "Cyclone" Taylor starring, a year later.

         The Senators would not win The Stanley Cup again until the 1919-20 season, once the team had joined the N.H.L. — once the team and the game of hockey had turned from amateur status to professional.

The relative merits of amateur vs. professional hockey was often debated in these years leading up to the creation of the N.H.L. in 1917. A fascinating Ottawa Citizen article, dated December 1909, entertained these arguments:

A good deal of public curiosity exists as to what professional lacrosse and hockey players get in Ottawa, now that straight professionalism is an accepted fact. In the olden days of athletics — that is, of the period some twenty years ago, the players were supposedly amateur, but in quite a number of cases a 'divvy' was looked for at the end of the season and when a season was more than ordinarily successful this totalled to quite a respectable figure. There was no guarantee given as to the amount each was to get from the members of the executive, but the athletes expected to be fairly treated on the division of the surplus cash at the end of the season. It was understood that anyone who benefited this way would take a greater interest in the success of his organization.

        Capt. Bruce Stuart of the champion Ottawa hockey team was asked what the players are receiving at present for their series. He replied: "I cannot say as to that. Each player knows what his own arrangement is, but managers of clubs are very much like heads of commercial establishments who usually prefer to keep their employees ignorant as to what their fellow workers are in the habit of getting. The man who plays hockey gets what he is worth to any club and therefore, there can be no fixed scale."

Art Ross, the captain of the Montreal Wanderers, is known to have received from Cobalt the sum of $1,000 for two matches against Haileybury. Tom Phillips of Kenora and Ottawa fame received $600 for two matches in Montreal. The ordinary man receives in the neighborhood of $600 for a season of twelve weeks.

By the time the First World War ended, The Ottawa Senators had joined the N.H.L. as a charter member. The City of Ottawa soon became the capital city of professional hockey during the glory years of the 1920s. 

In the 1890s my father, Chauncey T. Kirby was playing hockey for Ottawa and I think it was the old Foulkes Arena, corner of Elgin and Laurier. The Stanley Cup was a challenge cup; it wasn't a league cup. You had to defend it every week.

         I went to see a hockey match when I was old enough to go out in the evening — around 1911 — and it was a challenge to Ottawa who were holding The Stanley Cup and it was a challenge from Galt. They had come all that way to challenge Ottawa. And they got beaten. I was there and that was in Dey's Arena. All I can remember about it was it was a good clean game, no rough-house at all, and I can remember that the goaltender for Galt was a fellow named Hay .. .

         That Dey's arena, it seated over two thousand and the arena was always full. There was a crew of firemen walking underneath the stands with fire cleaners, chemicals to put out fire, smother it.

         When my father moved to Montreal to work in the bank he played hockey for Montreal. Then he came back from Montreal in 1907 — he got fed up with the bank and he didn't play hockey anymore. He refereed.

         There was another story that I want to bring in here. One of the last years he was playing hockey, the Ottawa team was on its way down to Montreal to play the Montreal Amateur Hockey Association and this was the last of the amateurism. Harvey Pulford wanted to be paid for playing with the Ottawa team in the game against Montreal. And this was announced when they got to Montreal. Chauncey T. Kirby was then on the management end of the team and C.T. said, "Fine, he wants to get paid. Well, he's not going to get paid and he's not going to play and he's not going to get back." And so Pulford didn't get the return ticket to go back. And that was the last of Chauncey's involvement with the hockey club, because it was a departure from the true amateurism that he believed in — "the Gentleman's Game" — where they bought their own uniforms, they bought their own skates, and they bought their own sticks, and often their own tickets to wherever they were going — although they had a fund usually of hundred dollars for that they were going — although they had a fund usually of hundred dollars for that.

a while? Well, one night they got mixed up and messed up with Chauncey T. three or four times. Anyway, when we came home — I dunno what the result of the game was — but anyway, my brother and I said to him, "You didn't have much luck on the boards, Dad?" And he said, "No." And one of us said, "Well, you really messed up a couple of plays." He never refereed again. When the criticism came from the two boys — from his own family — he signed off.

         And, of course, the referees didn't get paid. They did it for love. But dad once got one hundred dollars and his transportation to go and referee a game in the Silver Mining League — between Cobalt and Haileybury. I saw Art Ross play at Dey's Arena. Art Ross was playing for the Wanderers. But, anyway, he said it was really for blood to play at Haileybury. And Ross said after the game they had to tie their skates and sticks, strap them together as weapons, and then swing them back and forth to fight their way through the angry crowd. But my father was the referee — all he had was his skates and blades to swing back and forth to defend himself! He got out of Haileybury as fast as he could. In fact, I think, he must have caught the train at North Bay which would be coming down to get into Ottawa around six o'clock. He never refereed up there again. That was it.

         The medal J.R. Booth gave to Chauncey T. Kirby, center for the Ottawa City Hockey Club, is an eight-pointed star. The center would fit onto a bar that you'd pin on your coat in the form of a medal. On the back it says:

Champions of Canada

Presented by J.R. Booth, Esq. to

Other fellows who played on the team got medals at the same time. There was my uncle, Dr. H.S. Kirby, and there was Jenkins — now that's the famous curler, afterwards. There may have been a couple of Gilmours on it. P.D. Ross did some management of the hockey club, but he didn't play ...

         There's a very interesting thing about Cyclone Taylor. Now, Taylor went to New York once on an exhibition team with the Renfrew Millionaires to play the Montreal Wanderers, and they compared — he was getting a pretty good salary — and they compared the number of games he played in the season with a champion baseball player of his time and Taylor was making double the money per game that a baseball player was getting. You see, in those days hockey players never played more than Saturday and Wednesday nights.

Pretoria. It confused people all the time. You'd have thought Frank Ahearn who owned The Senators and the streetcars could have said, "We'll put a stop here at Argyle so they can walk into the rink." I mean, after all, it was his money that was going down the drain.

         We'd go to the City League as well because they had Ted Reid there, and also Wes Richards who played for the Shamrocks, and it was Jim McCaffery who used to manage that team then.

          A pair of season tickets cost about $125.00. Wes Richards played for the City League Shamrocks team and then he went into the Senator organization during the golden years. He coached The Senators for one year, and I remember going to watch the Ottawa Senators in 1923-24. It was the first season Frank Finnigan played, and we had second row seats. He could really zing one and you'd feel the boards bounce really zing one and you'd feel the boards bounce.

1922 or '23 on a mutual date. He'd just bought a new car and he met a young fellow friend of his in the Glebe and wanted to take him for a ride in his new car. And the young fellow friend said, "I know a girl down in New Edinburgh, let's go down and get a couple of girls."

          But he took me to the Auditorium to see the City League, The Shamrocks. And we sat next to Mr. Seldon. The Kirbys had their regular seat there. We were sitting there a while and John said to me, "There's my father across the rink." I said, "I can't see very well." So Mr. Seldon handed his binoculars to me and I looked and there was this tiny man. Sure enough, in five minutes he was across the rink to meet "the redhead." His son had never gone out with a redhead before. But he knew what redheads were like because he had cousins that were five boys in the family ... You can gather from this that I was a little on the flarey side.

           When he took me to the match I had Oxfords on. It was wintertime and I wanted to look nice and I had long woollen socks on that ended here — of course we had long skirts. They were low, and John said to me, "You're coming out in the wintertime with those on?" But he had a car and he had the finest place to park the car because the Auditorium was at Argyle Avenue there. So we parked up on the Museum grounds somewhere and I had to pick my way in, and I only knew him about a week or so then. Well, we had met in September so it was a little more than a week, I guess. I know he remarked on me not wearing rubbers in the wintertime. So, he might have known what kind of a witch he got. That was our first date — a hockey game.

bought a little house on Laurier Avenue West. It's still there — just off Bank Street — and they had a little back yard. And Kilrea was having this large family. Fourteen they had, you know. Anyway, he was an Irishman and he was an Orangeman. And he rose on the Twelfth of July before sunrise. At the first gleam of the sun he would be out there in the back yard in his "couth." And he had a revolver and he'd be firing shots into the air and yelling, "Hurray for King Billy! Hurray for King Billy!" At the top of his voice and already drunk! Yes, he would already have had two or three good shots of whiskey. He collected whiskey for the Twelfth, the glorious Twelfth; he wasn't drinking beer that day!

         And the police would come. In those days they were all Irish Catholics — not now though — and they would come and say, "Now, Mr. Kilrea, you mustn't make such a noise."

         And Jack would yell, "Get out of here or I'll drill you full! Hurray for King Billy! Out of my backyard, you damn Dogans!"

         And the police would say, "Kilrea, you are causing a disturbance —"

         And he would shout, "Are you a Dogan?"

         "No," the policemen would say, "we're Catholics."

         And he would say, "To hell with that! You're all damn black dogans, every last man jack of you! Out of here or I'll drill everyone of you!"

         And the policemen would go — partly because he was armed and partly because he was a fiercesome-looking man. He wasn't a big man but he was full of presence and he had yellow curls and a great yellow whisker. Another reason the policemen would go was because Jack Kilrea was the father of the later-famous Íåñ Kilrea of the Ottawa Senators.

         Every Twelfth of July, Jack Kilrea petrified his neighbors. But the police stopped coming to his place on the Glorious Twelfth. "Oh, it's just Jack Kilrea," they would say when the complaints came in. "He doesn't shoot at anything. He just shoots up into the sky!"

         Jack Kilrea was an Orangeman first, last, and always. For years the Kilreas lived from hand-to-mouth on Laurier Avenue. But then some of the girls got work and got married, and Íåñ was making all that money with the Ottawa Senators during the twenties and early thirties. And one Kilrea married a Jewish lady and when the first child was born her Jewish grandfather gave her a white mink hat and coat. It was the talk of the town.

"That's my boy down there." And somebody would answer him with a vile insult, or slanderous French, and they would be into it. And more and more people would be into it, taking sides until the whole Rush End would be in a melee — everyone fighting and hitting and cursing and swearing, in both French and English! Oh, it was audience participation in the truest sense of the word!

a sporting store in Ottawa.

Frank: And his uncle had before him.

Jake: I grew up in the Glebe on Second Avenue, and you know

where Mutchmor School is on Fifth Avenue? Well, just west of

Bank Street on Fifth there is a house and a hockey player lived in

Frank: Pete Howe. Real shifty. Played for City League team, Rideaus or New Edinboroughs — Little Pete Howe, one hundred and thirty-five pounds.

Frank: Harold Starr gave him an awful trimming at Harold Starr's hotel in the West End. Allan bothered him, really bugged him. Harold wasn't quarrelsome at all, but if he got something in his head like, "I think that son of a bitch insulted me," he'd go looking for him. Allen was an agitator.

Jake: But last time I saw him, I was driving somewhere in the city and there was "Big Pete" Allen Shields on the corner. So I picked him up — he was living then in Britannia — and he was waiting for a bus and I went in and had a beer with him; he was going blind then.

Frank: Well, there might have been a few old-timers who ended up on their uppers. Only a few . . .

Jake: Fred Connor and Harry Connor — a hell of a good fellow, Connor Washing Machines. And Fred "Crew" Connor, he never played for the National Hockey League but he played for Rovers. But Harry Connor, he was doing so well, I remember, corner of Bank and Laurier, and he had appliances. Then they went into the Connor Venetian Blinds and they used to sell them up The Valley, all the hotels and the hospitals. Harry bought a place, they were doing pretty well, 27 Powell Avenue, and 1 can remember going in to see Harry there, and do you know what he drank? Burnett's White Satin. Oh Lord, he drank!

Frank: Oh Lord! He drank a lot! Almost as much as I did — in my drinking days!

Jake: Nothing at all to be sitting down at the store in the morning drinking Burnett's White Satin, both Fred and Harry. Frank: The Kilrea girls were good-looking. Well, they were blond, you know, and in those days to be blond, well. .. Jake: Kenny Kilrea was a hell of a hockey player, the youngest of the Kilreas. He was going to Glebe, he married a Simon girl, Simon the Furriers. Now old Simon had, I think, three girls: Julie, Frances (Frankie), and Sylvia. Frankie Simon, a beautiful girl, married Kilrea when they were only in Fifth Form. The Kilreas lived on First Avenue, then they divorced. They were only kids when they got married, eighteen and sixteen — Kenny and Frankie.

          You know why the New Edinborough Canoe and Tennis Club was such a hangout for all the athletes in those days? So popular? I'll tell you why. They used to walk across the ice to buy beer and liquor in Gatineau Point and bring it back.

Frank: Dave Gill was a great supporter of the New Edinborough

Canoe Club and so was Jess Ketchum, old Jess .. .

Jake: Frank, the reason you and I get along so well is because I'm

Catholic and you're Protestant.

Frank: Clancy and I never made any difference. And Alex

Connell and Nighbor — I roomed with them and we never made

Jake: Alex was my coach when I was at St. Pat's hockey. At the last he was soliciting business for a transport company, just a little job he had. Alex was such a gentleman. I can remember Kay, his wife. 

Frank: They had one little girl and she got in a dreadful accident down on Rideau Street. Alex Connell was the secretary of the fire department and Gray Burnett, who was our neighbor on McLeod Street, he was fire chief.

Jake: I want you to try and name as many people as you can remember, because when everybody came home to Ottawa in those years from playing in the National Hockey League and the Western League, or the seniors or the semi-pro American league in the States, in the summer that was when things really lifted in Ottawa. The guys were home, they didn't have to play any more, 

Frank: Des Smith, Lionel Hitchman, Bill Cowley, all the Bouchers — four of them, Frank, Billy, Buck, George. Joe sold a correspondence music course, Carl didn't play hockey. Five, no, just four Bouchers — Bobby, yes, five. There were six brothers. Now get into the Kilreas: Kenny, Íåñ, Wally, Jack — he ran the camera shop — Brian played for Eddie Shore down in Springfield.

Jake: Right next to Kilrea's Camera Shop was Stewart's poolroom. It was called "The Sewer" and all the gang played pool there. CPP Telegraph was at the corner.

Frank: Crafty Crawford, Justine Bow, and then there was Ebbe Goodfellow, a hell of a hockey player, Harvey Rockburn, Ted Lindsay from Renfrew, the Cleghorns, Harold Darragh, Jack Darragh, Eddie Gerard, Punch Broadbent, Cy Denneny, Eddie Gorman from Buckingham, Newsy Lalonde, Les Graham, Des Smith, Roger Smith — his brother played for Pittsburgh same time as Lionel Conacher played over there before he went to The Maroons — Lew Bates, Eddie Finnigan, Joe Matt — went over to the States later —Jack McVicker from Renfrew went to The Maroons, Ray Kinsella, two Conn boys played for Toronto, Maddie Cullin, Quackinbush, Gordie Bruce played for Boston, Hank Blade, Tony Lecarie.

Jake: All these guys that played pro, semi-pro flooding back into town, into Ottawa for the summer in the '30s. When April came, they all got together. "How are you going?" The camaraderie that existed at that time was wonderful, exceptional. 

Frank: Art Gagnier, Lionel Hitchman played for Boston. A lot of people say he made Eddie Shore as a scorer because they wouldn't go near Hitchman, defence, a tough son of a bitch, long reach, raw-boned, hard to go around — but he never carried the puck fast — a good blocker. Alex Connell, King Clancy, Clint Benedict, Bert McKinley — oh, so many!

Jake: And Ottawa wasn't a big city then, about twenty thousand and you had that many players coming home every summer. Bill Touhey, D'Arcy Coulson, Harold Starr, Allen Shields, Gerry Lowry, all the Lowrys, Frank Lowry, brother of Tom Lowry of The Ottawa Journal, a great guy. Gerry Lowry told me one time that he was involved in a cup final and he threw a stick and they lost 1-0 and they never even put the puck in the net. You were automatically awarded a goal if you threw your stick in those days. Louis St. Denis, Gordie Bruce . . .

Frank: When I was playing hockey for Ottawa University, 1921, Coulson was backing the hockey club.

Jake: Ottawa University was an Irish university. Then the French came in. St. Pat's College was built for the Irish. St. Joseph's Church on Laurier Avenue is across from Sacred Heart. And where is the front door to St. Joseph's? Well, it's not on Laurier; it's at the side, because they wouldn't face each other directly. There was a fight between the Irish and the 

French . .. 

Frank: When I was there the two head priests were Father Legault and Father Cleary, one French and one Irish. And that was in the old building right on Laurier Avenue. And my picture, if they haven't taken it down, is still there.

Jake: King Clancy's father, Tom, taught there when he was a young academic. And old Tom Boucher, father of all the Bouchers, ran a hotel, played football and after a game he'd get out on the hotel veranda in Lowertown and they'd all cheer him and he'd wave. He played for Ottawa University; it was in the big league then.

Frank: A good Protestant that played for Ottawa U was Bob McCredie of Shawville. He played with Tom Clancy and Tom Boucher. King's dad got to be quite a drinker — like a lot of hotel keepers — and King's dad said, "Son, if you promise to never take a drink, I'll never take another drink." And that's why Clancy was a teetotaller.

Jake: But lots of times people would think he was half-cut because he was such a cut-up . . .

J.P.Jack Darragh (left) at his peak was a member of the "Super Six" in a lineup with Clint Benedict, Cy Denneny and Sprague Cleghorn. He jumped from Cliffsides to Ottawa Senators in a championship year, 1910-11, and went on to win three more Stanley Cups. He never played for any other city but his home town.

E.G. "Eddie" Gerard (right) was born in Ottawa in 1890, He joined the Ottawa Senators in 1913-14 and became team captain in 1920-21. Winner of four Stanley Cups he finally retired in 1934-35 when The Senators were sold to the 

Frank: Oh yes, there was Leo Gravelle from Aylmer; Joe Matt from Buckingham; Bill Phillips from Smith Falls; Hank Stavenough, Arnprior; Lorne Anderson, Renfrew; and Larry Gilmour, Thaine Simon, and Roy and Jack Geisebrecht, and Harry Cameron of Pembroke ...

Jake: And Dave Martel, Morley Bruce, Roly Hurd, Sam Godin, Hib Mylks, Bob Boucher, all of Ottawa, and Murph Chamberlain

of Shawville, and Johnny Sorell, Cornwall . . . And Connie Brown, Terry Murray, Hambly Shore, Harry Hullman, Spiff Campbell, Gene Chenore, Milt Halliday — all of Ottawa.