MCDARBY: Right. You’d have to get it from NHL too, though.
HIRSHON: He was under the impression that the NHL wouldn’t be involved in this part of it, because these are designs that were never officially commissioned by the NHL, even though the team was commissioning them in some sense.
MCDARBY: Then it’s just SME. And you’d have to get permission from them.
HIRSHON: Right. That’s what he was saying. And that’s why he was saying, “I’ll give you permission,” and all of that.
MCDARBY: Yeah. Okay. So hopefully he still has the original sketches. If he does, it’ll explain pretty much what I’m telling you.
You’ll see the different buckets of ideas that we had approached.
HIRSHON: And I also noticed that Nyisles, the mascot himself, seemed to change over the different seasons. This photo that’s in the New York Times shows him as being very overweight, this roly- poly kind of figure.
MCDARBY: He’s round. He’s barrel- chested.
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HIRSHON: Yeah. And then later on, the next season, it seems like he’s slimmed down significantly.
MCDARBY: Yes.
HIRSHON: He worked out all summer or something. And he all of a sudden has much more of a hockey player kind of build. So was that a conscious decision too?
MCDARBY: Yes. Yes. You throw the first thing out there, then you get responses from it. “Ah, he’s too fat. He looks slow.” So they made him more athletic the next year. But he probably also had a hard time walking down the aisles too. [He laughs.]
HIRSHON: Yeah. I saw there were some quotes in that story from the guy who was apparently wearing the outfit, at least in the early days, and talking about the attitude that they wanted. I guess everything you were saying. He’s supposed to have this New York attitude, in- your- face, obnoxious even, and maybe that went a little too far.
MCDARBY: Tough.
HIRSHON: Yeah, tough. It seems like here what you’ve brought up, there’s kind of this conflict here. On the one hand, you want him to be something where kids are gobbling up the merchandise and they want to hug the mascot and get their photo, but on the other hand, you want him to have this New York toughness and obnoxiousness.
That doesn’t seem to go hand in hand with each other.
MCDARBY: No. It’s a very tough sell.
HIRSHON: Yeah.
MCDARBY: A very tough sell. But the death of the logo was because it looked too much like the Gorton’s fisherman. If there wasn’t a Gorton’s fisherman logo out there, no one would have had anything to say.
They wouldn’t be yelling, “We want fish sticks!” That to me is what really killed it. I think design- wise it was a pretty decent logo. Not one of my favorites, but it was okay. I designed the Liberty logo for SME, the New York Rangers. Now that’s more my style. It’s more classic. The lighthouse is more classic, more hockey. And it would have endured a lot longer. I mean, what complaints could you have against that? The lighthouse was the secondary logo.
HIRSHON: Mmm- hmm.
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MCDARBY: I don’t know if you know that. It was on the shoulder.
HIRSHON: On the shoulder. Yeah. So you actually designed the lighthouse that’s on the shoulder?
MCDARBY: No. No. Andrew did that one too.
HIRSHON: Oh, he did that one too. But you did other versions of different lighthouses?
MCDARBY: Yes.
HIRSHON: Do you know what the inspiration was for the lighthouse?
Was there a particular one that they were going for?
MCDARBY: A lighthouse is a lighthouse. We just researched a lighthouse. I think the best part of the design was how he interpreted the rays of light. That was really well done. It was just a really nice, nice logo. If Ed has still the mock- ups of how that looked on the front, you’ll see it was a really good logo. Frankly, they should still do it.
HIRSHON: Yeah. I think at this point they’re so afraid, and you’ve seen it over the years now. The Islanders are afraid to change their jersey in any way beyond just the background color.
MCDARBY: It’s one of the worst logos in hockey.
HIRSHON: It’s what?
MCDARBY: It’s one of the worst logos in hockey.
HIRSHON: The current one that they have?
MCDARBY: Yeah. It’s an old 1980s- looking logo. The type is bad.
The NY is bad. A lot of people have this emotional attachment to it only because how great the team was. That’s the only thing. But if you look at it from a design standpoint, that logo just is amateurish.
HIRSHON: What about it doesn’t work?
MCDARBY: The map of the state behind the type. The type is just kind of clunky and not even. It’s typographically not well done. There’s no dimension to it. I just don’t like it.
HIRSHON: Okay. The other issue that some people have brought up besides the Gorton’s fisherman, like you’ve said, just the attachment to the old logo. And if they had never won in that old jersey, if this had been the first- ever logo . . .
MCDARBY: They would have had no attachment to it. If that team stunk from its inception, they’d have no attachment to it.
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HIRSHON: Yeah. Exactly.
MCDARBY: They have all these retro jerseys now. And what is that all about? It’s about the same thing. It’s about the heyday, the glory days of your team, if there was an Original Six or whatever. People gravitate to that when they were great.
HIRSHON: Right.
MCDARBY: It has nothing to do with how well it’s designed.
HIRSHON: And when you were talking about the logo or the mascot, Ed was saying that often they didn’t like to talk about it in terms of fishermen, maybe to avoid the Gorton’s fisherman, but they used to use the term bayman. Do you remember that?
MCDARBY: What was the term?
HIRSHON: Bayman.
MCDARBY: Bayman. The bayman. Yeah.
HIRSHON: Yeah? That’s what you guys would say sometimes?
MCDARBY: [He laughs.] What is he? He’s a fisherman.
HIRSHON: Right. I guess it’s sort of a euphemism.
MCDARBY: If it was a bayman, well, maybe he thought that he wouldn’t look like the Gorton’s fisherman because they had clam guys out there. The baymen were more clam guys. They were clammers. I actually kind of think we had some secondary logos with clamming boats on them. That’s a vague recollection, though.
HIRSHON: Well, that would make some sense, because Ed was
saying the reason why they used baymen was because Billy Joel had just come out with that song ‘Downeaster Alexa.’
MCDARBY: Yes. Yes. Right.
HIRSHON: And that they wanted to kind of evoke that image of the bayman. And even when they unveiled the logo officially, they actually brought in these guys from a baymen’s association to stand alongside the logo and talk about Long Island heritage.
MCDARBY: Oh, okay.
HIRSHON: Were you involved in any of that, like the official rolling out, going to games?
MCDARBY: No. I’m a pair of hands. That’s basically it. I came in and sketched it.
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HIRSHON: And as this logo is being unveiled and then it’s being panned, what was the feeling in the company? Was it embarrassing to be part of this?
MCDARBY: The next year. They thought it was great when they first came out with it. And it did pretty good with the sales, too, if I remember correctly. It was something new. It was something fresh.
People, they bought it up. But once they started getting panned and made fun of, the people who were Islander fanatics, they wanted their old logo back. You’re always gonna come up against that kind of thing with change.
HIRSHON: But in all the logos you’ve ever worked on, was this up there among the most vilified or controversial or however you want to frame it?
MCDARBY: It’s the most controversial.
HIRSHON: How about in all of sports? Because I’m sure you have an appreciation for other logos beyond what SME has done or what you did. Looking at the totality of sports logos, where do you think it ranks in that controversial aspect?
MCDARBY: It’s gotta be up there. I don’t know of any other logo that had people picketing it and hating it. You’re talking one or two. I’m trying to think of some of the other ones that got panned. Nothing that we’ve done at SME. I mean, everything was pretty successful. Out of SME that was the most embarrassing one. But again, you’re directed. I can’t blame SME for anything that was done. They had over a hundred choices. They could have chosen anything else. You wonder how it gets to that point sometimes. Is it design by committee? A lot of people talking? But SME did have that. They were selling that in- your- face stuff at that time. Of all the sketches that we did, the fisherman was the only real article that we had to put that in- your- face attitude on.
HIRSHON: Mmm- hmm. And as you recall, the time that you really realized this logo was gonna be doomed was when the Rangers fans started chanting against it, “We want fish sticks!”?
MCDARBY: Yes. Yeah. “We want fish sticks!” Yeah.
HIRSHON: Yeah.
MCDARBY: I was in the audience when they first played the Rangers.
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I was at the game, and I was just hiding my head. [He laughs.] And I’m a Ranger fan, unfortunately. [He laughs.]
HIRSHON: So this was at the Garden, you’re talking about?
MCDARBY: I was at the Garden. They gave me tickets to go see the game the first time the Islanders were on the ice with the new logo on.
HIRSHON: This was the very first time they wore the logo, or just the first time versus the Rangers?
MCDARBY: No. No. The first time at the Rangers.
HIRSHON: Okay.
MCDARBY: They had their unveiling at the Coliseum.
HIRSHON: Right.
MCDARBY: I didn’t go to that one.
HIRSHON: Yeah. I saw some old clips too from the Times and other papers about people throwing, of course, fish sticks on the ice but also just fish itself. Supposedly that happened at the Garden.
MCDARBY: Yeah. Yeah. It was just too much fuel for your opposition where it became embarrassing. And you don’t need that from your logo.
HIRSHON: Right. They were doing that to themselves enough on the ice.
MCDARBY: What’s that?
HIRSHON: They were doing that enough to themselves on the ice with just being a poor team.
MCDARBY: Yeah. They were a poor team. Yeah. If they won the Stanley Cup that year, people wouldn’t have said anything. That’s just the way it is, though.
HIRSHON: Well, is there any other aspect of either the mascot or the logo that I haven’t touched on you want to go into?
MCDARBY: No. That’s pretty much as much as I can remember,
too. It’s been a long time.
HIRSHON: Right. I know it’s a while ago.
MCDARBY: Well, I grew up in the Bronx, and I’ve done, like I said, over a hundred team identities and stuff, and my friends, guys in the Bronx, are cruel as it is. I have this one friend. He always introduces me, “Hey, here’s the guy that did the Islander logo!” [He laughs.] I say,
“Hey dude, that’s not the only logo I did!” [He laughs.] They don’t let 210
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you get a big head up in the Bronx. They like to bring you down. [He laughs.]
HIRSHON: Well, which other logos are you proud of? Of course, we’re talking about this one that’s not necessarily the best work.
MCDARBY: The Liberty logo was my favorite. And the Madison
Square Garden identity, but that’s not a team. That was a venue.
HIRSHON: Which logo did you do for the Garden?
MCDARBY: I did the whole identity logo. And MSG Network. And if you ever see the Garden bags, the plastic bag, the illustration on the front of them is mine.
HIRSHON: Ah. That’s all yours.
MCDARBY: Yeah.
HIRSHON: I know there is some sort of a Madison Square Garden logo, I haven’t seen it in a while, but there was something that has the side of the building on it. That’s yours, I guess?
MCDARBY: Yes. It’s the building. It’s looking up at the Garden.
You see the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building in the background.
HIRSHON: Okay.
MCDARBY: And it’s all purples and blues.
HIRSHON: This kind of begs the question: Did you want to ruin the Islanders ’cause you’re a Rangers fan?
MCDARBY: No. No. I have no control over that.
HIRSHON: Right. Right.
MCDARBY: No. I have a lot of pride in what I do, and I think everybody at SME did too. That’s your business. You try to do the best job you can for all your clients. ’Cause you do a bad job and you’re out.
And that’s a very narrow business. That’s a very small niche to be in.
And SME was the best at the time.
HIRSHON: And have you continued to do the logos? I saw on your website you still have a bunch of stuff up there.
MCDARBY: I just— I don’t know if you know the UFL [United Football League]?
HIRSHON: Uh huh. Yup.
MCDARBY: I did all the logos for that league.
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HIRSHON: Oh, wow.
MCDARBY: And at the turn of the millennium, I did Major League Soccer. Without SME. I left SME in 2000.
HIRSHON: Okay. When you’re doing Major League Soccer, was
that all of their teams or the logo for—
MCDARBY: No. It was the league logo and all- star logo and the Connecticut logo and their whole identity package. They have conference logos— West Conference, East Conference. Did all those.
HIRSHON: Gotcha. So besides the sources that I’ve already mentioned to you— obviously I’ve spoken to Ed, and I’m gonna try to reach Andrew and some other people— but is there any other person you think would be good to talk to, or a place to go to, an archive where some of this might be still in existence?
MCDARBY: Um, well, who was the— I’m trying to think who was the owner of the Islanders at that time, because he had a big part in the whole thing.
HIRSHON: The main owner was John Pickett, who apparently was an absentee owner, but the remaining 10 percent were a few other guys. I think they called them a Gang of Three or Gang of Four. Robert Rosenthal was probably the one that you may remember.
MCDARBY: I don’t remember him. But there was definitely somebody over there pulling— making the decisions. Like I said, I never met with those guys. I just got reports back and I got job descriptions of what we had to do, and that’s where I would go work from.
HIRSHON: Gotcha.
MCDARBY: But there was somebody definitely at the ownership over there making these decisions. If I remember Ed, he didn’t want that. I don’t know if he told you that that he didn’t want that.
HIRSHON: Yeah. That’s what he told me. Yeah.
MCDARBY: Yeah. He didn’t want that logo. He was definitely trying to sell the lighthouse.
HIRSHON: But apparently he said, like you’re saying, that the owners were very gung- ho about the fisherman, perhaps with the prospect of sales and with the mascot.
MCDARBY: It is more family friendly. A lighthouse— how do you 212
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connect with an inanimate object? But symbolically, I think it’s a better thing, but you’re not gonna sell it to kids. You can’t worry about selling to kids. You sell it to your fans.
HIRSHON: Mmm- hmm. I guess that speaks to the 1990s in general.
Ed was also saying with the Mighty Ducks, that had just come out, and everybody was thinking about, How can we get more cartoonish and get to that Disney kind of level?
MCDARBY: And actually, one of SME’s largest coups, one of their best designs from that time, was the Raptors. It was a cartoon dinosaur.
&nbs
p; They didn’t have a team yet, and they were selling millions of dollars’
worth of fashion. If you look at the Islander logo and the Raptors logo, it has a similar feel to it. They’re trying to build on that success, I guess.
HIRSHON: And I think that was Ed’s point. Maybe it worked for the Raptors a few years earlier, but by the time the Islanders were using it—
MCDARBY: Yes. And it was a great success. The other thing with the Raptors was the fashion colors. SME started using the fashion forecasts to choose the color palettes. It matched with the Nike sneaker of the time. I think they did that with the Islanders, too.
HIRSHON: I know that the Islanders never came out with any sort of merchandise besides selling the fisherman logo on pucks and on the jerseys obviously, but apparently they never came out with dolls and other sorts of things that they were at first thinking about that would have maybe been more lucrative.
MCDARBY: I think that they might have been waiting to see if it had any impetus as far as it being a good thing. I don’t think they would get into merchandising in the first year. When they’d seen it going south, they just probably said, “No, let’s not go forward with this.”
HIRSHON: I guess that was a good decision.
MCDARBY: Yes. It was.
HIRSHON: ’Cause you’d have millions of these fisherman dolls in some basement in Nassau Coliseum.
MCDARBY: With the fish.
HIRSHON: Yeah. Exactly. Sleeping with the fishes.
MCDARBY: [He laughs.]
HIRSHON: All right. I think that’s pretty much what I wanted to 213
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cover. Thank you very much for your time. And of course, this is all very flexible and I’m still working through some of these things, so if you don’t mind, I may be in touch again and I’ll certainly keep you abreast of what I’m doing.
MCDARBY: If I find anything, I’ll email you to let you know what I got.
HIRSHON: Yeah. That would be great. And if you want me to run it past Ed again, or if you want to do that to make sure that it’s okay.
MCDARBY: Well, Ed and I are not on good terms, though. [He
laughs.]
HIRSHON: Oh, okay.
MCDARBY: He probably didn’t even mention my name.
HIRSHON: Oh, no. He actually didn’t. But I didn’t know if that was because he didn’t want— at one point, he said during the conversation that he didn’t want to get too involved with naming people as if he was blaming people. So I think that that was part of it. But anyway, I saw your name luckily when I was going through that one story, so I’m glad that that exists.
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