Hockey Towns

by Ron MacLean

  Father David Bauer was the Majors’ coach. He was slender and not very tall, but a tremendous athlete from a great hockey family. His older brother was Bobby Bauer, who played on the famous Kraut Line with teammates Milt Schmidt and Woody Dumart in Boston. Gerry admired how, in baseball, Father Bauer could pitch with either hand. Like Vic Teal, Father Bauer believed a goalie had to be a skater. He drilled that point home by making Gerry skate in the forward’s drills. In fact, in Gerry’s last year, Bauer put him on a line for twelve games.

  Gerry couldn’t be contained at St. Mike’s. At first, his dorm room was on the third floor, so he couldn’t sneak out, but the last two years he was there, he was moved to the first floor. When the lights went out, Gerry would climb out his window and down the little wooden fire ladder, and then run down to the community dry cleaners and play Hearts with the owner, his wife and their nephew until the wee hours of the morning. Then he’d sneak back in and be up and on his knees at mass by 7 a.m.

  In 1958, Gerry’s third year, he’d duck out to the Greenwood Raceway with one of the priests, Father Flanagan, who was a real racetracker. Father would venture out under a big pair of sunglasses and a ballcap. He’d find Gerry and whisper to him to meet at the car.

  That year, everyone was talking about the Kentucky Derby and the handsome dark bay colt, Tim Tam, that was favoured to win. Gerry and a pal, John Chasczewski, decided to take some action on the race, but instead of going with track odds at about 6–1, they cut the odds in half, to 3–1. That way, they couldn’t lose. The boys got a little nervous when their handle got up to about five hundred dollars. That’s equivalent to more than four thousand today.

  On the Friday night before the race, Gerry got called in to see the principal, Father Reagan. Gerry’s heart sank to the bottom of his feet. He figured somebody had blown the whistle on him and he was going to get kicked out of school. Father Reagan was a rigid disciplinarian. Very tough.

  He walked into the big office in a sweat, and Father Reagan threw him a stern look. “Gerry, sit down.”

  Gerry felt like throwing up. “Aw nuts,” he thought. “How am I going to explain this to my mother?”

  Father Reagan straightened the papers on his desk and said, “Listen, Gerry, what are the odds on Tim Tam?”

  Gerry blinked. “Three to one, Father, but I’ll give you four to one.”

  Father Reagan nodded. “Put ten dollars on him for me.” Tim Tam won, Father Reagan was forty dollars richer, and that was the end of it.

  In the meantime, the hockey team under Father Bauer was winning like crazy. He would go on to become a big fish in Hockey Canada with the development of the Olympic team program, and he became one of the most influential persons in Gerry’s life. The Majors made it all the way to the Memorial Cup for the first time in fourteen years. Father Bauer was ahead of his time in the way he coached a psychological game. In fact, he taught psychology at St. Mike’s. During the playoffs, they lost a very physical game to Hamilton. Father Bauer publicly objected to how rough things got on the ice and threatened to pull his team if Hamilton didn’t dial it back. Meanwhile, in the dressing room, he sang another tune. “C’mon, boys! Let’s go beat the hell out of them.” It was part of the way he kept the opposition off balance.

  St. Mike’s had such a good team. It was the kind of team Father Bauer created, full of speedy checkers. Terry O’Malley was the team captain and a very good defenceman. He went on to become president of Père Athol Murray’s school in Wilcox, Saskatchewan. Barry MacKenzie was on that team too. He’s the coach who brought along players like Russ Courtnall and Wendel Clark at Notre Dame, and he preceded Terry as president. There were the Draper twins, Bruce and Dave. Bruce was probably the best player on the St. Mike’s team. He and Larry Keenan would go on to play with Gerry in Rochester of the American League, and Bruce would help the Hershey Bears reach the Calder Cup final in 1964–65. Sadly, Bruce was diagnosed with leukemia and died three years later at twenty-seven years of age. Then there was Arnie Brown, who has been ranked ninety-third on the all-time list of New York Rangers. Billy MacMillan, who made the NHL at age twenty-seven and ended up assisting Al Arbour when he coached the New York Islanders. Terry Clancy, who could skate like the wind and was the son of longtime NHLer King Clancy. And Gerry Cheevers.

  Half that team wound up in the NHL. The first three games of the Memorial Cup finals were held at Edmonton Gardens, and not many of the boys had ever flown, including Gerry. It was a great back-and-forth series, but St. Mike’s persevered, winning in Edmonton’s rink, thanks in large part to Gerry’s performance. Afterward, Gerry said it helped that whenever he walked into the old rink, he’d smell the onions they fried for their burgers. That’s what got him going.

  A lot of college scouts were in attendance. Murray Armstrong, the head coach of the University of Denver in Colorado, was so impressed by Gerry’s goaltending, he offered him a scholarship. But when word got back to the Leafs, the deal fell apart. Back then, the Leafs paid amateur goalies to be standby netminders in case of an injury. In his last two years of high school, the Leafs had paid Gerry ten dollars a game for this service, and NCAA rules don’t allow players to receive money from professional teams.

  In those days, when it came to negotiating with the NHL, it was their way or the highway. But Father Bauer was mad that Gerry wasn’t going to be able to attend college, so he went in to see the Leafs with Gerry and did all the talking. He got the best contract possible for the kid—$5,000 his first season, $5,500 in year two and a $3,000 signing bonus. Gerry drove home to St. Catharines that night, feeling like he had just won the lottery. But he didn’t have the bonus money long—the next day, Joe sold him a car for $2,700.

  Gerry went on to play goal with Bobby Orr and the Boston Bruins, winning two Stanley Cups, in 1970 and 1972. He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1985. In his opening remarks on live television he said, “They haven’t given me long here. And so on the two most important times of my life, tonight and my honeymoon, both are all over in ninety seconds.”

  Little Zee

  Wednesdays during the winter, I play hockey with a group of guys who’ve been skating together for more than twenty years. Three of our stalwarts are the Piercey brothers, Doug, Darren and Ronnie. Tough as steel—all with good hands.

  Doug, a Peel Regional police officer in Toronto, has a good friend named Zenon Konopka. They’re birds of a feather. Zenon was an NHL policeman on the ice and although not the fastest skater, he too had good hands.

  You might have heard that Zenon had to sit twenty games while playing with the Sabres in 2014 for using a performance-enhancing substance during off-season training. Turns out it was an over-the-counter supplement that did not pass muster. The time missed cost him. His NHL career was over. A tough smear on the resume of a man held in the greatest regard by teammates and friends.

  Zee deserves to be remembered another way. He had an impressive career with 346 games in the NHL, and he skated for the 1999 Memorial Cup champions, the Ottawa 67’s, under Hall of Fame coach Brian Kilrea.

  My favourite memory of Zenon is the time I ran into him at an NHL playoff game in Calgary. He and former 67’s teammate Lance Galbraith were playing in Idaho for the ECHL Steelheads. Just visiting, they came over to meet Don Cherry and told us about their recent victory at the Kelly Cup. During the team’s first season, they’d won the league title at home in Boise. Zenon shared some Kilrea stories with Grapes and then mentioned their goalie, Saskatoon’s Dan Ellis, who was the Kelly Cup MVP. (That performance launched Dan’s career, big time. Fourteen years in the NHL and counting.) I had refereed Dan in the OHA when he was with the Junior B Orangeville Crushers. He, like Zenon, was a bit of a long shot to make the NHL.

  Zenon shared great stories of that run in Boise and never mentioned himself or his contribution—leaving out the fact he led the team in goals and points. Zenon shares my mother’s birth date, January 2. His humility and his wonderful storytelling reminded me of Mom. Doug Pierc
ey and I feel you should know a very special man.

  Martin Konopka worked extremely hard to have a good life in Poland. In 1939, he and his wife Katarzyna (Katherine) and four children lived close to the Russian border, in Lwów, now Lviv, which is now part of Ukraine.

  Elżbieta (Elizabeth) was seven, Jadwiga (Jennette) six, Zenon—the only boy—was four years old and Waleria (Valerie) was three. All were well taken care of. They had a nice house on a big acreage, they had a maid and they owned some good horses. And then, twenty-five years after the start of World War I, Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, triggering World War II.

  On September 17, Soviet Russia attacked Poland unexpectedly from the east thanks to a secret protocol attached to the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact—a treaty of non-aggression signed by Germany and Russia just a month earlier. The two countries split Poland in two and pledged to remain neutral if a third party attacked either nation.

  For about six months, Russian tanks overwhelmed the country and deportations of the intelligentsia began as Josef Stalin got rid of professors, scientists, doctors and artists. Next, the Soviets began nationalizing businesses, so shop owners and the middle class were arrested too. All in all, 1.7 million inhabitants of eastern Poland were classified as Soviet citizens of the second category and sent into the bowels of Russia.

  At about three thirty on the morning of February 10, 1940, there was a loud and terrible pounding on the Konopkas’ front door. The family’s two big blond Labradors, Rex and Lord, scrambled for purchase across the hardwood foyer. Both were barking furiously. The maid hurried down the hallway, quickly tying her housecoat about her waist. She opened the door and screamed as two Russian soldiers holding machine guns burst in. Katarzyna joined them, clutching her dressing gown tight to her chest. The soldiers ordered her to get herself and the children dressed and to pack up just what they could carry.

  Katarzyna pleaded with them to wait for her husband, who was away on business. He was supposed to return the next day. But they told her there was no time. The Germans were preparing to attack, they lied. They bullied her—where exactly was Martin? She insisted she didn’t know, and they let her go. Katarzyna ran to get her children ready. She was in tears as she shook them awake, telling them to get up and to dress in several layers of clothing, as many as they could. Meanwhile, the maid frantically stuffed as many of her mistress’s good clothes and jewels as she could into a large suitcase.

  Four-year-old Zenon was waiting in the hall, rubbing his sleepy eyes, when in came a Russian captain dressed in his army-green tunic and jodhpurs with big black boots. He spotted Katarzyna running around and smiled at her reassuringly. He told her not to panic and to stop crying, that she and her family would be taken good care of. He told her she would be travelling far by train and that she and the children would need warm clothing and to take some dishes and food because they were not going to be fed for some time. He patted Zenon on the head and said, “Of course, you have small children, so bring milk.”

  Zenon ran into the kitchen, where the maid was filling another suitcase full of dishes and cooked food, everything they had in the house. Zenon pulled up a stool to reach the cupboards and packed his pockets full of pierogies, pastries and cookies.

  The family was taken to the nearest train station. That day, 175,000 others in the country were ordered to board cattle cars already full of people. Katarzyna hesitated. There was no room in the wagon! But she and the children were pushed forward into fifty voices full of shouts and questions. Little Elżbieta looked around in the dimness. There was only one small window near the top of the wall, and the car was freezing. Early February meant the days were short and cloudy, with almost always a little snow or rain, and the cast-iron stove in the middle of the car had no fuel. She spotted a hole in the floor, and when her mother explained that it was to be used as the toilet, she blushed. How could she be expected to do her business in public?

  The doors were slammed and bolted, thrusting them into near pitch darkness. At one end of the car there was a little platform in the corner, and Katarzyna was invited to use part of it for her and her children. Many of the people in the car worked for her father, who was a fair and generous man, and so they were kindly disposed toward her.

  The soldiers met Martin on his way home the following day. They refused to let him into his house. Instead, they took him straight to the station. Martin pulled up in front of the cattle cars in his huge sleigh drawn by four horses, and several train car doors were opened as he searched for his family. Finding them gave him a mixture of relief and sorrow. Thankfully, he had a wagon full of food and supplies. Most of it was pushed into the car with him.

  The train didn’t move for two weeks. Some of the people cried quietly and most prayed, but there was little commotion. Even the children stayed still. The car doors were rarely opened because the guards feared their passengers would escape. Conditions continued to deteriorate. The smell in the car was sickening. Every breath filled their noses and throats with a musty and bloody burn from the stench of human feces and vomit. Most had brought very little food, so Katarzyna shared what she could, but nobody ate much anyway. One day, little Zenon surprised the family with the pierogies and cookies he had stored in his pockets.

  The biggest problem was getting water. Each car was given a small jug to share every few days. Everyone was dirty and dehydrated, especially the children. Polish people in the area brought food, water and milk and stood outside the train cars, begging the Russian soldiers to open the door just a little.

  At the beginning of the third week, the train started to move. By then, everyone had heard they were headed to Siberia. As the trains pulled out of the station, the people in every car came together in one tearful voice, singing, “We will not abandon our land.”

  Occasionally they would stop along the route and the door would open. A Russian soldier would poke his head in and ask, “Is anybody dead?” Bodies were thrown out into the snowy ditches along the tracks. People were allowed out to melt snow for water and to relieve themselves. The soldiers knew they wouldn’t escape. Where to?

  Finally, they arrived near the large city of Sverdlovsk, now called Yekaterinburg. It’s the fourth-largest city in Russia, located at the foot of the Ural Mountains, right on the border between Europe and Asia. The people were told to unload and then were forced to walk for hours until they reached their new home—a set of poorly constructed barracks. Each family was assigned to one room, but many of the parents were forced into hard labour. Six days a week, Martin and Katarzyna were sent deep into the forest to cut trees and send them down the river to other prisoners who were building a railroad track, which would never be completed. The Konopkas worked in the wet snow from 5 a.m. until well after dark. And then, on Sundays, because there was only one travel permit per family, either Martin or Katarzyna would make the twenty-kilometre walk back to the barracks to check on the children. Weekdays, Elżbieta, who was now eight years old, was in charge of the children, who were always hungry. There was so little food—no breakfast, soup for lunch and only a small ration of bread for supper. Fortunately, Katarzyna had packed some beautiful clothes and jewellery that she was able to sell to the commandant’s wife for a cup of milk here and there.

  Katarzyna had also brought along her greatest treasure, a blue crystal statue of Jesus. Martin’s mother had given it to her when Elżbieta was a toddler and very ill. Katarzyna was told that if she prayed to Jesus, her child would live. The statue was sacred to the family.

  Under Stalin’s orders, Russians were not allowed any religious icons. Communism dictated that there was no God. One day, the camp commander came through the door for inspection, machine gun at his side. He picked up the statue and turned it over, examining it, then held it up, intending to smash it on the floor. Little Zenon ran over to him and raised his hands in protest. “Don’t touch it!” he yelled. “That’s God! We pray to Him. Put it down.”

  The commander looked at Zenon and then placed the s
tatue gently back on the table. “You are a brave little boy,” he said.

  A little while later, the men in the forest camp were gathered to hear a speaker talk about the glories of Russia and about how lucky and proud they should all feel now that they were part of such a great country under a great leader like Stalin. After the meeting, Martin walked out with a friend. He told the man, “I wish lightning would strike the great Stalin dead.” Someone overheard him, and Martin was arrested. Several people had already been shot for treasonous remarks. As his family wept and waited for news of his fate, Martin held firm in insisting he said no such thing. Finally, the same camp commander intervened and Martin was released.

  On June 22, 1941, Hitler organized a surprise attack on the Soviet Union. General Wladyslaw Sikorski, head of occupied Poland’s government-in-exile, had taken refuge in England. He signed a treaty with the Soviets leading to the pardon of the captured Poles, and a Polish army was organized in Russia to fight against Hitler.

  Martin immediately signed up so that his family would be allowed to leave Siberia for Uzbekistan. From there, the family went to Persia—modern-day Iran. When they crossed the border, they were met by members of the Polish army, who had organized hot showers for the family. Their heads were shaved, their filthy clothes were discarded and they were given a warm meal and new, clean clothes.

  Katarzyna and the children lived in Tehran for six months. They were housed in tents, with no ground sheets or any kind of floor, but in comparison to Russia, it was heaven. The Persians were exceptionally kind to the Poles, bringing them boiled eggs and pickles. They were given all they could eat, but hundreds were dying due to typhus, dysentery and the effect of the new abundance of food on their starving stomachs.

  Persia couldn’t possibly accommodate all the people who were flooding in for refuge, so they were dispersed to several countries. Some went to Lebanon and other parts of North Africa, and some to Mexico. The Konopkas were sent to East Africa, but they first stopped in Karachi, India, which is now in Pakistan.