Looking Back to Another Time When Canada's Hockey Hopes Rested on Non-NHL Players (Part 1 of 3)

By Joe Corrigan

There was a great deal made about not sending players from the NHL to the 2018 Olympics in Pyeong Chang and how it would impact the quality of the tournament. In the end, what resulted was one of the most competitive and exciting competitions for a gold medal in recent years and it afforded the opportunity for a number of former NHLers and minor league pros to achieve a hitherto unattainable dream, an Olympic medal.

Having top calibre professional athletes competing in the Olympics is only something that has been in place since the 1990's. Before that, a code of amateurism (although I hesitate to use the word "strict" given the way it was applied) prohibited professionals from taking part. From the first Olympic ice hockey tournament in Antwerp, Belgium in 1920 until the Nagano games in 1998, Canada was represented by senior amateur teams from Winnipeg, Toronto (Granite Club and U of T Grads), Port Arthur, the Royal Canadian Air Force, Edmonton and Kitchener-Waterloo. That was also true of the International Ice Hockey Federation's (IIHF) World Championships where Canada was represented by towns like East York, Ontario, Belleville, Ontario, Trail, B.C., Penticton, B.C. and, my home town, Whitby, Ontario. This week marks the 60th anniversary of the Whitby Dunlops Senior "A" hockey team representing Canada at the World Championships in Oslo, Norway.     

Left to right: RCAF Flyers- 1948 Olympics, East York Lyndhursts- 1954 World Championships, Penticton V's- 1955 World Championships, Kitchener-Waterloo Dutchment-1956 Olympics, Belleville MacFarlands- 1959 World Championships

To have an understanding of the atmosphere around the 1958 World Championships it is necessary to see the tournament within the context of international politics. The mid-1950's represented a very tense time in world history. It was the height of the cold war and the dawn of an era of great advancement in nuclear and space technology. The advent of the atomic bomb which ended the Second World War gave humanity a glimpse of its potential ultimate destruction. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) under Joseph Stalin was involved in international intrigue against the west and McCarthyism, where the United States Senate's Committee on Un-American Activities was making accusations of Communist affiliations against authors, playwrights and others in the entertainment industry without due process, brought an end to many careers. Adding to the paranoia, the Soviets had tested their own atomic bomb in 1949 becoming the world's second atomic power after the United States. The USSR's control of Eastern Europe was referred to by Winston Churchill as an "iron curtain" descending upon Europe. The construction of the Berlin Wall, the invasion of Hungary in 1956 and the military suppression of the Hungarian revolution were greeted with outrage in the west. Add to that the incredible folly of Great Britain and France invading Egypt to cease control of the Suez Canal that same year which only served to split these two allies from the United States. To say that the situation was tense would be an understatement. Fortunately, with regard to the Suez crisis, the world was pulled back from the brink by Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister, and later Prime Minister, Lester Pearson's peace keeping force proposal. 1957 saw another deeply troubling development for western nations when the USSR launched the world's first orbiting space satellite, "Sputnik" on October 4th. It was against this geo-political backdrop that a senior hockey team from Whitby, Ontario (population 6,000) would take to the ice and challenge the Soviet Union for the World Ice Hockey Championship supremacy in the cause of freedom and the western democracies (perhaps a little over dramatic but that's what it must have seemed like to the players at the time).       

If the politicians of the world were concerned with the Soviet's threat of world domination, so too were Canadian hockey enthusiasts. Prior to World War II, Canada dominated international ice hockey competitions. Our teams often embarrassed other countries with lopsided scores and strings of shut out victories. The only time that a Canadian team lost an Olympic title in those days was at the 1936 Games in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany when we underestimated a team from Great Britain made up entirely of ex-patriot Canadians. That changed with the post-war era. The Soviets planned their move so that when they did finally appear on the international ice hockey scene it would be as a dominant force. Canada won both the 1948 and 1952 Olympic gold medals but that would mark the end of our Olympic championships until 50 years later at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City, Utah with NHL professionals under the guidance of General Manager Wayne Gretzky and a brain trust of Canadian hockey elites.   

Canada didn't enter a team in the 1953 IIHF World Championships which was staged in Zurich, Switzerland and competed between European nations. Sweden claimed its first title that year. In 1954, Canada had trouble finding a team to represent our country in the event. In a moment of hubris, the powers that be settled on a Senior "B" level team, the East York Lyndhursts (named after a local car dealership). The Lyndhursts played in the local East York Senior "B" league of which they weren't even the champions. They had lost the league semi-final in the 1952-53 season and the final in 1953-54, immediately before going to the World Championships which were held in Stockholm Sweden. Despite their junior stature on the Canadian senior hockey scene, they did quite well in their first 6 games. They ended the tournament with a goal differential of +47 and a 6-1 record. The only problem was that they ran up against a superior Soviet team in the final game and lost 7-2 in a lopsided contest. The finger pointing at home started immediately. The Lyndhursts, despite being set up for failure, were a stain on the nation's hockey honour, especially in losing to the upstart "Russians". The Canadian hockey hierarchy was determined to get revenge and sent the legendary Penticton "V's" to reclaim the trophy, which they did at the 1955 tournament in Dusseldorf, Dortmund, Krefeld and Cologne, West Germany. The V's had an 8-0 win loss record and a +60 goal differential. They went on to demolish the Soviet team 5-0 in the final game of the tournament bringing the title home for the 16th time. Rumour has it the V's brought home more than the title. When it came time to return the trophy to the IIHF for the next year's tournament, they supposedly sent back a replica, retaining the original in the Penticton arena!

1954 World Championship Opening Ceremony

Soviets vs. Canada - 1954 World Championship

Championship Trophy & CCCP Sweater

The V's triumph was short lived. There was no 1956 World Ice Hockey Championship as it was an Olympic year. Canada's gold medal hopes rested on the shoulders of the Kitchener-Waterloo "Dutchmen" at the games in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy. The Canadian team finished third behind the Soviets and the United States. The 1957 World Championships took place in Moscow, USSR. Canada and the United States boycotted the tournament in protest of the Soviets military intervention in Hungary the year before. The trophy was competed for by European nations and a team from Japan. Sweden won their second championship title that year with the Soviets finishing second. That set the stage for the 1958 World Championships in Oslo. The Whitby Dunlops' road to that tournament will be the subject of part two of this blog.

Joe Corrigan has been Museum Manager at Lang Pioneer Village since February of 2003. He has been a lifelong student of history. His specific areas of interest are Canadian and world political, military and sports history with a particular focus on biographical works.