toronto hockey

The lost hockey teams of Toronto

Hockey in Toronto isn't all about the NHL. Kids in Toronto have been playing Canada's game on frozen ponds and home-made rinks for more than a century.

These pictures, taken from around 1910 to the mid 1960s show school, city park, and recreation centre teams, usually in the east end, and feature young players across a range of ages. Some have uniforms, others play in plain clothes with cricket pads and gloves as their only measure of protection against slapped pucks.

toronto hockey

One picture captures the touring "Fast Ojibway Indians" and the "Great Cree Indians" teams, who visited Toronto in 1928 during a 2,200-mile cross-country motor coach tour.

toronto hockey

From the professional world, there's the Toronto Arenas a short-lived Stanley Cup-winning precursor to the Toronto St. Patricks, who became the Maple Leafs in the 1920s, and some images of the Army Daggers and Royal Canadian Air Force teams from the 1940s.

Those squads feature players whose wonderful names could only be from the wartime period, who all sound like friends of your grandparents: Buddy Glover, Buck Jones, Lloyd Finkbeiner, Herb Mortimer.

The handful of action shots capture the scrape and clatter of pick-up games at Christie Pits Park (when there still were pits,) Riverdale Park, and the University of Toronto campus.

You can almost feel the pinch of the crisp winter air. Not long now.

toronto hockey

Hockey at Christie Pits

toronto hockey

Adam Beck - playground champions

toronto hockey

Earl Grey school

toronto hockey

East Riverdale boys

toronto hockey

East Riverdale girls

toronto hockey

Ice rinks at Riverdale Park with the General Steel Wares Building in the background

toronto hockey

Essex playground team

toronto hockey

Hodgson's championship team

toronto hockey

Hughes

toronto hockey

Keele school juvenile champions

toronto hockey

University of Toronto players

toronto hockey

McCormick

toronto hockey

Moss Park

toronto hockey

A match outside the St. Clair car barn

toronto hockey

North Toronto

toronto hockey

Osler playground

toronto hockey

The Royal Canadian Air Force team celebrates a win

toronto hockey

Strathcona

toronto hockey

TTC's Danforth barns team

toronto hockey

Wilkinson

toronto hockey

Women's hockey

toronto hockey

Buddy Davis of the Army Daggers

toronto hockey

Buddy Glover from the Daggers

toronto hockey

The Toronto Arenas

toronto hockey

The Toronto St. Patricks

toronto hockey

Toronto Maple Leafs

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Images: City of Toronto Archives


Latest Videos



Latest Videos


Join the conversation Load comments

Latest in Sports & Play

Air Canada now has a plane with a Vince Carter design on it

Toronto Raptors players wore some wild costumes at their Halloween bash

Toronto Maple Leafs Halloween party featured plenty of hilarious costumes

Here's why a woman ran onto the court at a Toronto Raptors game

Toronto Maple Leafs are now worth a billion dollars more than before

Toronto's largest indoor roller skating rink shuts down

Fans can now tour the Leafs and Raptors dressing rooms at Scotiabank Arena

Former Toronto Raptors coach lived in a hotel during his whole tenure with team