sr edler
gold is not reality
- Mar 20, 2010
- 12,183
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In March of 1904, the Ottawa Hockey Club had won and defended the Stanley Cup for a second consecutive year, and the club was right in the midst of a run of seasons that would later be defined as an early ice hockey ”dynasty”, with the team subsequently being dubbed the ”Silver Seven”, with such players as Harvey Pulford, Alf Smith, Harry ”Rat” Westwick and ”One-Eyed” Frank McGee in key roles.
But not all was well and dandy in the broader hockey world. In fact, the winter of 1904 was quite a turbulent one when it came to organised puck chasing matters.
At the onset of the 1903–04 season, the Ottawa Hockey Club had been a member of the Canadian Amateur Hockey League, but they had left the league mid-season after four straight victories for the Federal Amateur Hockey League, which instead left the Quebec Hockey Club to snag the league title. But the Stanley Cup didn’t end up in the latter aggregation’s lap, as the Stanley Cup trustees (Dr. John Sweetland and Philip Dansken Ross) decided that it would remain with Ottawa. Quebec subsequently refused to challenge for the trophy, arguing that it belonged to the CAHL champions, i.e. themselves.[1]
CAHL president Harry Trihey, himself a former Stanley Cup champion as a player with the Montreal Shamrocks in 1899 and 1900, naturally wasn’t very pleased with the Stanley Cup trustees decision, and rumblings soon started to brew in various newspapers about Trihey trying to organise for a new championship trophy.
Harry Trihey had joined ranks with R. A. C. ”Pat” Manning, a Winnipeg native former player with the Winnipeg Hockey Club and Winnipeg Rowing Club, and president of the Western Canada League (WCAHA), a circuit only comprised of two aggregations in the Winnipeg Rowing Club and Winnipeg Victorias. Trihey (representing Quebec) and Manning (representing Manitoba) had also been in talks with hockey people in Toronto connected to the Ontario Hockey Association, partly related to the Toronto Marlboros unfavourable experience challenging the Ottawa Hockey Club for the Stanley Cup in February of 1904, and a plan was soon laid out to cast aside the Stanley Cup for a new championship trophy of Canada.[2]
Harry Trihey and Pat Manning
The underlying tone of the complaints seemed to paint a picture of the Stanley Cup trustees running an Ottawa-centric agenda. The OHA teams had complaints about conflicting schedules, as the challenge games for the Stanley Cup were usually finished early in the winter, and in Manitoba they planned to finish their new series in the first week of February, when the conditions of ice and weather would be fair to all parties involved. Pat Manning claimed that the Winnipeg Rowing Club had not received a fair deal from the trustees during its 1903–04 Stanley Cup series (which they had lost 2 games to 1 against Ottawa), and that all other challenging teams were up against the same troubles.
Harry Trihey admitted to having contacted W. A. ”Billy” Hewitt, honorary secretary of the Ontario Hockey Association, by letter on March 7, outlining the conditions under which the new championship trophy (the ”Dominion Challenge Cup”, as he called it) would be competed for, and asking whether he considered it a good idea to join Manitoba and Quebec in disowning the Stanley Cup. According to Trihey, Hewitt had then answered back to him on March 11 that he had promised to place the matter before the executive of his association, and that he would let Trihey know what action, if any, would be taken at a later point in time. Trihey expected a definite answer early in the fall of 1904.[3]
The Montreal Star from April 19, 1904
In Ottawa however, the whole thing was somewhat laughed at. Ottawa Hockey Club manager Robert Shillington said it was a most inconsistent move as the other clubs could not win on the ice and the Ottawa club would not give them any committee room victories. He also claimed that his side would and could win any new cup put up by the other leagues, while still retaining the Stanley Cup: ”Let them put up another trophy representing the ’championship,’ we’ll go out and take that too.”[4][5]
Federal Amateur Hockey League president William Foran, of the Ottawa Capitals, joined in on Shillington’s sentiments and said that it simply did not concern his league if a couple of outside bodies wished to put up a trophy and play for it every season. According to Foran, the Stanley Cup would continue to represent the championship of Canada and the FAHL would continue to hold it as such. He still couldn’t hold himself from jabbing back at the CAHL president and former Montreal Shamrocks captain, saying that ”I wouldn’t be at all surprised, if they called the new trophy the ’Trihey Cup.’”[5]
While the Ottawa Hockey Club and FAHL executives mouthed back at Trihey, Philip Dansken Ross, the younger and more active one of the two Stanley Cup trustees, held a more diplomatic profile, simply claiming that nothing had been said to him in the matter so he had nothing to say.[2]
Ottawa Hockey Club manager Robert Shillington, FAHL president William Foran, and Stanley Cup trustee Philip Dansken Ross
Despite tensions riding high between the various hockey camps for some time, cooler heads still prevailed moving forward, and the Stanley Cup survived without ever having been challenged by an actual Trihey Cup.
The Ottawa Hockey Club spent one full season, 1904–05, in the Federal Amateur Hockey League, defending the Stanley Cup for a third consecutive season, before rejoining the Quebec/Montreal teams in the newly launched Eastern Canada Amateur Hockey Association for the 1905–06 campaign. They were eventually dethroned as Stanley Cup champions in March of 1906 by their ECAHA colleagues Montreal Wanderers, losing the two-game series 10 goals to 12.
Sources:
[1] The Montreal Gazette, February 25, 1904
[2] The Montreal Star, April 19, 1904
[3] The Montreal Star, April 20, 1904
[4] The Ottawa Journal, April 18, 1904
[5] The Ottawa Citizen, April 19, 1904
Posted on Behind the Boards (SIHR Blog)
But not all was well and dandy in the broader hockey world. In fact, the winter of 1904 was quite a turbulent one when it came to organised puck chasing matters.
At the onset of the 1903–04 season, the Ottawa Hockey Club had been a member of the Canadian Amateur Hockey League, but they had left the league mid-season after four straight victories for the Federal Amateur Hockey League, which instead left the Quebec Hockey Club to snag the league title. But the Stanley Cup didn’t end up in the latter aggregation’s lap, as the Stanley Cup trustees (Dr. John Sweetland and Philip Dansken Ross) decided that it would remain with Ottawa. Quebec subsequently refused to challenge for the trophy, arguing that it belonged to the CAHL champions, i.e. themselves.[1]
CAHL president Harry Trihey, himself a former Stanley Cup champion as a player with the Montreal Shamrocks in 1899 and 1900, naturally wasn’t very pleased with the Stanley Cup trustees decision, and rumblings soon started to brew in various newspapers about Trihey trying to organise for a new championship trophy.
Harry Trihey had joined ranks with R. A. C. ”Pat” Manning, a Winnipeg native former player with the Winnipeg Hockey Club and Winnipeg Rowing Club, and president of the Western Canada League (WCAHA), a circuit only comprised of two aggregations in the Winnipeg Rowing Club and Winnipeg Victorias. Trihey (representing Quebec) and Manning (representing Manitoba) had also been in talks with hockey people in Toronto connected to the Ontario Hockey Association, partly related to the Toronto Marlboros unfavourable experience challenging the Ottawa Hockey Club for the Stanley Cup in February of 1904, and a plan was soon laid out to cast aside the Stanley Cup for a new championship trophy of Canada.[2]
Harry Trihey and Pat Manning
The underlying tone of the complaints seemed to paint a picture of the Stanley Cup trustees running an Ottawa-centric agenda. The OHA teams had complaints about conflicting schedules, as the challenge games for the Stanley Cup were usually finished early in the winter, and in Manitoba they planned to finish their new series in the first week of February, when the conditions of ice and weather would be fair to all parties involved. Pat Manning claimed that the Winnipeg Rowing Club had not received a fair deal from the trustees during its 1903–04 Stanley Cup series (which they had lost 2 games to 1 against Ottawa), and that all other challenging teams were up against the same troubles.
Harry Trihey admitted to having contacted W. A. ”Billy” Hewitt, honorary secretary of the Ontario Hockey Association, by letter on March 7, outlining the conditions under which the new championship trophy (the ”Dominion Challenge Cup”, as he called it) would be competed for, and asking whether he considered it a good idea to join Manitoba and Quebec in disowning the Stanley Cup. According to Trihey, Hewitt had then answered back to him on March 11 that he had promised to place the matter before the executive of his association, and that he would let Trihey know what action, if any, would be taken at a later point in time. Trihey expected a definite answer early in the fall of 1904.[3]
The Montreal Star from April 19, 1904
In Ottawa however, the whole thing was somewhat laughed at. Ottawa Hockey Club manager Robert Shillington said it was a most inconsistent move as the other clubs could not win on the ice and the Ottawa club would not give them any committee room victories. He also claimed that his side would and could win any new cup put up by the other leagues, while still retaining the Stanley Cup: ”Let them put up another trophy representing the ’championship,’ we’ll go out and take that too.”[4][5]
Federal Amateur Hockey League president William Foran, of the Ottawa Capitals, joined in on Shillington’s sentiments and said that it simply did not concern his league if a couple of outside bodies wished to put up a trophy and play for it every season. According to Foran, the Stanley Cup would continue to represent the championship of Canada and the FAHL would continue to hold it as such. He still couldn’t hold himself from jabbing back at the CAHL president and former Montreal Shamrocks captain, saying that ”I wouldn’t be at all surprised, if they called the new trophy the ’Trihey Cup.’”[5]
While the Ottawa Hockey Club and FAHL executives mouthed back at Trihey, Philip Dansken Ross, the younger and more active one of the two Stanley Cup trustees, held a more diplomatic profile, simply claiming that nothing had been said to him in the matter so he had nothing to say.[2]
Ottawa Hockey Club manager Robert Shillington, FAHL president William Foran, and Stanley Cup trustee Philip Dansken Ross
Despite tensions riding high between the various hockey camps for some time, cooler heads still prevailed moving forward, and the Stanley Cup survived without ever having been challenged by an actual Trihey Cup.
The Ottawa Hockey Club spent one full season, 1904–05, in the Federal Amateur Hockey League, defending the Stanley Cup for a third consecutive season, before rejoining the Quebec/Montreal teams in the newly launched Eastern Canada Amateur Hockey Association for the 1905–06 campaign. They were eventually dethroned as Stanley Cup champions in March of 1906 by their ECAHA colleagues Montreal Wanderers, losing the two-game series 10 goals to 12.
Sources:
[1] The Montreal Gazette, February 25, 1904
[2] The Montreal Star, April 19, 1904
[3] The Montreal Star, April 20, 1904
[4] The Ottawa Journal, April 18, 1904
[5] The Ottawa Citizen, April 19, 1904
Posted on Behind the Boards (SIHR Blog)
