Remembering Winnipeg’s old outdoor rinks

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 08/11/2016 (3251 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Heritage Classic played at Investors Group Field on Oct. 23 led to lots of stories about playing hockey outdoors.

Everyone who grew up on the Prairies seems to have  memories of skating on ponds, rivers and lakes where the ice was clear as glass. Some are probably true.

Here in Winnipeg players spent more time playing outside on school grounds and at community clubs than rural kids did on the ponds. Until the early 1960s, there were only two indoor rinks in the city, so most minor hockey was played outside until the ice melted. A covered rink, often with natural ice, was the focal point of most rural communities. In The Pas, where this writer grew up, we skated on Halcrow Lake at the edge of town for a week or two when it froze over. Once the snow came, hockey and skating went inside.

Frank Mathers was inducted into the Manitoba Hockey Hall of Fame in 1987 and the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto in 1992. Mathers, who grew up in the Wolseley area, never forgot his roots in Winnipeg. Not long before he died in 2005, he sent a photo that captures a somewhat forgotten outdoor hockey facility. What follows are Mathers’ own words:   

“Site: Sherburn Rink — A big ice-skating rink located at Portage Avenue and Sherburn Street. It contained two hockey rinks and a large skating surface. The poles carried lights that allowed night games and public skating.

“Year: I’m just guessing the year to be 1941 and the clothes worn would indicate springtime. Most guys were neighbourhood people, even including the two whose names I can’t think of.
“The Building: Crescent Creamery was a large milk-processing company. Milk was brought there in bulk form and treated (homogenized, etc.), bottled and delivered to the homes. Delivery was made by ‘the milkman’ every morning, often or maybe always by horse-drawn carriages. Later the business became motorized. Is the building still there?

“I doubt it.”

Mathers, who is third from the left in the photo, had an impressive hockey record in the city. He won a provincial bantam B and two midget championships with Excelsiors and two juvenile titles with the Rangers. In 1943, the defenseman played for the junior Rangers who won the Canadian championship. After turning pro, he spent 14 seasons in the AHL, where he was a first-team all-star for five straight years. After retiring as a player, he coached and then served as general manager and president of the Hershey Bears for many years.

In the photo to the right of the goalie is Bill Tindall, another bright young athlete who lived in the West End and attended Gordon Bell High School. At age 17, he made the 1943 Rangers and in 1946  he won a second Memorial Cup with the Winnipeg Monarchs. He is the last player to win two national junior championships with local teams. Considered by many to be the best junior defenseman in Western Canada, Tindall chose to leave hockey after the Monarchs’ Canadian championship victory over St. Michael’s in Maple Leaf Gardens.  

Memories of Sport appears every second week in the Canstar Community News weeklies. Kent Morgan can be contacted at 204-489-6641 or email: sportsmemories@canstarnews.com