A Great Game (11 page)

At the series' conclusion, the
News
also printed a telling, if anonymous, letter. It blamed the Marlboro debacle on the Ontario Hockey Association for not permitting tougher hockey.
²⁴
Another outside organ, the
Belleville Intelligencer
, took the argument further. It accused the
OHA of “making hockey a sort of cross between croquet and ping-pong, instructing their referees to rule men off for what is considered perfectly fair in other associations.”
²⁵
The charge was repeated by the era's greatest player, William Hodgson “Hod” Stuart. The rough-and-tumble Ottawa native, who had turned professional with the Pittsburgh Bankers a year earlier, claimed that in the OHA, “I could not lift my stick off the ice.”
²⁶

There can be no doubt that the OHA was using its iron grip to consciously develop a less physical brand of hockey in the province. At the end of the 1904–05 season, First Vice-President Nelson bragged to a reception in Berlin that the OHA had not had a single serious injury.
²⁷
This was quite a record, given the nature of the sport and the hundreds of games that constituted an OHA campaign. Nor was it coincidence that only Phillips seemed not to be slowed by Ottawa's hitting. Though born in Toronto, he had grown up and learned his hockey at Rat Portage, under the control of the Manitoba Hockey Association.

In truth, the OHA had been linking a Marlboro defeat to “eastern” rough play before the series had even begun. Robertson's
Telegram
had proclaimed that “to beat Ottawa on Ottawa ice under an eastern referee is a big undertaking.”
²⁸
Faulting the referee was contrary to OHA culture, but throughout the series there were suggestions that non-OHA officials simply did not understand the fine points of OHA rules.

It is clear, however, that not everyone agreed with this direction in Ontario hockey. Teddy Marriott, the Marlboros' manager at the time of the series and a notable Toronto proponent of tough hockey, was not making any excuses. Contradicting his OHA superiors, he stated simply that “we were beaten by a better team.”
²⁹

There would be one other intriguing take on the series—that of W. A. Hewitt. In his autobiography, published some fifty-four years later, the OHA secretary suggested the Ottawas had salted the ice during the halftime of game one to slow down the speedier Marlboros.
³⁰
The problem is that there is no contemporary reference to any such theory, even in Hewitt's own
Toronto Star
. So it seems that, a half century later, Billy Hewitt was still making excuses for the home team.
³¹

There is no doubt that the OHA brass was genuinely upset by the roughhouse eastern hockey that had taken down the Marlboros. Nonetheless, they must have been much more worried about the state of their own association. The uneven handling of the Peel and McMillan cases had greatly aggravated already controversial situations. With Robertson overseas and absent for much of the season, there were increasing questions about the way the OHA was being run.

Few were prepared for how the returning OHA president would respond. Robertson not only backed the expulsion of both Peel and McMillan, he went further—much further. Shortly before the 1904 annual meeting, he announced the expulsion of all senior lacrosse players from Ontario hockey—on his personal authority. Such a ruling would have a huge impact on the OHA game, as a great many of its top performers were lacrosse stars in summer.

While it was true that the CAAU had already labelled the Canadian Lacrosse Association a professional organization, the president was acting on dubious constitutional authority. It seemed more as if he was railing, Lear-like, at the professional world closing in around him.

There may, however, have been some method in Robertson's apparent madness. The mass lacrosse expulsion galvanized opposition to his autocratic rule, but it also polarized debate about his control around an issue of principle. Threatening to resign, he quickly brought the executive behind the McMillan suspension, his lacrosse edict and the reversal of the Peel reinstatement.

These decisions also had immediate consequences that strengthened Robertson's hand. By backing the McMillan expulsion he secured the continued participation of ally Francis Nelson and rid the executive of Gus Porter for good. Likewise, the lacrosse decision purged the body of opposition member Duff Adams, who was associated with Brantford's lacrosse club. A general message had also been delivered to those thinking of attending the upcoming OHA convention: associate with lacrosse or hockey, but not both.

No doubt this dynamic was undercutting the campaign of Hamilton's William Wyndham, who had decided to challenge for the presidency. Yet Robertson's re-election bid did not restrict itself to executive manoeuvres. Prior to the convention, a slander campaign against Wyndham was launched by OHA-friendly papers across Ontario. The essence of the undertaking was, of course, to accuse the opponent of planning to scrap the OHA's principles in favour of professionalism.

As a matter of fact, William Wyndham was not campaigning for professionalism—or even semi-professionalism—but against Robertson's increasingly despotic leadership style. The challenger proposed, for example, to end secret proceedings at meetings of the OHA executive. This was a sharp rebuke to a body that included three high-ranking Toronto
journalists. Nevertheless, the president had successfully framed the issue: it was about the Peel decision and amateur principles.

The annual meeting of December 3, 1904, was stormy. Robertson began with a thundering defence of amateurism and the actions of the executive. In an unprecedented move, one executive member then took the floor to deliver a pointed rebuttal. Next, Nelson moved that the meeting back the reversal of the Peel reinstatement and his credentials to do so were challenged.

A heated debate raged for two hours but ended decisively. The removal of Peel was carried by a vote of 43–26. The annual meeting had asserted the principle “once a professional, always a professional” and forbade any future executive from reopening the question. Robertson defeated Wyndham by a wider margin, 49–22.

This meeting marked a turning point in the history of the Ontario
Hockey Association. The forces of rigid amateurism, championed by President John Ross Robertson, had carried the day. They would not, however, be content with just their clear victory at the convention. Having gained the upper hand, Robertson and his supporters set out to drive all remaining dissent and debate from the organization.

The agenda of enforced conformity to the president's views became evident shortly after the annual meeting. The OHA newspapers continued their assault on those who had opposed Robertson. Press allies Nelson and Hewitt had been re-elected to the executive by acclamation. This, according to the president, was as it should be. After all, he had concluded, the “growing evil of canvassing for votes”
³²
was responsible for all the turmoil in the association.

Henceforth, Robertson instructed OHA clubs, delegates should come to the annual meeting unpledged and there should be no campaigning. As he put it: “Office should seek the man and not the man the office.” Likewise, all aspirants must have “the highest interests of amateurism at heart.”
³³

In other words, even as Doc Gibson's bold embrace of open professionalism was changing top-level hockey in every other jurisdiction, amateurism had been declared absolute and eternal in Ontario. In its defence, and with the enemy all around him, John Ross Robertson was determined to rule—absolutely and forever.

The Defection of the Marlboros

You know that Abe Lincoln said that the Union could not exist half slave and half free. I believe that the O.H.A. cannot honorably be half amateur and half professional.
¹

—J
OHN
R
OSS
R
OBERTSON

With the Ontario Hockey Association's amateurism permanently entrenched in its rules, John Ross Robertson's executive launched the 1904–05 season with a renewed determination to stamp out professionalism. As a first line of defence, virtually no exceptions were permitted to the rule against change of residence after October 1. One so refused was a young Fred Taylor. This would prove to be an epic blunder by Robertson's organization, creating yet another powerful opponent of the amateur order it sought to uphold.

In his 1977 biography, Frederick Wellington Taylor described the infamous moment that changed his hockey career forever. Preparing to leave the junior ranks in the fall of 1904, Taylor received a call from the OHA's powerful secretary, W. A. Hewitt.
²
Hewitt once again asked Taylor to join the Toronto Marlboros. When he refused, the angry executive “told me straight out, ‘All right, if you won't play for the Marlboros, you won't play anywhere!'. . . I never forgave Billy Hewitt for that.”
³