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National Library News |
Don Carter,
Research and Information Services
The June SAVOIR FAIRE seminar, entitled "Rebels in Name Only: Early Hockey and the Ottawa Elite", was presented by Mr. Paul Kitchen. Mr. Kitchen is the president of the Society for International Hockey Research and is a regular researcher at the National Library of Canada.
Mr. Kitchen began his very entertaining and well-attended talk by describing the sporting tradition in Victorian Canada. The audience learned that organized sport, at that time, was largely the domain of the middle and upper classes. The clubs which they formed were open to all those who shared sporting values such as fair play, team spirit and proper sporting conduct – values that originated with the leisured aristocracy of England.
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The speaker explained that organized hockey, as we know it, began at the Victoria Skating Rink in Montreal on March 3, 1875. Two young Ottawa sportsmen viewed organized games of hockey being played at the Montreal Winter Carnival in 1883; and by March of that year, a team had been formed in Ottawa.
The audience learned that this first Ottawa hockey team comprised players from well-established local families, together with several others who had recently graduated from McGill University and were working for the federal government. One of these players, Albert Peter Low, who had joined the Geological Survey of Canada as a "surveyor and explorer", later became a federal deputy minister. We also heard about another player, Frank Jenkins, who as well as captaining the team was a renowned church organist in the community.
Mr. Kitchen then described the excitement of the Ottawa Hockey Club’s first competition which took place in a tournament at the Montreal Winter Carnival in 1884. He showed slides of the club’s players and the rinks where games were played.
Mr. Kitchen described the attendance of Lord Stanley of Preston, then Governor General of Canada, at his first hockey game in 1889. He discussed the formation of the Rebels hockey team in 1890. Organized for the sake of having fun, the team was made up of the social elite of Ottawa, including a law clerk of the Senate and a member of Parliament. We learned about the Rebels’ trip in Lord Stanley’s private railway car to play a team in Kingston and also about their role in popularizing the sport in Ontario.
In the course of his talk, Mr. Kitchen commented on a number of published hockey history texts which he had brought with him. He thanked the staff of the National Library for "their expert professional and technical assistance". While carrying out his research, Mr. Kitchen had made extensive use of the National Library’s collections of newspapers, city directories and biographical dictionaries and had consulted numerous books dealing with Canadian social history.
Mr. Kitchen concluded his presentation by showing a number of slides which included early photos of the Rebels as well as photos of well-known Canadian personalities such as Charlotte Whitton, Gustave Lanctot and Lester B. Pearson enjoying the game of hockey.