Dickie Moore's death at 84 closes the curtain on a too-forgotten hockey era that offers a subplot showing how English and French Montrealers can achieve glory by working together.Moore was teammates and best friends with fellow local Montreal anglo hockey great Doug Harvey and the duo helped propel an unstoppable hockey juggernaut to 50s glory, working side-by-side with fellow Quebec-born hockey greats such as Beliveau, Plante, Richard and Geoffrion.
During an era when Montreal English were frequently perceived as dominant colonial oppressors, Moore and Harvey offered the invaluable lesson that anglo Montrealers were also brothers-in-the-trenches, heart-and-soul street battlers, capable of harmony with their French-speaking brethren.
Montreal anglos owe them a massive debt of gratitude just for that.
Moore rose to early glory riding shotgun on a line with Quebecois greats Jean Beliveau and Bernard Geoffrion, notably uniting to help blast the Boston Bruins 8-1 in 1954.
Moore, who played here from 1951-63, later sought to help teammate Henri Richard, another francophone Montrealer, to beat him in the race for the scoring crown, as Red Fischer recounted in a must-read tribute.
Language and ethnicity are irrelevant in the brutal meritocracy of pro sports where it doesn't matter if your dad owns the team. If you can win, you're in. That's how it's supposed to work everywhere in life.
But until recently, language conflicts in Montreal pro hockey were still never far from the surface,In the 70s fans grumbled that aging Ken Dryden was starting over Bunny Larocque.
Captains Mike Keane and Saku Koivu were assailed for being unable to speak French and a subsequent effort to make the team more French led to the disastrous Houle-Tremblay era.
Montreal's hockey language divisions are deep-rooted,going back to a sort of pro hockey apartheid that prevailed when the city had a pair of NHL teams, the Maroons for the English crowd and the Canadiens for the French.When the Maroons went broke after winning two Stanley Cups, the Canadiens remained the French team and such Flying Frenchmen as The Rocket, Beliveau, Boom Boom, Cournoyer and Lafleur went on to entertain and inspire and become a great source of pride and admiration for all.
But to their credit the Canadiens also had room for English-speakers from Montreal as well, which made the team a true reflection of the city it represented, unthinkable in an era almost every pro athlete leaves town at the end of the season to go back to where they are from.
Moore and Harvey
 |
| Doug Harvey |
Doug Harvey, the fabled larger-than-life perennial all star defenceman from Oxford Park NDG, played on the Habs from 1948-1961.
Moore, while a fun-loving prankster, was a figure of some gravitas, playing through many serious injuries and in retirement becoming a low-profile and serious businessman, building a tool rental operation.
Doug Harvey was a heartfelt brother to many with an appetite for the brotherhood of tavern life that eventually robbed him and friends and family of much.
Moore was never the same after Harvey left, although their epic friendship brought them together for one unlikely early cup run for St. Louis.
Anglo Montreal's contribution to pro hockey
Other Montreal anglos pulling their weight for Montreal hockey during that era include Kenny Mosdell, (45-59) and the well-loved Charlie Hodge from Lachine (58-67) while maskless Gump Worsley from the Point tended some fine net from 1963-70.Early-days stars Sprague and Odie Cleghorn from Westmount also played for the Habs.
- Also read: Westmount - birthplace of road hockey
- Interview with Montreal hockey legend Charlie Hodge
- Montreal's Ian Turnbull - my story in brief
Montrealers Mike Ribeiro and Sergio Momesso also had some Habs glory, although whether they are allophones or anglophones is another question.
Anglo Montrealer Russell Bowie of the Montreal Victorias was an insanely proficient goal scorer but that was in an early amateur version of the sport.
Archie Wilcox (29-33), and Paul Haynes were anglo-Montrealers starring for the Maroons as was Nels Stewart (25-32) who, in fact, grew up in Toronto.
Of course NHL players have little control over which teams they play for, thus many English-speaking kids born in Montreal went on to star elsewhere.
Some anglo Montrealers who made the NHL were born in Montreal but grew up elsewhere: Tony McKegney, Bryan Fogarty and Gary Galley (whose dad famously uprooted the family to Ottawa after a South Shore grocery store clerk declined to reply to him in English).
Scott Mellanby, Ian Turnbull, Lester Patrick and Art Ross are some some of many English-Montrealers who never played for the Canadiens while old-time Phil Watson and more-recent Ranndy McKay played here briefly.
Thousands of kids still look up to others with similar backgrounds for hockey inspiration, so those anglo-Montrealers who attained success in that difficult sport of pro hockey are all to be saluted, but none more than Moore and Harvey who not only starred but did so with much purpose and in their natural environment.