The Return of Hockey

The National Hockey League
(NHL) is a professional sports
organization composed of hockey
teams in the United States and
Canada, where it is also known by its
French name, Ligue Nationale de
Hockey (LNH). It is generally regarded
as the premier professional ice
hockey league in the world. The NHL
is often (but not always) listed as one
of the major professional sports
leagues of North America.

National Hockey League was founded
in 1917 after a series of disputes
within the (Canadian) National
Hockey Association (NHA). The first
NHL season began in 1917-18 with
five teams.

The primary conflict involved Toronto
Blueshirts' owner Edward J.
Livingstone. An ongoing source of
controversy among fellow NHA
owners, he was often accused of
exploiting loopholes in league
regulations to create what some
viewed as unfair advantages, and had
particularly incited the wrath of
owners when he merged his two
Toronto teams (the Ontarios and the
Blueshirts) after the latter had been
deprived of its top players.
Livingstone sometimes offered
contracts to other teams' members not
to play hockey, and once
campaigned to kick the Montreal
Wanderers out of the league after the
team tried to lure two of his top
Blueshirts players. Throughout his
battles with owners, Livingstone
repeatedly threatened to start a rival
league in the United States.

In its final season (1916-17), the
National Hockey Association was
comprised of six teams: The Montreal
Canadiens, Montreal Wanderers,
Ottawa Senators, Quebec Bulldogs,
Toronto Blueshirts, and an army team
from the Toronto-based 228th
Battalion. Owners met in Montreal to
consider the league's future on
February 11, 1917, a day after
members of the 228th Battalion, the
most popular NHA team, were called
into World War I action. Livingstone,
unable to attend the meeting
because of illness, was shocked to
learn that owners had chosen to
effectively eject him and the
Blueshirts from the NHA.

After the resignation of NHA president
and Livingstone ally Frank Robinson,
Livingstone stopped attending league
meetings and sent a lawyer to
represent his interests. When owners
convened on September 29, 1917,
they demanded that Livingstone sell
the Blueshirts within five days.
Livingstone then negotiated a deal in
which the Toronto Arena Gardens
would take control of the Blueshirts'
daily business, with Livingstone to
eventually regain control if the NHA
continued operations. In response,
NHA owners met at Montreal's
Windsor Hotel on November 26, 1917,
and formed the National Hockey
League, with the Canadiens,
Wanderers, Senators, Bulldogs and
newly-renamed Toronto Arenas as
founding members.

The NHL endured a rocky inaugural
season in 1917-18, starting with the
temporary shuttering of the Bulldogs.
On January 2, 1918, the Westmount
Arena in Montreal, home to the
Wanderers and Canadiens, was
destroyed in a fire. The Wanderers,
already a shadow of its former self,
folded in the wake of the fire, ending
one of the most storied franchises in
the early years of Canadian
professional hockey. With the
Bulldogs and Wanderers out, the NHL
operated with just three teams for the
remainder of its opening year, and
through the second season. Though
Livingstone had been shut out, one of
his NHA ideas — a proposal for a split
regular season — was adopted by the
new league and integrated into its
playoff system. The Toronto Arenas
became the first NHL winner of the
Stanley Cup, the annual trophy
awarded since 1894 to the Canadian
hockey champion. A furious
Livingstone, meanwhile, failed in his
attempt to collect a share of profits
from the Arenas, then sued the team
and the NHL. The dispute lingered
through the 1930s, with the Arenas
since renamed the Toronto St.
Patricks and ultimately the Toronto
Maple Leafs. History has looked back
on Livingstone and the NHL's
formation with a sense of irony: The
man whom league owners had worked
so hard to exclude was, in the words
of Canadiens owner George Kennedy,
the same figure that "made [the NHL]
a real league".

Though the league struggled to stay
in the business during its first decade,
NHL teams were quite successful on
the ice, winning the Stanley Cup
seven out of its first nine years. (The
1918-19 competition was cancelled
because of the Spanish Flu epidemic
that had hit Seattle). By 1926, having
increased player salaries to a level
that couldn't be matched by other
Canadian leagues, the NHL was
alone in Stanley Cup competition.
The league had also expanded into
the United States, with the Boston
Bruins in 1924, and the New York
Rangers, Detroit Cougars (later to
become the Red Wings), and
Chicago Blackhawks two years. By the
end of the 1930-31 season, the NHL
featured a total of 10 teams. However,
the Great Depression took a toll on
the league; teams such as the
Pittsburgh Pirates and the New York
Americans came and went, and even
the fabled Ottawa Senators were
forced to fold after moving to St.
Louis because of financial
difficulties. With these developments
and the onset of World War II, the
NHL was reduced to six teams during
its 25th anniversary year of (1942) –
six teams still known today, if
somewhat inaccurately, as the
Original Six: The Canadiens, Maple
Leafs, Red Wings, Bruins, Rangers,
and Blackhawks. World War II had
provided many players their first
chance to play professional hockey,
but after the war, many found
themselves relegated to minor
leagues.