Edward J. Livingstone
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Edward J. Livingstone (September 12 1884 - September 11, 1945) was the principal owner of the Toronto Blueshirts, a predecessor of the Toronto Maple Leafs, in the seasons prior to the formation of the National Hockey League. His battles with his fellow owners in the National Hockey Association led to the formation of the NHL.
Livingstone was born in Toronto, Ontario as the youngest of three children. He played junior and intermediate hockey with the St. George's Club in Toronto, before taking up the bell as an Ontario Hockey Association referee. He also covered hockey for the Toronto Mail and Empire - often reporting on the games he refereed, a practice that was not unheard of in those days.
Livingstone's ambition was such that he sought an OHA management position through the formation of the Toronto Rugby and Athletic Association (TR & AA). The club, formed after a split from the Toronto Amateur Athletic Club, won the John Ross Robertson Trophy (awarded to the senior hockey champion of Ontario) in consecutive years, 1913 and 1914.
The success in amateur hockey prompted Livingstone to make the jump to the professional game by buying the struggling Toronto Ontarios of the National Hockey Association. During the 1914-15 season, the Ontarios traded in their orange sweaters for green and were renamed the Toronto Shamrocks - a bold move in a city that was staunchly Protestant. The team skated to a record of 7 wins and 13 losses, an improvement of three games over the 1913-14 campaign.
Meanwhile, Percy Quinn, owner of the Toronto Blueshirts (the 1914 Stanley Cup champions), had turned his team over to Frank Robinson. Robinson, in turn, sold the Blueshirts to Livingstone in 1915, triggering one of many controversies that would mark Livvy's tenure as a hockey promoter. In a "raid," Frank and Lester Patrick of the Pacific Coast Hockey Association signed nearly all of the team's regulars.
The National Hockey Association seized the Shamrocks franchise, but couldn't find a buyer with enough money -- or players. The NHA drew up a five-team schedule for 1915-16, which suited Livingstone just fine; he operated his team as the Blueshirts, but his roster drew heavily from the former Shamrock players, with the notable additions of Duke Keats, Ken Randall and Harry Meeking.
The 1916-17 campaign was a stormy one for the NHA. Canada intensified its contribution to World War I, and a number of pro and amateur hockey players volunteered for military service. The 228th Battalion of the Canadian infantry applied to join the NHA, effectively taking the place of the suspended Toronto Shamrocks franchise (which the league had seized) and sharing Toronto's Arena Gardens with the Blueshirts.
There was only one problem: what if the 228th were called overseas in midseason? The Battalion posted a $3,000 bond, and they were accepted into the league.
The move was controversial. Western players such as Eddie Oatman and Art Duncan jumped from their PCHA team to join the 228th, angering the Patrick brothers. Meanwhile, Livingstone lost several of his Blueshirts to the war effort: Harry Cameron, George and Howard McNamara, and goalie Percy LeSueur. Duke Keats had also joined the battalion, but his rights were traded back to Toronto in exchange for the right to use LeSueur. All was well, until the 228th tried to renege on that arrangement.
Another of Livingstone's stars, Cy Denneny, had found full-time employment in Ottawa and subsequently demanded a trade to that city's team, the Senators. Livingstone suspended Denneny, but ultimately capitulated and sold his rights to Ottawa.
Livingstone was often accused of exploiting loopholes in league regulations to create what some viewed as unfair advantages. He squabbled with the Montreal-based owners of the team's home rink, the Arena Gardens, and threatened at least once to move to Boston.
He had a particularly bitter rivalry with Montreal Wanderers owner Sam Lichtenhein. At one meeting during the 1916-17 campaign, Lichtenhein grew so infuriated that he offered Livingstone $3,000 to abandon his team. Livingstone countered with a $5,000 bid for Lichtenhein to shut down his Wanderers.
On February 8, 1917, the 228th Battalion got its orders to proceed overseas. It withdrew its teams from the OHA and the NHA, and three days later Livingstone's fellow owners voted to kick the Blueshirts out of the league as well. Rubbing salt into the wound, the owners claimed the rights to his players and divided them among themselves. League president Frank Robinson stood by and watched.
The withdrawal of the 228th precipitated the disintegration of the NHA and its replacement with the National Hockey League in November 1917. When one of the NHL's four charter franchises, the Quebec Bulldogs, decided not to operate in 1917-18, the NHL returned to Toronto, granting a franchise to the owners of the Arena Gardens. The team drew largely from Livingstone's Blueshirts; apparently, the team leased the players from Livingstone.
Having been cast aside by his former business associates, Livingstone spent the next several years in court, in a bid to be compensated for the loss of his franchise and his players.
He also aimed to battle the NHL on the ice. When the rights to his players reverted to him in 1918-19, he announced plans to launch the rival Canadian Hockey Association. However, the proposed teams could not obtain ice time. Undaunted, Livvy vowed to pay his players, whether or not the league played any games. Still, his players opted to play for the NHL's Toronto Arenas in 1918-19.
Again in the summer of 1920, there was talk that the CHA might get off the ground. This effort was thwarted when the NHL moved its struggling Quebec franchise to Hamilton, Ontario which the CHA had targeted as a prime market.
In 1925, the Pittsburgh Yellow Jackets abandoned the United States Amateur Hockey Association, becoming the Pittsburgh Pirates of the NHL. This move left the AHA in the lurch, and its midwestern clubs (Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Duluth) considered the merits of turning pro.
Meanwhile, senior amateur clubs in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, withdrew from the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association. And at the end of the 1925-26 season, the Western Canadian Hockey League disbanded, selling its players to NHL expansion clubs in Boston, Chicago and Detroit.
Enter Livingstone, who acquired an AHA franchise for Chicago. The owner of the fledgling Chicago Blackhawks, Major Frederic McLaughlin, was apparently unaware of who Livingstone was. Having leased the Chicago Coliseum for his Hawks and installed ice-making equipment, he seemed only too willing to rent ice time to Livingstone's Chicago Cardinals. McLaughlin even scheduled a series of pre-season exhibition games against AHA teams.
Meanwhile, the Sault Ste. Marie team, owned by former Toronto Shamrock and Blueshirt George McNamara, made a hasty move to Detroit, where they would battle the expansion Cougars for the sporting dollar. Livingstone didn't have his rival major league, but he did have a viable franchise, with an arena deal, in a pro league that went head to head with the NHL in two significant markets.
In the early days, Livingstone's Cardinals were outdrawing the Blackhawks at the box office. NHL President Frank Calder retaliated, declaring the AHA an outlaw league and, with a few notable exceptions, banning AHA players from signing with NHL clubs. But the success was short-lived. Construction delays forced the Detroit Cougars to play home games in Windsor, Ontario, while the Greyhounds took to the road. But the latter team ran into financial troubles and folded.
When the Blackhawks and Cardinals engaged in a price war, Livingstone -- who was still battling the NHL in court and was therefore strapped for cash -- threw in the towel. He tried to sell his team to local owners, who renamed it the Chicago Americans, but when it transpired that neither Livingstgone nor the new owners were paying the players, Livingstone felt he had no choice but to fold the team in March of 1927.
In the meantime, Livingstone's Blueshirts had turned into the Toronto Arenas, and then the Toronto St. Patricks. In the latter incarnation, they were owned by a group that included Charlie Querrie. But by February 1927, the St. Pats had landed on rough times. There was even talk the club would be sold to owners in Philadelphia. Conn Smythe put together a group that bought the franchise and renamed them the Toronto Maple Leafs.
The AHA would return to Chicago in 1930, a move that would alter the course of National Hockey League history. After winning the 1931-32 AHA championship, Chicago Shamrocks owner James Norris acquired the bankrupt Detroit Falcons of the NHL, and engineered what was effectively a merger with his Shamrocks. The resulting team was renamed the Detroit Red Wings.
Livingstone returned to Toronto, where he coached and managed amateur teams such as the Young Lions, who played at the new Maple Leaf Gardens.
Livingstone died September 11th, 1945.
