Hockey in St. Louis before 1967
Although the St. Louis Arena was not originally designed with hockey in mind, it met NHL standards of the era for size and had good sight lines for the games. After an ice plant was installed, the minor league St. Louis Flyers began play there in 1929. St. Louis soon began to attract the interest as a potential NHL market, eventually leading the owners of the moribund Ottawa Senators to move there for the 1934-1935 season. The move proved both ill-conceived and ill-timed, as the renamed St. Louis Eagles continued to lose money. Their situation was not helped by the decision to keep the Eagles in the Canadian Division to keep the divisions balanced, which left the team with unaffordable travel expenses to games in Toronto and Montreal. The team finished last in the division and disbanded after one season.
Following further contraction, the league stabilized at six teams after 1942. During this period, the NHL rebuffed attempts at further expansion. Eventually, the St. Louis Arena came under the control of the owners of the Chicago Black Hawks. The Black Hawks treated St. Louis as a secondary market, placing minor league affiliates there and even playing a few NHL games in St. Louis during the 1950’s while the team still struggled to sell tickets at Chicago Stadium.
1967 Explanation
The Blues were one of the six teams added to the NHL in the 1967 expansion, along with the Minnesota North Stars, Los Angeles Kings, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins, and California Seals. St. Louis was the last of the six expansion teams to gain entry into the League; the market was chosen over Baltimore at the insistence of the Black Hawks owners, James D. Norris and Arthur Wirtz. Following the Black Hawks’ championship in 1961, the team became much more successful at the box office in Chicago, thus St. Louis was no longer useful as a secondary market. Nevertheless, the Black Hawks owners still owned the St. Louis Arena. They sought to unload what was then a decrepit facility which had not been well-maintained since the 1940’s, and thus pressed the NHL to give the franchise to St. Louis, which had not submitted a formal expansion bid. The Black Hawks owners felt they could establish a “lovable loser” (much like the Cubs) with the St. Louis hockey team. NHL president Clarence Campbell said during the 1967 expansion meetings, “We want a team in St. Louis because of the city’s geographical location and the fact that it has an adequate building.”
The teams’ first owners were insurance tycoon Sid Salomon Jr., his son Sid Salomon III, and Robert L. Wolfson, who were granted the franchise in 1966. Sid Salomon III convinced his initially wary father to make a bid for the team. Former St. Louis Cardinals great Stan Musial and Musial’s business partner Julius “Biggie” Garagnani were also members of the 16-man investment group that made the initial formal application for the franchise. Garagnani would never see the Blues franchise take the ice, as he died from a heart attack on June 19, 1967, less than three months before the Blues played their first preseason game(1). Upon acquiring the franchise in 1966, Salomon then spent several million dollars on extensive renovations for the 38-year-old arena, expanding it from 12,000 seats to 15,000.
Beginnings and Stanley Cup Finals appearances 1967
Lynn Patrick initially served as general manager and head coach. However, he resigned as head coach in late November after recording a 4-13-2 record. He was replaced by assistant coach Scotty Bowman, who thereafter led the team to a winning record for the rest of the season. Like the other five expansion teams, the Blues’ roster consisted mostly of castoffs from the Original Six and players who had previously never managed to break out of the minor leagues. As part of the expansion, the NHL had agreed to put all of the expansion teams in the new Western Division, an arrangement which was intended to ensure all of the new teams all had an equal chance of reaching the playoffs.
Under the expansion playoff format, Bowman’s leadership was enough as the Blues qualified for the playoffs in their inaugural season. Although they had finished in third place, St. Louis was regarded as fairly evenly matched with the other three Western qualifiers since only four point separated first and fourth place. Ultimately, it was the Blues who prevailed by winning in seven games each over the Philadelphia Flyers and Minnesota North Stars to reach the 1968 Stanley Cup Finals. However, St. Louis was swept in their first Finals appearance by the heavily favored Montreal Canadiens.
Under Bowman, the Blues dominated the West for the next two season, becoming the only expansion team to compile a winning record, and they captured division titles by wide margins each year. However, they were swept in the Stanley Cup Finals by the Montreal Canadiens in 1969 and then by the Boston Bruins in 1970.
While the first Blues teams included fading veterans like Doug Harvey, Don McKenney, the goaltending tandem of veterans Glenn Hall and Jacques Plante proved more durable, winning a Veznia Trophy in 1969 behind a sterling defense that featured players like skilled defensive forward Jim Roberts, team captain Al Arbour and hardrock brothers Bob and Barclay Plager. Phil Goyette won the Lady Byng Trophy for the Blues in 1970 and New York Rangers castoff Red Berenson became the expansion team’s first major star at center. The arena quickly became one of the loudest buildings in the NHL, a reputation it maintained throughout its tenure as the Blues’ home.
During that time, Salomon gained a reputation throughout the NHL as the top players’ owner. He gave his players cars, signed them to deferred contracts and treated them to vacations in Florida. The players, used to being treated like mere commodities, felt the only way they could pay him back was to give their best on the ice every night(2).
Resources:
1. https://news.google.com/newspapers
?nid=1893&dat=19670620&id=
UMofAAAAIBAJ&pg=4797,7268421
2. https://archive.org/details/totalnhl0000unse
