I met Gordie Howe when I was really young, at Maple Leaf Gardens. I don't really remember it. What I do remember is the next time I met him.
1988, my brother had Flames season tickets and more importantly, a security pass for work his construction company was doing on the new but not quite finished Saddledome. Rangers were in town, great for me, so after the first period we decided to see how far the security pass would take us. We went down to the dressing rooms. Walking along, two big guys coming toward us.
Lo and behold, Phil Esposito and Gordie Howe. They stopped to talk to us. The only thing I remember saying was telling Phil that the D made some bad pinches. He agreed, laughed and said he would tell the coach. BTW, the coach was Michel Bergeron, who the Rangers got from Quebec Nordiques for a first round pick and $75K.
Gordie was nice, as was Phil. I wish I could remember more about it, but it was just pleasant chit-chat. They shook our hands. Shaking Phil's hand was a normal occurrance. Shaking Gordie's hand, you knew you were dealing with a powerful man. Guys who grow up working on farms have hands like that, and strength like that.
Here was this legend, being as nice as your next door neighbour to you. I don't remember why Gordie was there that particular night.
What a gas that was. Later, after the Rangers loss (Flames were on their way to a Stanley Cup, very good team) we went to III Cheers bar, where I hung out with Tomas Sandstrom who had had a great game, for a short while. His English was much better than my Swedish, but the conversation was a bit laboured, but what a great guy and what a fantastic player. He seemed sincerely happy to just chat about the Rangers and whatever with me.
All in all, I never met so many great hockey players in such a compressed period of time.
I had an autographed quality lithograph of Gordie from the 60's, but somehow I lost it over the years.
What a guy he was.