Tommy Gorman
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Thomas Patrick "Tommy" Gorman (June 9, 1886 in Ottawa, Ontario - May 15, 1961) was a general manager in the National Hockey League.
As a youth, Tommy was a parliamentary page boy, but sports were his love and he played lacrosse. He was on the lacrosse team for Canada that won the gold medal in the 1908 olympics, and then played professionally for a number of seasons. He then became sports editor of the Ottawa Citizen and retired from lacrosse to manage a lacrosse team.
Edwin "Ted" Dey, principal owner of the Ottawa Senators of the National Hockey Association, had trouble recruiting players for the 1916-17 season and hired Gorman to do the task. He did so capably that he was hired as secretary-treasurer(general manager). Gorman, George Kennedy, Sam Lichtenhein and Mike Quinn all played a part in forming the National Hockey League in an effort to rid themselves of Eddie Livingstone.
Tommy was a terrific evaluator of talent and helped four franchises to Stanley Cup glory. In 1917, he took over the Ottawa Senators and helped lead the team to three Stanley Cups in the 1920s. He sold his interest in the Senators in 1925 and became manager-coach of the New York Americans. He resigned after the 1928-29 season to get involved in horse racing. He managed the Agua Caliente racetrack in Mexico. In 1932, Tommy brought the legendary horse Phar Lap to Mexico where the horse won the $100,000 Agua Caliente Handicap before dying under mysterious circumstances in San Francisco.When the president of Agua Caliente sold the racetrack, Tommy was out of sports ---but not for long. In the second half of the 1932-33 season, he was hired as coach of the Chicago Blackhawks and became general manager as well the following season. He led that franchise to their first Cup in 1933-34. After the success in Chicago, he went to Montreal and helped the Maroons to their final Cup in 1935. Finally, in 1941, he took over the Montreal Canadiens and lead them to Cup victories in 1944 and 1946. In 1963, he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame as a builder.
Tommy was a promoter, also. One of his flops was after he became manager-coach of the Montreal Maroons. He decided to have evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson at the Montreal Forum, but few people came. "No one wanted to be saved." he explained. However, some of his better promotions came when he was the Montreal Canadiens general manager. He had Duke Ellington and Frank Sinatra perform at the Forum.
After retiring as general manager of the Canadiens in 1946, he bought the Ottawa Auditorium and the Quebec Senior Hockey League's Ottawa Senators, and it won an Allan Cup in 1949. He revived wrestling in Montreal, promoted it in Ottawa and introduced professional baseball to Ottawa with the Ottawa Giants in 1951.
Later, he took figure skater Barbara Ann Scott on a Continental tour after she won the olympic figure skating championship.
He died of cancer on May 15th,1961 at the age of 74. At the time of his death, he was managing the Connaught race track near Ottawa, which did a gross business of $6,000,000 in 1960.
