"Sport is part of culture and a good way to learn about another country… To discover why people are so passionate about it, it's like, 'Tell me what your sport is and I'll tell you who you are,' " he said.

Bauer said he might demonstrate his neutrality on the subject by lecturing in a referee jersey.

The arena is their temple, the players are their saviours, and those who worship them pray that the sacrifices made on the ice — of blood, sweat and tears — will lead them to glory.

In Prof. Olivier Bauer's class at the Université de Montréal, worshippers can argue that their team is their religion

Mayor Jean Drapeau telephoned Campbell at the NHL officein town and begged him not to attend the game that night. Theimperious Campbell not only ignored the mayor's advice but alsomade a diva's entrance at the Forum

No athlete has embodied the soul of a city and the spirit of itspeople as Richard did in the 1940s and '50s in Montreal, my homefor the past 21 years.

There are moments when life gets in the way, when sports and thereal world collide at some intersection

One by one, they introduce the men who have become legends here, who gave the building its history: Emile Bouchard, Jean Béliveau, Ken Dryden, Yvan Cournoyer, Guy Lafleur … and then, only one remains. Before the emcee can finish listing his exploits, the cheers begin for the silver-haired man. Wearing his No. 9 home jersey, he walks out onto the red carpet spread over the ice.

The events had troubled him, especially to think they may have been done in his name.

“Kill Campbell!”

In a letter to Campbell, one person called out the ethnic prejudice seemingly tainting the NHL president’s judgment: “If Richard’s name was Richardson you would have given a different verdict.”

“I don’t remember what happened.”

“The Babe Ruth of hockey

Le Rocket

Richard stood 5’10, 180 pounds, with the fists of a former boxer, but his most distinguishing physical feature was his eyes, dark, focused, under a heavy brow.

By 1955, Richard had scored more goals, 422, than anyone in the history of the NHL — 98 more than the next guy on the list. He had become the only player to score 50 goals in the 50-game season.

The punishment is worse for Richard. Udvari kicks him out of the game.

For five minutes

thinks

So now, at 15:11 of the third period, when Laycoe confronts Richard, the crowd senses something bad about to happen — but it has no way of knowing how bad it is going to get.

Montreal’s homegrown French-Canadian star from the city’s blue-collar Nouveau-Bordeaux neighborhood, the world’s greatest hockey player to that time

“No one can know when the anger of men, whipped indefinitely, becomes sculpted into political revenge. And more, it is not just a matter of hockey.”

And the Rocket, who always refused to align himself with a political party, would lead his teammates to five straight Stanley Cup victories until retiring in the spring of 1960 with 544 regular-season goals to his credit.

After the riot, the NHL began to crack down on all-out brawls (especially carrying your stick into one), though it would take another 25 years for the changes to take effect with the institution of the third-man-in rule.

asking for calm.

I have often seen Rocket Richard fill the Forum," said Dick Irvin, Jr., later the legendary Montreal play-by-play and colour man, and at that time the son of the team's coach. "But that's the first time I've ever seen him empty it."

However, nothing may have happened if Campbell hadn't made a tactical error — he showed up to the game (10 minutes late) with his secretary (future wife) and took his regular place.

Richard's story had linesman Cliff Thompson holding him back, arms pinned, while Laycoe was allowed to smack away. Rocket said he warned the linesman three times to let him go before he finally clocked the official.

Hockey's greatest player at that time was Richard, who in 1945 became the first to score 50 goals in a season (in 50 games, no less). He was a talent so large that Conn Smythe, owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs, offered a million dollars to the Canadiens for him (about $10 million today). Richard's coal-black eyes glowed with defiance, danger and pure disgust for losing.

Sticks were high, fists flew, blood often smeared the ice, and the owners thought this was all manly and a great way to sell tickets.

Maurice Richard said many times that, in order to understand the events leading up to the riot of March 17, 1955 that forever bears his name, it was crucial to know how violent the National Hockey League was in those days

150th birthday in 2017.

For the voices had spoken commandingly and she knew she could not choose but obey.

... Tous les palais des rois N'ont rien de comparable Aux beautes que je vois Dans cette etable.

"After the first snowfall there is yet a month before winter sets in. The old folks always so declared, and I believe it myself." He was right; for in two days a rain carried off the snow and the dark soil again lay bare. Still the warning was heeded, and they set about preparations; the yearly defences against the snow that may not be trifled with, and the piercing cold.

Charles Eugene pulled gallantly between the shafts; the cart was swallowed up in the barn, stopped beside the mow, and once again the forks were plunged into the hard-packed hay, raised a thick mat of it with strain of wrist and back, and unloaded it to one side. By the end of the week the hay, well-dried and of excellent colour, was all under cover; the men stretched themselves and took long breaths, knowing the fight was over and won

François Paradis stole a glance at Maria, then turned his eyes away and tightly clasped his hands. Ah, but she was good to look upon! Thus to sit beside her, to catch these shy glimpses of the strong bosom, the sweet face so modest and so patient, the utter simplicity of attitude and of her rare gestures; a great hunger for her awoke in him,

"The mass is beautiful. I am often very sorry that we live so far from churches. Perhaps not being able to attend to our religion every Sunday hinders us from being just so fortunate as other people."

To Maria Chapdelaine, glancing inattentively here and there, there was nothing in all this to make one feel lonely or afraid. Never had she known other prospect from October to May, save those still more depressing and sad, farther yet from the dwellings of man and the marks of his labour; and moreover all about her that morning had taken on a softer outline, was brighter with a new promise, by virtue of something sweet and gracious that the future had in its keeping. Perhaps the coming springtime ... perhaps another happiness that was stealing toward her, nameless and unrecognized.

Meantime the women in their turn had begun to leave the church. Young or old, pretty or ugly, nearly all were well clad in fur cloaks, or in coats of heavy cloth; for, honouring the Sunday mass, sole festival of their lives, they had doffed coarse blouses and homespun petticoats, and a stranger might well have stood amazed to find them habited almost with elegance in this remote spot; still French to their finger-tips in the midst of the vast lonely forest and the snow, and as tastefully dressed, these peasant women, as most of the middle-class folk in provincial France.

"I tell you that we shall have a lean year," asserted one old fellow, "the frost got in before the last snows fell."

Egide Simard

Peribonka