Jack Walker
Hockey Hall of Fame, 1960
Walker with the Seattle Metropolitans.
Born	(1888-11-29)November 29, 1888 Silver Mountain, Ontario, Canada
Died	February 16, 1950(1950-02-16) (aged 61) Seattle, Washington, U.S.
Height	5 ft 8 in (173 cm)
Weight	153 lb (69 kg; 10 st 13 lb)
Position	Rover/Winger
Shot	Left
Played for	Oakland Sheiks Hollywood Stars Seattle Eskimos Detroit Cougars Victoria Cougars Seattle Metropolitans Moncton Victorias Toronto Blueshirts Port Arthur Lake City
Playing career	1907–1933

John Phillip "Jack" Walker (November 29, 1888 – February 16, 1950) was aCanadian professionalice hockeyforward who played for theToronto Blueshirts,Seattle Metropolitans,Victoria Cougars, andDetroit Cougars. He played in all the big professional leagues at the time: theNational Hockey Association (NHA),Pacific Coast Hockey Association (PCHA),Western Canada Hockey League (WCHL), andNational Hockey League (NHL).

Walker won threeStanley Cups in his career: in1914 with the Toronto Blueshirts, in1917 with the Seattle Metropolitans, and in1925 with the Victoria Cougars. GoaltenderHarry "Hap" Holmes and forwardFrank Foyston were his teammates on all three Stanley Cup winning teams. Walker is one of only 11 players in Stanley Cup history to win the Cup with three or more different teams.^[1]

Outside of his three Stanley Cup victories Walker also appeared in four other instances where his team played for the Stanley Cup, either in challenge games or in Stanley Cup series: in1911 with Port Arthur Lake City, in1919 and1920 with the Seattle Metropolitans, and in1926 with the Victoria Cougars. In 1911, 1920 and 1926 he was on the losing side of either the challenge game or the series, and in 1919 the Stanley Cup series between the Seattle Metropolitans and theMontreal Canadiens was cancelled because of theSpanish flupandemic.^[2]

Born inSilver Mountain,Ontario Walker grew up inPort Arthur, Ontario (present dayThunder Bay), where his parents had lived since 1870. He played with the Port Arthur Lake City team in the New Ontario Hockey League (NOHL) from 1907–1912. On March 16, 1911, he and teammateEddie Carpenter played for thePort Arthur Hockey Club against theOttawa Senators of theNational Hockey Association (NHA) for theStanley Cup. Carpenter and Walker each scored a goal, but the Port Arthur team lost 4-13 in front of 3,000 spectators at the Laurier AvenueArena inOttawa.^[3]

Impressed by Walker's play in the Stanley Cup challenge game the Ottawa Senators tried to land him for the 1911–12 season, but Walker declined the offer as he thought Port Arthur had a strong enough team to again compete for the Stanley Cup.^[4] For the 1911–12 season futureHockey Hall of Fame membersHarry Cameron andFrank Nighbor joined the Port Arthur team fromPembroke, Ontario, but after the team defeated the Saskatoon Wholesalers 12-6 (11-1, 1-5) in a qualifying two-game series on March 2 and 4, 1912 for a chance to challenge the National Hockey Association champions (Quebec Bulldogs) for the Stanley Cup, Port Arthur nonetheless turned down the opportunity because they felt they had practically no chance to defeat the NHA champions.^[5]

During the 1912–13 season, Walker and Eddie Carpenter played for theMoncton Victorias of theMaritime Professional Hockey League (MaPHL), and Walker also played one initial game with theToronto Blueshirts of the NHA. Walker had first signed a contract with the Toronto club for the1912–13 NHA season, but jumped contract to Moncton along withFred Doherty after only one game in the NHA for a higher salary in the Maritimes.^[6] In1913–14 Walker became a full time member of the Toronto Blueshirts.

Back in Toronto Walker helped the 1913–14 Toronto Blueshirts win the Stanley Cup by defeating the Montreal Canadiens. The two teams tied each other for first place in the NHA, and Toronto won the deciding playoffs 6-2 (0-2, 6-0) over two games on March 7 and 11. The Blueshirts then defeated theVictoria Aristocrats, champions of the Pacific Coast Hockey Association (PCHA), in three straight games 5-2, 6-5 and 2-1 between March 14 to 19.^[7]

Walker played with the Toronto Blueshirts also in1914–15, but prior to the 1915–16 seasonLester andFrank Patrick, the men behind the PCHA, took advantage of a turbulent situation in the NHA when MajorFrank Robinson, owner of the Blueshirts, was about to sell his team to join the military. The Patricks raided the Blueshirts and created a new PCHA team in theSeattle Metropolitans, stocking it with Walker, Eddie Carpenter, Harry "Hap" Holmes, Frank Foyston andCarol "Cully" Wilson.^[8]

In his second season with the Metropolitans, in1916–17, Walker helped the American team to a first place finish in the PCHA, in front of theVancouver Millionaires,Portland Rosebuds andSpokane Canaries. In the following Stanley Cup finals the Metropolitans defeated the Montreal Canadiens of the NHA 3 games to 1 to claim the Stanley Cup,^[9] making it the first time an American team had won the coveted trophy.

World War I had a big impact on the game, and prior to the1917–18 season Walker and Eddie Carpenter were stuck in Port Arthur working on adry dock. They had been given exemption from the war on the condition that they continued with their employment in the city, which held them out from rejoining the Metropolitans in the PCHA.^[10] Walker and Carpenter instead played with different Port Arthur teams in the NOHL.

Back in the PCHA for the1918–19 season Walker again helped the Metropolitans reach the Stanley Cup finals, a rematch against the Montreal Canadiens from two seasons prior. The 1919 series was a more even affair than the 1917 series but had to be cancelled with the teams tied at 2-2 in the best-of-five format due to theSpanish flupandemic when several players on the Canadiens ended up sick in hospital.^[2]Joe Hall, a Hockey Hall of Fame defenseman on the Canadiens team, subsequently died ofpneumonia, related to his influenza, in a hospital inSeattle on April 5, only four days after the series had been cancelled.

In1919–20 Walker again helped the Metropolitans to the Stanley Cup finals, this time against the Ottawa Senators. The Senators, led offensively by Frank Nighbor, Walker's old teammate from Port Arthur during the 1911–12 season, won the series 3 games to 2 after a 6-1 decision in game five on April 1, 1920.^[11]

Walker played four more seasons with the Metropolitans, but when the team folded after the1923–24 season Walker, along with his longtime teammates Hap Holmes and Frank Foyston, joined the Victoria Cougars in the Western Canada Hockey League for the1924–25 season. The Cougars, led offensively by their Icelandic-Canadian star forwardFrank Fredrickson, only finished third in the 1924–25 WCHL standings, but they succeeded in winning the following league playoffs (defeating both theSaskatoon Crescents and theCalgary Tigers) which gave them the opportunity to play NHL champion Montreal Canadiens for the Stanley Cup. Walker, who had a modest regular season offensively speaking with the Cougars, turned it on for the playoffs, scoring 4 goals during the WCHL playoffs and 4 goals in the Stanley Cup finals, helping the Cougars defeat the Canadiens 3 games to 1 while being matched against the Canadiens young star forwardHowie Morenz.^[12] The 1925 Victoria Cougars were the last non-NHL team to win the Stanley Cup.

In1926 the team was back in the Stanley Cup finals after winning the WHL playoffs, but theMontreal Maroons of the NHL were too difficult to overcome, winning the series 3 games to 1, with Montreal goaltenderClint Benedict recording three shutouts in the series.^[13]

When theWHL folded after the1925–26 season Walker moved along with the Victoria Cougars toDetroit and the NHL where the team became theDetroit Cougars. Walker, then aged 37, played two seasons with the Detroit Cougars in the NHL before he headed back to Seattle where he played three seasons with the Seattle Eskimos of thePacific Coast Hockey League. During the 1931–32 and 1932–33 seasons Walker was a playing manager for the Hollywood Stars and the Oakland Sheiks respectively in theCalifornia Hockey League,^[14] a league where several other old PCHA stars such asMoose Johnson,Lloyd Cook andFred "Smokey" Harris also played during their twilight years.

After his playing career Walker stayed on the West Coast where he was active as an ice hockey coach. He finally settled down in Seattle where he died on February 16, 1950, at the age of 61.

He was inducted posthumously into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1960.^[15]

During his hockey career Walker played mostly as arover (the archaic seven man game forward position betweendefense and thecentre forward) or, in the six man game against opponents from the NHA, as awinger. He was a good stick-handler and had much speed, something which both theOttawa Journal and theOttawa Citizen complimented him on after the Port Arthur Lake City aggregation played the Ottawa Senators for the Stanley Cup on March 16, 1911.^[16][17]

Walker was a prominent two-way player who could make a difference at both ends of the rink, and he is often credited with introducing thehook check (a defensive technique in which the player sweeps or hooks his stick low to the ice in an effort to remove the puck from an opponent's stick) to the game of hockey.^[18] Walker's forward teammate on the 1911–12 Port Arthur Lake City team Frank Nighbor was another defensive specialist during the same era who excelled at both the poke check^{[note 1]} and the sweep check.^[19] In a 1960 interview withBill Westwick of theOttawa Journal, Nighbor claimed he had learned his famous poke checking technique by watching Walker while the two players were teammates in Port Arthur.^[20]

One instance in which Walker used his hook check with great success was during the1917 Stanley Cup Finals against theMontreal Canadiens. The Canadiens had won the first game of the best-of-five series 8 goals to 4, but in game two Walker used his hook check effectively onDidier Pitre, one of the star forwards on the Montreal team who had scored four goals in the first game, helping his team hold the Canadiens to only one goal in a 6–1 victory.^[21] The Seattle Metropolitans then won game three 4-1 and game four 9-1, becoming the first American team in history to win the Stanley Cup.

Whether or not Walker came up with his hook checking technique by himself, or if he drew inspiration from contemporary players, is disputed. BothJoel Rochon and William "Bud" Saurel,^{[note 2]} two players fromFort William whom Walker played against in the NOHL, claimed to have originated the check.^[22] Rochon's claim was echoed by Fort William native Hockey Hall of Fame memberJack Adams who claimed Frank Nighbor must have learned his poke check after having played against Rochon and Fort William in the NOHL, something Nighbor himself denied.^[20]Harry Scott, a teammate of Walker with the 1912–13 Moncton Victorias and an opponent of him in the NOHL between 1907–1911, claimed that it was "Bud" Saurel who had taught Walker the check.^[23]

In an era that was known for a lot of on-ice violence Walker was known as a clean and gentlemanly player, which reflected not only in a comparatively low amount of penalty minutes but also in a comparatively low amount of serious injuries. One serious injury he did suffer happened during the1921–22 season when he was hit over his already injured left hand in a game inVictoria on February 10 andblood-poisoning set in to the wound. He was taken toGeneral Hospital in Vancouver where on February 13 he was operated on,^[24] and he later came back and finished the season.

Lester Patrick, the hockey mogul behind the PCHA and later a two-time Stanley Cup winning coach with theNew York Rangers, had high praise for Walker, calling him "one of the greatest players who ever lived" in a 1950Maclean's magazine interview, but he also stated that in comparison with contemporary players likeCyclone Taylor, Frank Nighbor, Howie Morenz,Eddie Shore, Moose Johnson,Ching Johnson and Frank Fredrickson, Walker, much like his Seattle Metropolitans teammate Frank Foyston, "lacked color" and "no matter how brilliant he was, he didn't bring the crowd to their feet."^[25]

• Stanley Cup – 1914 withToronto Blueshirts, 1917 withSeattle Metropolitans and 1925 withVictoria Cougars
• PCHA First All-Star Team – 1920–21, 1921–22 and 1923–24
• PCHA Second All-Star Team – 1916–17, 1918–19 and 1919–20

• Podnieks, Andrew (2003).Players: the ultimate A-Z guide of everyone who has ever played in the NHL. Doubleday Canada.ISBN 0-385-25999-9.
• Holzman, Morey; Nieforth, Joseph (2002).Deceptions and doublecross : how the NHL conquered hockey. Dundurn Press.ISBN 1-55002-413-2.

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