Blackhawks attempt their first Stanley Cup in 48 years
Nicki Timian
Issue date: 4/28/09 Section: Features
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The Chicago Blackhawks came into existence when they played their first game on Nov. 17, 1926 against the Toronto St. Pat's (who later became the Toronto Maple Leafs). The Blackhawks got their name from a World War I army division that the club's first owner, Frederic McLaughlin, was a part of. The division itself was named after Chief Black Hawk, an Illinois native and chief of the Sauk tribe, who helped fight alongside the British forces during the War of 1812. This wouldn't be the only time an NHL team was named after a World War I fighting assemblage, though - the Toronto Maple Leafs were named after the Canadian Maple Leaf Regiment, (which also explains the apparent grammatical error in the pluralized form of 'leaf' - since the regiment itself is a proper noun, it is made plural just by adding an 's' at the end).
The Blackhawks became a part of the "Original Six," which were the six NHL teams that played from 1942 to the NHL expansion in 1967. The teams included the Boston Bruins, the Chicago Blackhawks, the Detroit Redwings, the Montreal Canadiens, the New York Rangers, and the Toronto Maple Leafs. During much of their early history, the Blackhawks sat uncomfortably as one of the worst teams in the league. Part of this was due to the fact that from 1944 to 1958, they were owned by James E. Norris, who also happened to be the owner of the Detroit Red Wings. Norris kept the Red Wings competitive while making sure that the Blackhawks had mediocre talent, giving the Red Wings a natural advantage and boosting their position in the league. Even though the Blackhawks won their second Stanley Cup in 1938 (the first was in 1934), they performed so badly during the regular season that they still hold the record for being the worst performing team to ever win the Stanley Cup Championship.
The Blackhawks won their third and last Stanley Cup Championship in 1961, which gives them another unfortunate record, this time for being the team with the most amount of time since their last championship - so far, that's been 48 years. In fact, the Blackhawks have had such a disappointing history as a team that in 2004 ESPN called it the "worst franchise in professional sports." Matters were made even worse for those fans willing to stick with the team despite its bad performance when Bill Wirtz, the Blackhawks owner during the 1990s and 2000s until his death in 2007, refused to televise home games in an obvious attempt to get more Chicago fans to attend those games and yet raised ticket prices in a thinly veiled attempt to make more profits.
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