In 1951, Bill Barilko died in a plane crash -two mysteries remain unsolved
I recall the Hudson family very well. Mrs. Hudson and I were the last two people to see Dr. Hudson and Bill Barilko alive on the day that little plane took off.
BILL BARILKO
At the end of this post is a poem I wrote in 2001, fifty years to the day after Timmins native, Bill Barilko scored in overtime to win the Stanley Cup for the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Excerpt from Hard Knock Graduate, Gate Lepine’s autobiography. Gate is an 87 year old songwriter, author, painter, guitar player, a renaissance man. In 1964, he befriended a hungry and down and out hobo named Tom Connors. Years later, “Stompin’ Tom” was born and with Gate by his side, a lifelong friendship and songwriting partnership followed.
Before reading this story, a writer by the name of Douglas Klar sent me this photo and back story. He is writing a book about the Bill Barilko plane crash. It’s clear there is another mystery surrounding the crash…according to Douglas…
Sandra Catterello
Sandra Catterello was the wife of Holman Pluggers hockey coach Carlo Catterello. The Pluggers were a local Juvenile team that played out of Timmins in the 1940’s. One year Catterello coached future NHL players Eric Prentice, Allan Stanley, Bill Barilko and others. He was a pillar in the Timmins hockey community back then.
Sandra went on a Barilko plane wreckage recovery trip a few years back and was photographed with a glass vile of gold that she had brought. She said she wanted to deposit the gold at the site where Barilko and Dentist Dr. Henry Hudson’s plane crashed? There were many theories as to why the plane went down that day taking a hockey hero’s life. I think the photo speaks volumes of what Sandra thought all these years later.
The photo was taken by writer Kevin Vincent who helped organize and document the wreckage recovery trip.
Gate continues….
A few months after that famous goal, Bill Barilko would suffer a fatal accident when he and his dentist friend, (and my next door neighbour) Dr. Henry Hudson, perished in Dr. Hudson’s small plane. It crashed in a dense forest while they were both heading out on a fishing trip.
I recall the Hudson family very well. Mrs. Hudson and I were the last two people to see Dr. Hudson and Bill Barilko alive on the day that little plane took off.
Doctor Hudson and his wife were our next-door neighbours in Timmins. His small plane often sat on the river near our back yard. I used to do some odd chores for Mrs Hudson from time to time and she and her husband were always very kind to me.
On the evening before Dr. Hudson was to leave with Bill Barilko on their fishing trip, Mrs. Hudson had informed me about it and told me to come over to their place early the next morning and Dr. Hudson would introduce me to Bill Barilko. I was totally dumbstruck and in awe. I was a young Montreal Canadians hockey fan and I knew darn well who Bill Barilko was. He was the guy who scored the overtime goal to beat my Canadians in overtime, and win the Stanley Cup, while I listened to it happen on the radio.
I recall walking over anxiously to Dr. Hudson’s plane near the dock early the next morning. They were about to take off and I did get to meet Mr. Barilko and shake his hand. I was still a pretty shy and awkward kid and I think I was stammering a lot when I talked to him. I recall saying at one point, “You beat my Canadians.” I forget his response but I know he didn’t apologize for that. I think he said it was a tough game or something but whatever he said made me feel like he was an OK guy. At least he didn’t brag about his amazing goal.
I helped Dr.Hudson a bit by handing him a few items from the dock to pack onto his small plane before he took off, with Bill Barilko aboard, to never return again. The plane went down in August of 1951. Bill Barilko’s glory came in “sudden-death” overtime. Months later, his life ended in “sudden-death” when the dreadful news of that fatal flight was reported to the country.
Following that tragic event, I was in such shock at the news that I could never face Mrs. Hudson again. I was devastated and I couldn’t imagine how much worse Mrs. Hudson could be feeling. I couldn’t think of anything to say to her if I saw her and I was afraid to approach her because of that. I just felt so uncomfortable that I was afraid I would just say something embarrassing in error and I couldn’t bring myself to go near her. I was too afraid to witness her grief. Today I would have no qualms about just expressing my honest sympathies to her and I regret that it’s something I just did not know how to do at that time.
I wrote this poem in 2001, fifty years to the day after Timmins native, Bill Barilko scored in overtime to win the Stanley Cup for the Toronto Maple Leafs. I was fourteen at that time of the win.
“Bashing” Bill Barilko was a dashing lad on blades;
A young soldier with a stick on ice, at war,
With a vision of the Stanley Cup parade.
He’d help to win it then he would play no more.
The glory and the tragedy of spring-summer ’51
Is a true, Canadian story so often told
Of how he scored the winning goal and won
In overtime to beat the Montreal Canadians cold.
He lifted it to sip that champagne from the cup,
Held it higher, smiling, for the fans in that parade
But “Destiny”, in one hungry, giant gulp,
Swallowed all the glory when waiting in the shade.
Of the senseless tragedy that followed him when
He ventured north, just a few months later,
On a fishing trip long planned,
So damn suddenly in the last and final chapter
Of a story-book, dashing, bashing hockey hero
Who did vanish into thin air
When they plunged to the forest floor below
In the muskeg swamp where darkness stared.
Awaiting him and his friend, Henry,
To grasp the plane, the doctor and the lad.
With the nation searching, in a frenzy,
Where the ending was so sad.
In glory and in tragedy, the year the cup was won,
When bashing Bill of the Toronto Maple Leafs scored
To win the Stanley trophy in nineteen-fifty-one,
To die a hockey hero, to play the game no more.