Can you imagine something like this today—a Toronto Maple Leaf “album”?

In case you've missed some recent posts...

-Why we fans are the weak link in the labour dispute

-A thank you (and some individual shout-outs) to many of the great posters here at VLM

-Hey, the Leafs are apparently the 120th "smartest spending" team in pro sports (NBA, NFL, MLB and NHL)

-Grading the Leaf heading into the season (forwards) Part II

-Grading the Leafs heading into the season (goalies and defence) Part I


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I think I've written about this before, but back in the early 1960s, as a very young but definitely devoted Maple Leaf follower, I sent away for one of those “offers”—you know, where you send 50 cents, or a top from some food product or other to obtain something that you wanted.  (Hey, maybe kids still do that today; our kids are grown now and I am somewhat out of that loop…)  Now, I realize that’s not a very good description, but I’m struggling to find a clearer way to depict this sort of old-time “transaction”.

Here’s what I (none to well) am referring to:  Back when the Leafs were really good and actually challenged for or even won the Stanley Cup on occasion, then GM and coach Punch Imlach was approached about doing a “record”.  I’m not talking about Johnny Bower’s famous (perhaps infamous is the better word) recording of “Honky the Christmas Goose”.  No, I’m actually recalling a different project, one where Imlach and a few of the Leaf players recorded an audio album called “Let’s Talk Hockey”.

Bower was indeed one of the participants, along with (as you can see above) Dave Keon, Andy Bathgate and defenseman Tim Horton.  The inclusion of Bathgate in this project would mean this occurred likely in the summer on 1964, after the Leafs had won their third Cup in a row, but before Bathgate was traded away to the Red Wings in the spring/summer of 1965. (Bathgate, seen in the photo above,  was a marvellous winger with the New York Rangers for more than a decade before Imlach acquired him for Dickie Duff, a favourite Leaf of mine back then, along with Bob Nevin and some promising youngsters like Rod Seiling and Arnie Brown.)

In any event, there was also an accompanying booklet written by Imlach and the players, as they each described a particular aspect of hockey and playing the game—Imlach of course speaking of coaching and strategy and the players talking on various aspects of their role on the team.

I have no recollection of ever actually having the album (if I ever had one, I would think that I would have held onto it, though goodness knows I’ve lost far more valuable items than that over the years…), so I may have my facts wrong on this one.  Maybe the items I'm thinking about were two different offers/productions?

I’m hoping some other Leaf fans from yesteryear can bail me out. 

Nonetheless I still have the “booklet” (upper right), so maybe people were able to send away separately for the booklet and the “album”.  Whatever the details at the time, I thought you might enjoy this, while we await positive news on the NHL  “labour” front.

I will say this: things were a lot simpler in a lot of ways back in the early and mid 1960s….but I love these little nuggets from Leaf history.