Ken Dryden holds a special place in the hearts of many Canadians. Revered for his outsized talent on the ice – as well as for his post-NHL accomplishments in politics, law and writing – he inspired countless people along the way.
After his death at the age of 78 following a battle with cancer, many Globe and Mail readers took the time to send in their memories, personal stories that reveal the sense of awe they felt upon meeting him. Here is a selection of what they shared. Submissions have been edited for clarity and length.
Flowers are laid at a plaque honouring former Montreal Canadiens goaltender Ken Dryden outside the Bell Centre in Montreal, following his death on Sept. 5.Graham Hughes/The Canadian Press
Brian Etherington, Picton, Ont.
In the summer of 1998, I was invited by my good friend Jim Thompson (the then-president of TSN), to a round of golf at a club we both belonged to just north of Toronto.
Upon arrival, I was struck by a set of old wooden golf clubs sitting beside Jim’s high-tech, top drawer set. I next found my hand encased in the strong grip of Ken Dryden, and simultaneously answering a number of questions from him about my friendship with Jim.
As we approached the first tee, Dryden apologized for his game’s rust, and then deposited a 300-yard drive down the heart of the fairway, a position which Jim and I both eventually reached after several additional shots.
Scholar-athlete Ken Dryden was a role model far beyond the NHL
As the holes fell away, so did any feeling of being with a celebrity as Dryden answered our questions about his journey growing up, his love for Canada, family and hockey – all with the same ease associated with that iconic stance of his on the ice at breaks in play, with his arms at rest over his goalie stick.
Word spread about his presence that day and suddenly people were climbing over fences to seek his autograph and perhaps get a picture with him. He patiently obliged each request, pausing only to apologize to his playing partners for the distractions.
As the years passed, during which Dryden was involved in his acclaimed public service and writing, I had several subsequent opportunities to be in his presence. But I have never forgotten the majesty of the man who I first met, a man used a wooden golf club, who by then had already won a country over with a different wooden stick and who left us a collection of profound reflections, written, I like to think, with a wooden pencil.
Dryden and members of his family gather at centre ice at Montreal’s Bell Centre as his number is retired during a pre-game ceremony on Jan. 29, 2007.
Ryan Remiorz/THE CANADIAN PRESS
Douglas Gibson, Toronto
Ken Dryden was already famous for his role as a hockey goalie with the Montreal Canadiens when our paths crossed. I approached him to write a hockey book for me. He retired from the NHL in 1979, and travelled to Cambridge in England to write The Game.
On Dec. 8, 1983, he inscribed The Game to me with these words:
For Doug, we have gone through a lot for a long time. I hope you’re as satisfied with the end result as I am. Thank you for all your help and patience.
My help and patience consisted almost solely of encouraging Ken to keep going with the ambitious book he had planned.
When we launched it, I knew that it was very thoughtful and well-written, and also knew that it would be popular. I had no idea how popular, until our very first public event, an autographing by Ken that took place at the University of Toronto Bookroom. As I usually did, when I was available, I went along to, metaphorically, hold the author’s hand.
In this case, something was terribly wrong. An endless line of young people snaked all around the bookstore, blocking every aisle in the very extensive store – and we didn’t have enough books on hand. Fast work enabled us to rush scores of extra copies there to satisfy the massive customer demand. But after, I staggered back to the Macmillan office with the urgent message that we had to print more copies. We did. We reprinted and reprinted this perfect book for intelligent hockey fans, and the reviews cascaded out. The Globe and Mail called The Game “the sports book of the year or maybe the decade or maybe the century.”
Ken and I were later brought even closer by sport. Not by hockey. By field hockey. At high school at University of Toronto Schools, Ken’s daughter Sarah was on the same team as my girls Meg and Katie – a team that won the city championship. Often the only two dads on the sidelines were named Dryden and Gibson, and we roamed up and down, following the play and punching each other’s shoulders in triumph when the UTS girls scored.
Just a few weeks ago, Ken sent me an e-mail to say that he saw an article and picture of my daughter Meg in the UTS magazine. Something that I had failed to notice.
He was a good friend, and I will miss him.
Dryden and members of Team Canada from the 1972 Canada-Russia Summit Series are honoured in the House of Commons in Ottawa, on Sept. 22, 2022.PATRICK DOYLE/The Canadian Press
Peter Raymont, White Pine Pictures, Toronto
In 2016, Ken Dryden reached out to me and suggested we produce a TV series for Canada’s sesquicentennial, profiling and championing young Canadians who were making a difference in many fields of endeavour.
Ken had lots of ideas and was brimming with enthusiasm and energy. He wanted this 150th anniversary project to be forward-looking – not gazing back at our history but into the future. We brought the CBC and Radio-Canada on board, raised the production funds and put together a terrific team. I remember clearly the day Ken came into our production office and gave us a memorable locker-room-style pep talk. He urged us to do our best, to not be discouraged by problems, to find great characters, to dig deep and keep going.
Tall, articulate, mesmerizing, Ken spoke quietly but passionately, with both gravitas and humour, sharing his unbridled enthusiasm for our mission, sharing his love of Canada.
Later that day we walked into Trinity Bellwoods Park to shoot on-camera introductions. It was a bitterly cold but bright winter day. We carried big cue cards with handwritten scripts Ken had written. He stood tall, put up with all my nudges, suggestions and requests for retakes. People walking their dogs or skating nearby approached for autographs and selfies. Ken was unfailingly courteous, curious and kind.
Our little project won the award for best documentary series at the Yorkton Film Festival and Ken flew out to Saskatchewan to accept the prize, bringing his celebrity status to the event. He also made a personal, unreported side trip to visit with the parents and families of the young hockey players from Humboldt killed in the horrific bus accident.
Ken was a great man who put his values and his country before himself. I miss his kindness and support, his gentle smile and hearty laugh. His intelligence and curiosity. His decency and friendship.
Serge Savard laughs as Dryden shows a picture of the duo during their playing days, at a news conference to announce the retirement of their numbers in Montreal on Sept. 20, 2006.Ian Barrett/The Canadian Press
Anne Tait, Toronto
Among the many accolades to Ken Dryden’s accomplishments in sports, politics and writing, one more side of him should be celebrated: his sense of fun. Ken Dryden’s book about hockey was produced as a CBC-TV series Home Game by my friend Peter Pearson, who once called from Montreal and invited me to join him at a film biz party in Toronto. He gave me the address and said that “his driver” would pick me up.
When the driver arrived, duly announced by my concierge, it was Ken Dryden himself at the wheel, in chauffeur gear! That was Ken – adding yet another skill to all his others.
We had a good laugh together.
Lydia Vale, Toronto
My son prepared a documentary in 2008, when he was in high school, on the Canada-Russia Series. One of the players he spoke to was Ken Dryden, then a member of Parliament, at his constituency office. I was lucky enough to have been there for the interview and listened with great attention to Dryden’s take on the series.
While he showed little emotion as he spoke, he expressed his great disappointment with Team Canada’s loss in Game 1 of the series. What was supposed to be a blowout for Canada was instead an embarrassment. The team had come to Toronto following the game and, as Dryden told my son, there were no Sunday newspapers or internet and it was as if the whole thing had never happened. While he wished that was the case, it wasn’t.
Ken Dryden was a true gentleman. He gave my son all the time he needed, he spoke thoughtfully and, at the end, even autographed a souvenir my son had from the ’72 Series.
Russia tries to out-manoeuvre Team Canada goalie Dryden in the first game of the Canada-Russia Summit Series in Montreal on Sept. 2, 1972.Dennis Robinson/The Globe and Mail
Stan Podwin, Toronto
A few years ago I was volunteering at Toronto General Hospital, helping visitors find their way around the building. At the hospital entrance where I was stationed, I greeted Ken Dryden a few times and exchanged pleasantries.
Once, I introduced myself and told him that I had contributed for more than 30 years to his family’s charity, Sleeping Children Around The World. We talked for quite a while about the great work his parents had done to establish the charity, and I asked him to tell his family how much I appreciated all they were doing to help children in need.
I also told him that I grew up in Montreal and was a passionate Canadiens fan. I thanked him for those memories as well.
Dryden, former Minister of Social Development, joins the children doing arts and crafts at the Glebe Parents’ Day Care in Ottawa in November, 2004.Supplied
Toby Heaps, Corporate Knights Inc., Toronto
I first met our dearly departed Ken Dryden over 10 years ago while organizing a surprise roast for Ralph Nader, hosted by the former Nader Raiders – a group of which Ken was proudly a part. There’s something quietly beautiful about how a man who reached the summit of fame and excellence in 1971 with the Stanley Cup would step away from the bright lights of victory to dive into the citizen activist trenches, spending a summer as an intern far from home.
It calls to mind Leonard Cohen, who likewise sought deeper meaning at the height of his career by retreating to the Mount Baldy Zen Buddhist monastery in Los Angeles, where he spent years meditating and serving as cook – preparing eggs for his friend, the Zen Master Roshi.
For Ken, that search for purpose was with a secular monk of sorts, Ralph Nader, and he worked seven days a week from Nader’s Public Citizen office in Washington, D.C., to organize fishermen for cleaner water and stronger environmental protections.
Thomas Flavin, Edmonton
When I heard the news of Ken Dryden’s passing, I was transported to a hockey banquet in the spring of 1975. Dryden was the guest of honour, and it was my first brush with hockey greatness.
It was the era when minor hockey was a father-and-son activity, and still was mainly about how you played the game, not who won or how much they were going to earn later. There were a few of the dreaded “hockey parents” but they were a small minority, outnumbered by great dads (and a few moms) who loved the game for the best reasons – especially the teamwork.
For us boys, it was sheer heaven – driving to the games and practices in station wagons and then doing what we watched stars do on TV. The 1972 Canada-Russia series was not too far in the past and we all knew the names of those stars who played in it. To me, Dryden lived on a plane of hockey existence even higher than the rest of Team Canada, for he had won the Stanley Cup. The Leafs were our hometown team, but in our era the Canadiens were, well, Canada’s team. Dryden playing for them proved it.
The Toronto Maple Leafs’ Dave Williams battles for the puck with Montreal’s Guy Lafleur and Dryden during a game in December, 1977.JOHN MAIOLA
So when I learned that Ken Dryden was coming to our hockey banquet, it was almost like hearing Jesus would be there, right beside the parish priest. It was the first year my friends and I had been lifted from the humble house league to the parish minor atom rep team, which meant we had – gasp – a colour team picture taken.
The night of the banquet, we each received our team photo. It could not have been a more humble affair, if all you looked at was the setting – a church basement, paper tablecloths, and Kentucky Fried Chicken served out of the bucket. But there on the stage was a head table that included Ken Dryden.
We were each up to meet Ken Dryden. There must have been dozens of us, but Dryden took a moment with me before signing my team photo. I don’t recall exactly what he said, but I do recall that there was a calm and kindness to him that made a deep impression.
I remember he arrived without fanfare and without publicists, news coverage or handlers. He was just there for us boys, sharing the love of hockey.
Ken Dryden achieved much more after I met him, in hockey but also in law, politics and writing. What I saw of him that night – the willingness to spend time with people who could do nothing for him except share the love of the game, and of Canada – I understand why.
Dryden, right, takes his famous pose as he chats with former teammate Steve Shutt during centennial celebration in Montreal on December, 2009.Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press
Damien Coakeley, Toronto
Like Ken Dryden, I too am a tall man and was well on the way to being so when he was in his heyday. He inspired me to take up my post between the pipes, just like him, and I even wore number 29. The one thing I could not do, however, is lean on the goalie stick, his iconic pose – that one is all his.
I finally got my chance to meet him as I was preparing in 2009 to go Afghanistan to train and mentor the Afghan National Police, the highlight of my career with the Ottawa Police Service. We had to first fly to Toronto, where we would board the newly dispatched Emirates A-380 airliner to take us to Dubai and onwards.
I don’t always realize how tall I am, although I know it can intimidating. I’m sure Dryden felt the same way about his own height. After finding my seat while boarding the Air Canada flight to Toronto, the cabin aisle was filled with an enormous man whose size I could not believe. As he walked past me to the rear of the aircraft, I clued in. “That’s Ken Dryden,” I exclaimed to myself. After all these years, I had finally seen him in person.
I am not and never have been an autograph seeker. Unless previously arranged, I consider it an intrusion. But this was different. This was Ken Dryden, my idol, my hero, and during my hockey times, my alter ego.
After we arrived at Pearson, I gingerly approached him and said, “Mr. Dryden, would you please indulge me in something that I have been waiting for since I was 10 years old?” I was 47 at the time. To say that he was gracious in his speaking and dealing with me would not do him justice. He asked me whether I played hockey and what position I played – so I naturally told him that I was also a goalie and had been completely inspired by him. Although I no longer wore number 29, I did tell him that I had done so for many years.
He asked me if I had anything for him to sign. I did not, but somewhere found a napkin which, to me, would be good enough.
I remember him saying to me, “No one will ever believe you if you just have me sign a napkin!”
“Here,” he said, “I’ll give you my boarding pass and I will sign that.” So, on his pass with his full name – “Mr. Kenneth Dryden” – he did just that, inscribing, “To Damien, #37, who loves The Game. Best wishes, Ken Dryden.”
Remember, I was 47 at the time. But my first bragging phone call was to my mother who, upon being told that I had met the one person in life who I had always longed to meet said, “Who, Ken Dryden?”
Yes, I replied, and burst into tears.
Canada has truly lost a cultural icon. Rest in eternal peace, Ken Dryden. I, like many Canadians, loved you so much!
Dryden guards against Danny O’Shea of the Chicago Blackhawks during the Stanley Cup Playoff final in Chicago on May 18, 1971. The Canadiens defeated the Blackhawks 3-2 for the coveted Stanley Cup.The Associated Press
Mark Bulgutch, formerly with CBC News
Like most Canadians, my first view of Ken Dryden was during the 1971 NHL playoffs. His out-of-this-world goaltending led “my” Montreal Canadiens to the Stanley Cup, cementing his place in my personal hall of fame.
More than 25 years later, I was an executive producer at CBC News when I looked up to see Dryden walking through the national newsroom in Toronto. He was the president of the Toronto Maple Leafs at the time, and had come to do an interview with some program I had nothing to do with, so there was no reason for me to approach him.
An hour later, he had finished his interview, and as it happened, my day was done, so we stepped on an elevator together for the ride to street level. Just the two of us. I was wearing a Montreal Canadiens ballcap.
He looked at me and said, “Nice hat.”
I replied, “Yeah, and I never became a traitor.”
He instantly recognized the everlasting disdain for the Leafs that resides in the heart of every Canadiens fan.
We both smiled broadly, shared a little chuckle, and enjoyed a moment that only long-time hockey fans in Canada truly understand.