The Toronto Launch of In the Pressure of the Moment: Remembering Gerry McNeil

The Toronto launch of In the Pressure of the Moment: Remembering Gerry McNeil was held Thursday evening (6-8 pm) at Mike Wilson's Hockey Museum. The evening was billed as "A Night to Remember" and what was being remembered was Bill Barilko's famous Stanley Cup winning goal scored 65 years ago to the day (April 21st). There were three guests of honor: David McNeil, who spoke about his father's experience being the victim of Barilko's heroics, Kevin Shea, who provided a background on Barilko's career and life that were tragically cut short, and Dan Donohue, who claimed that his family had inherited the puck that Barilko got passed McNeil 65 years ago. Naturally, much of the discussion centred on the subject of sports memorabilia, the challenges authenticating it, and the stories arising therefrom. Mike Wilson's Hockey Museum, which is a shrine to the Maple Leafs and packed with Leaf memorabilia, was a perfect venue for the evening's events.

Dan fascinated the audience with his story of how the puck came into the possession of his family. His father, a 16-year boy at the time, was at Game Five at the Gardens with his father (Jeremiah). Apparently, while Barilko was being mobbed by his teammates, Harry asked his dad if he could go on the ice and retrieve the puck that was still in the net. (Yes, the same puck that was captured in the mesh by the famous Turofsky goal!) Getting the nod from dad and an usher, the boy made his way onto the ice unobstructed. Needless to say, it was a different time. Guests were shown rare footage of the on-ice celebration: a dejected Gerry McNeil slowly makes his exit in front of the jubillant victors, and then a young man in a trench coat heads in the opposite direction towards the Montreal net. This is where things get interesting. The figure goes off-screen right, and then reappears on-screen right looking like he has what he came for (his arm seems to be securing something in his coat pocket). Is it the puck? We may never know for sure, but the item that Dan brought to Mike Wilson's Museum has been verified as a vulcanized Art Ross model first put into use in 1950.

Guest then heard Kevin tell the story of how Barilko disappeared on a fishing trip later that summer. His remains were not discovered until the Leafs won another Cup in 1962. As far as Gerry McNeil was concerned, as hard as the defeat was that night, he forever associated the loss with the birth of his daughter Karen who arrived in the world earlier that day. Over the years, he realized how precious she was and that more than made up for losing the Cup in '51. David also admitted to having himself indulged in the market of sports memorabilia via the online Classic Sport Auctions.

David also spoke about the importance of sport memorabilia as relics. He leaned over and put his hand on Dan Donohue's puck: "Is this the actual physical thing that got by my father 65 years ago tonight? We may never know for sure but that very uncertainty will be the source of many stories like the one that Dan has told tonight. At least as far back as Chaucer, we have literature about the questionable trade in so-called relics, and modern novelists like Don Delillo and Wayne Johnston have both fictionalized narratives around sport memorabilia. We feel a sacredness about the relic, because it gives us a sense of touching history itself. A piece of sport memorabilia, like your grandmother's wedding ring, like any family heirloom handed down through the generations, is a physical connection to the past."

Among the people in attendance were two more Davis cousins (John and Gary), David's daughter Trish and brother-in-law Patrick O'Neill. The youngest of Hal Murphy's children, Margaret, was also present. As were the Toronto core of SIHR (Society for International Hockey Research): Paul Patskou, Lloyd Davis, Craig Campbell, Lenard Kotylo, and Jim Amodeo. Lance Hornby wrote an article on the evening that appeared in the Toronto Sun. Thanks to Mike Wilson for hosting this event, and to Paul Patskou for organizing it.

Perhaps it is fitting to quote a couple of pertinent passages from In the Pressure of the Moment on the subject of sports memorabilia:

Johnston's novel (The Divine Ryans), like Delillo's Underworld, dramatizes the cultural importance that attaches itself to sports memorabilia--e.g., a puck from the last minute of the last game in the 1953 Stanley Cup Final, the baseball that Bobby Thompson hit in 1951 for a pennant-winning home run. These novels may well register a shift that has come with an increased sense of the spectacle of sport and its commercialization. We crave the relic that somehow puts us in touch with a time that is nostalgically idealized. I have a friend who happened to come into possession of a stick that Maurice Richard used during the 1953 season. He kept it for many years, knew its every little mark, its weight, its feel. He ultimately offered it to one of the popular auction services and fetched a nice sum for his children's college fund, a move that I admire as wise and noble.

from In the Pressure of the Moment (p. 220)

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Last Updated: 15 January 2026