Gordie Howe was the Ideal Canadian Athelete
He played until he was fifty-two, long enough to skate professionally alongside his own sons. His accumulated stats include 2,421 games, 1,071 goals, 1,518 assists, 2,589 points, and 2,418 penalty minutes. Until Gretzky passed him, he held the professional records of 801 goals and 1,850 points. He seemed to play forever, and he forever played well, winning six M.V.P. awards and six scoring championships, too.
.. “Gordie Howe hat trick,” which is when a player has a goal, an assist, and a fight all in one game.
.. he was a representative—the perfect representative—of a certain kind of Canadianness, reflected, as it was bound to be, in a hockey player, as perhaps Lou Gehrig or Stan Musial, other Iron Men, were representative of similar, American baseball values, now largely lost.
.. He nonetheless made the Canadian virtues of modesty, persistence, and family-above-all-else part of the heritage of hockey. He didn’t just play with his sons; he played well with his sons