Editor’s note: This story was originally published on Nov. 18, 2017.
LISTOWEL — With all of the changes Pete Leppard and Murray Helmka have experienced over their lives, one of the constants has been their mutual love for hockey.
That is evident watching the two 69-year-olds on the Listowel Memorial Arena ice for their weekly Thursday morning game of shinny. Helmka, still a capable defenceman, and Leppard, one of the group’s two goaltenders. They’re perhaps not as quick or agile as they once were, but they’re still out there huffing, puffing, grinning, occasionally trash-talking.
“We’ve both played hockey our whole lives,” said Helmka. “We can still stumble around out there.”
Helmka and Leppard also share a deep connection since childhood that few can relate to. Fifty-eight years ago, the two longtime friends were on the ice when the roof of the original Listowel Memorial Arena came down, killing seven of their teammates and recreation director Kenneth McLeod.
Leppard and Helmka were just getting to the bench for a line change when the disaster took place. Their relative distance from the steel beams supporting the arena roof was likely the only thing that saved their lives that Saturday morning, Feb. 28, 1959, at 9:27 a.m.
“The guys that were coming off the ice were the lucky ones,” said Helmka.
“If you were under a beam, you were in a lot of trouble,” added Leppard, whose father Gordon was watching his peewee team’s practice along with his three-year-old nephew, who “had wanted to watch his uncle Pete play hockey” that day.
After the roof came down (later attributed to a combination of heavy overnight rains, snow buildup and poor construction practices), Gordon Leppard was able to exit the arena and make his way around the side of the building where he could get in a position to begin helping victims get clear the rubble. Pete climbed straight up and out under his own power; Murray was temporarily trapped but freed soon after.
“Dad sent me down to the hospital,” said Leppard. “I had a little cut on my head and the back of my skate was turned at a 90-degree angle. I was in between beams, I was lucky.”
“They checked me out at the hospital, they checked out my back,” said Helmka. “I could go home, so I was lucky.”
The front page of the March 5, 1959 Listowel Banner outlined the town’s darkest day in its history, as details of the Memorial Arena roof collapse and its victims were released.
After getting checked out of the hospital, Leppard, Helmka and another teammate were transported home where they were immediately put to bed. By 10:30 a.m., everyone had been pulled clear of the building. By 2:30 p.m., most of the debris had been cleared away and pushed into piles.
The visitation and funeral for McLeod, James Hastings, Kenneth Hymers, Richard Kaufman, John (Jackie) Rheubottom, Bryan Seehaver, Barry Smith and Keith Wight were held over the next two days. By Tuesday, the boys were back to school.
“That’s the way they did things in those days,” recalled Helmka of the quick turnaround.
In the days and years following the collapse, many Listowel residents who had witnessed or lived through the tragedy never spoke of it again, Leppard’s father included.
“He never mentioned it after, it was like being in the war,” said Leppard. “You just didn’t discuss it. Right up to his death he still didn’t discuss what he had done that day.”
Listowel went without an arena for five years while construction on the new Memorial Arena was planned and completed; local teams played on outdoor rinks or got ice time in neighbouring Palmerston until the new facility opened its doors in 1964.
“Listowel didn’t play hockey much for a while after that,” said Leppard. “We spent most of the time getting our asses kicked because we didn’t have the numbers that the other towns had. Plus, the guys that got killed were good hockey players.”
Helmka and Leppard still understandably get emotional recalling their teammates who didn’t get to go home from hockey practice that day. Fifty-eight years has made the subject no easier to speak about, but talking about it has aided in the healing process for Leppard.
He was present at Memorial Arena in 2009 for the 50th anniversary of the collapse; Listowel hosted a peewee tournament that weekend, which fell on the same day as the disaster half a century before. His memories of 1959 were especially vivid during that tournament.
“It was the 28th of February,” said Leppard. “I got up and came here about 9 o’clock. I watched the kids play; it was Strathroy playing somebody else. I waited until 9:27 — that’s what time the arena went down, 9:27 — and I looked at the ice surface, and nothing happened.
“Nothing was going to happen, but I still waited.”
Listowel Memorial Arena will cease active duty next month, when the Steve Kerr Memorial Complex officially opens its doors on Dec. 9. Leppard and former fellow teammate Keith Bender will be involved in the closing ceremonies at the 53-year-old rink, which will include the lowering of the 1959 memorial banner that hangs above centre ice. Listowel’s minor hockey clubs wear a similar patch on their jerseys in tribute to those who lost their lives that day.
A stone memorial and plaque commemorating the victims was also dedicated at the Listowel branch of the North Perth Public Library in 2000. Leppard said that something more should be done at the site of Memorial Arena should the municipality opt to remove it completely in the future.
“This place has changed a lot, nothing like it was then,” said Leppard outside the Memorial Arena dressing rooms on Nov. 16. “People have asked me how I feel, and I say well you should know how I feel about that ground. That is pretty precious ground. I don’t want it to be a parking lot or an apartment building or anything like that.”
“It can’t stay forever I guess, it’s too bad,” said Helmka.
Leppard and Helmka will be moving their weekly Thursday shinny to the new Steve Kerr Complex next month, the pair’s third Listowel arena over their seven decades. And every time they step on to the ice — no matter what ice it happens to be — they do it as a tribute to their friends and teammates who never had the chance to grow old playing the game they loved.
“It still hurts,” said Leppard. “Until my final day I will remember it. You can’t forget. For everybody that was there, it’s right at the front of your eyes all the time.”
