The Stanley Cup, awarded annually to the best team in the National Hockey League, is the oldest trophy in professional sports. And whether you like hockey or not, we bet you’ll find the cup’s history fascinating.
Lord Arthur Frederick Stanley of Preston, England, son of the 14th Earl of Derby, was appointed Governor-General of the Dominion of Canada in 1888. When he arrived in the country he brought his seven ice-skating sons with him. They fell in love with the rough-and-tumble game of hockey and went on to become some of the best players of their time.
Nineteen-year-old Arthur Stanley and his brother Algy nagged their father for support in organizing the game into teams and leagues, and for a trophy to show as “an outward and visible sign of the ice hockey championship.” Dad finally came through. At a dinner for the Ottawa Amateur Athletic Association on March 18, 1892, a member of the Governor-General’s staff, Lord Kilcoursie (also a hockey player), made this announcement on behalf of Lord Stanley:
I have for some time been thinking that it would be a good thing if there were a challenge cup which should be held from year to year by the champion hockey team in the Dominion. There does not appear to be any such outward sign of a championship at present, and considering the general interest which matches now elicit, and the importance of having the game played fairly and under rules generally recognized, I am willing to give a cup which shall be held from year to year by the winning team.
Lord Stanley instructed an aide in England to order a gold-lined silver bowl to be used as the trophy. The bowl measured 7½ inches high and 11½ inches in diameter, and cost about $50. Original name: Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup. But everyone called it the Lord Stanley Cup.
Stanley appointed two trustees and outlined some conditions:
• The winners are to return the Cup promptly when required by the trustees in order that it may be handed over to any other team which may win it.
• Each winning team is to have the club name and year engraved on a silver ring fitted on the Cup.
• The Cup is to remain a challenge competition and not the property of any one team, even if won more than once.
• The trustees are to maintain absolute authority in all disputes over the winner of the Cup.
• A substitute trustee will be named in the event that one of the existing trustees drops out.
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The boys got their trophy, and the game of hockey grew in popularity. But, ironically, they never got to play for it, and Lord Stanley, the father of organized hockey, never saw a Stanley Cup game. In July 1893, Stanley’s brother died and Stanley was called back to England to become the 16th Earl of Derby. He never returned to watch a game for the trophy that bore his name.
Lord Stanley had the trustees present the trophy the first year, 1893, to the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association, which had won an ameteur tournament. Then they arranged for an actual championship game between his hometown Ottawa team and Toronto. But the game never took place.
Ottawa was considered the best team, but the trustees insisted they play a “challenge game” since it was a “challenge cup.” They also insisted that the game be played in Toronto. Ottawa refused to do it. So the trustees declared the Montreal AAA the first Stanley Cup champions in 1893 without a playoff.
The first official Stanley Cup playoff game took place on March 22, 1894, when Ottawa challenged Montreal in the Montreal Victoria Arena before 5,000 fans. Montreal got to keep the Cup, winning the game 3–1.
Lord Stanley’s announcement and his order of a small silver cup would mark the beginning of what would become Canada’s national sport…and a game still played internationally more than a century later.
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