The memorial

11/10/2013

Above is a picture of the seat sale that happened on Nov 9th 2013. I ended up buying a set of 4 for $100 to help save the memories. For those of us that grew up here this was more than a building it was the Heart of the town. It was where we gathered to watch our sons, brothers, husbands and boyfriends play hockey on the weekends. Where we went for a whole week in March to cheer for our home team play against others from around North America in the greatest Bantam Tournament; When town's people took their weeks holidays so not to miss any of the action; when high school girls would go check out the out of town hotties. It's where in the summer we would watch Wrestling and Roller Skate to local bands set up on Center Ice. It's where my sister fell during one of those nights and lost some of her teeth. It's where My kids learned to Skate and play hockey. Its where the younger siblings who ran around found the greatest hiding spots in Hide and go seek. It's where the Rose Room Dances were..You see it's far more than Cinder Blocks and Cement and Cold saturday mornings.. It is and always will be the Heart that kept georgetown more than a town, It kept us all Family!!

Mary Jane Murray It was like the heart of the town. You could skate hang out. Cheer for the cute hockey players. Scream for the senior Raiders and their antics on ice. Go up stairs and dance take numerous lessons upstairs. It was the place to be. Tournaments years of family activities. Later years it grew into many other venues for sports roller skating, ball hockey etc on and on it goes. You always did a drive by when in town. Generations met and grew up there. It is just like a family member and it will be missed.

Jack King At the Bantam Tourney , One yr , a Lady from Winnepeg... Team Coat Full of Hockey Pins ... She Looked like The Mixed up Aunt Off Of Bewitch.... But She Stoled Our hearts. Everyday... Us Rink Rats Where Cheering For Winn.... So she would Stay......Memories .

Keith Bennett Played all my minor hockey there. Worked as a rink rat. Met my future wife and mother-in-law there. Watched my 2 sons begin there skating lessons and hockey in that old barn.

Cathy Crocker-Poirier I remember roller skating there in the 80s, and ice skating there on school trips, those were the days!

Jack King You always seem to lose your Girlfrend for a Wk...

Paul Ward. waiting on cold dark mornings for jack Wilson to open the doors.....lacrosse on a dirt and dusty floor.....no pool in back of arena......cut through back of arena to get to chapel street school......buck's house on the corner,,,,,Oscar lived across the street....skating on curling rink ice...oops.......tripping over curling broom straws at public skating...... there was always public skating before raider games so raiders wouldn't trip over said broom straws......stoves in dressings rooms.....what a great skater jack kempshead was.....rabbit Rhodes...mrs pries's hot dogs.......sun shining through windows in roof....bill devorsky...pat Paterson....bocko macdonald and last but not least there WEREN'T any seats in the arena.....

Peggy Anne Barber this is where my life as a hockey daughter, sister, fan, and Mom all started ! So many great memories for sure

Nigel King what a great place, I grew up there worked there, you name it. Played hockey in that place until I was an adult. My dad coached myself and my brother's teams there for many years, helped out Norm and Hal as a conveanor. Great memories of my games being reffed by Perk or Rosco and who could forget everyones favourite fan of every team.......Johnny!!!!! AAAAAAOOOOOOOO!!! Will always miss the home of the little NHL

Shelley Perkins Burns Perk would rent the ice every yr between Christmas and New Years....cause our family just did not spend enough time there!!! lol...EVERYONE was invited to come skate/play hockey....from older relatives to cousins, friends their kids...to little ones just learning how to skate...he loved every minute of it!!

Annie Golden Crocker So many memories - skating, Bantam tournaments, roller bootin', live bands. But the best one of all was meeting my husband-to-be there!

16 Comments

Patricia

11/10/2013 05:23:43 am

It was a special time for me watching Uncle Gerry and also meeting Whipper Billy Watson and Sweet Daddy Siki still have their autographs in my autograph book

Jackie Martel

11/10/2013 05:24:45 am

The arena represents the happiest years of my teenage life. I worked with Mrs. Pries at the canteen, and also with Don Gosling and John Knight at the pool. I had a beautiful romance with someone at public skating and danced my feet off in the Rose Room. A big part of my life belongs to the Memorial. Thank God for my memories.

Shelley (Perkins) Burns

11/10/2013 06:23:21 am

From the day I was born sleeping in the goal pads in the equipment room while Dad refed....to all the roller skating, wrestling matches, ice skating,so many Bantam tournaments... Big Chills, to watching my Son play rep hockey ....to my Dad working as a rink rat....to my daughter working the canteen all the way through high school, to my son working as a rink rat....it just seeps through the veins ....she is a life time of memories for my entire family forever

Don Fendley

11/10/2013 07:14:03 am

I fell in love with a lady for the second time in my life, the first was my mother, the second (at the age of 8) was THE GRAND OLD LADY ON JOHN, a love affair that lives to this day. I loved her smell, her excitement, with her I experienced THE THRILL OF VICTORY...THE AGONY OF DEFEAT, through her I found wonderful friendships that have lasted a life time. We Danced, we Roller-skated, we watched fine athletes, some went on to Stardom, we watched the early days of professional wrestling...it is a love that will never day. You were an amazing Lady, I will miss you...

Teri Jane Moffatt

11/10/2013 07:28:34 am

I can remember roller skating here in the summer and took swimming lesson's outback at the pool - it seems as though it should have been looked after and used for hockey for the little ones - other communities are trying to hang onto the old arenas while we are dismantling ours

Kathy Brook <KING>

11/10/2013 08:20:11 am

The Memorial.
So many great Memories.
Watching the Bantam Tournament. Watching all my brothers play Hockey there. Dad coaching a team. Don Fendley as his assistant coach.
Working at one of my first jobs. Taking tickets for the ice skating and for Rollerskating nights.
I would have a pair of skates on in my booth , waiting for the last half hour and no money was collected and I could go out and skate.
We had dances afterwards with local bands playing.
The Topics, Deadbeats, Stationhouse.... to name a few.
It the place where you were dared to stick your tongue on the post...and we all did.
The Rinkrats,,,,my great bosses.
Johhny Knight, Doug Vivian and Don & Ian Gosling.
Falling in love....
Hot chocolate , and string licorice at the little Booth with Gail Pries & her Mother

Kathy Parent(magno)

11/10/2013 08:21:09 am

was supposed to be babysitting on first friday night of bantam tourney(15 yrs old)told them I needed to go as my dad got sick,(so not true)lol..went down to the tourney to watch the game with Chris Bryant(hale)Colleen Rundell..was home free till...Colleen got hit with a puck above the eye and needed stitches...parents were called, not happy....so busted..lol..Good times..great memories..

Joe Letts

11/10/2013 09:57:02 am

So many great memories that keep giving back 50 years later. Taught myself to swim in the Georgetown Pool and went on to become the youngest scuba instructor in Canada, still active, ran a dive shop above the old Bank Building in Georgetown, Lett's Dive!! Learned to play hockey in the old arena and years later watched my Son play there too! Played the Rose Room with our bands more Friday nights than I can remember. Outcasts, Five Outcasts, Ides of March. Made lifelong friends there. Played many Battles of the Bands there with The Tombstones from Owen Sound, The Deadbeats (Dave Booth, Gene Rosher (sp?)), The Topix, The Nitrons, Blues Incorporated (Bill Mckeown) and many more. My lead singer days in the Rose Room still let's me jam on any stage or take a prize on Karaoke nights the world over even today. I can still see Mr. Ramautarsingh our history teacher walking into the Friday night dances still in his suit coming right up front to the stage, listening to us and between sets reassuringly telling us, "you're good!". Played roller skating with the bands on Saturday night. Can still hear Bob Barber on keyboards next to me playing the keyboard riff to Morrison's Light My Fire. We'd come away from those nights with our hair and gear white with concrete dust from the floor and those steel wheels going round and round. Can only imagine what my lungs looked like! It was where everyone would gather. Oh to put the band together again for one last gig in the Rose Room before she's gone.....farewell old friend.

Tom Dalziel

2/19/2021 12:26:04 pm

Joe,
I'm starting to put together my history and found your note. I absolutely loved to skate to your music. Mick Jagger had nothing on you. I can still hear the sound of the Lesley winding up for Bob's solos and Gig Hillock hammering away at the drums.

Life was good.

I hope you are still around and well.

Tom Dalziel

Nigel King

11/10/2013 12:39:35 pm

I moved to Georgetown from Brampton in 1985, I was 11 years old. My 2nd year of organized hockey was played in that arena. I played there until the moved midget players to the Alcott. I worked there for 2 years as a teenager as a Rink Rat , patrolling public skating, shoveling the end of the rink after the zamboni cleared the ice, clearing goal crease, removing the post magnets etc. Love that place, scored my first goal there as a kid, first hockey fight there, met some of the best friends in the world at that very rink, Christian Febel, Josh Barber, Dougie Crawford and many more. Svored my last goal there as well as an adult Beer League player. What a great place.

Al Densmore

11/11/2013 02:59:10 am

Laying on the ice in the net after being knocked out with a shot (masks were nothing more than a hunk of plastic stuck to your face then) at the Bantam tournament in the semi finals. Woke up to Normy Lockhurst smiling and saying "at least ya stopped it". We lost to 2 or 3-1 and missed our chance to win the whole tournament. Winning an Ontario championship in that arena. and Paul that was when there were no seats and everyone stood because it was to bloody cold to sit.

Scott Mackay

2/13/2014 10:33:16 am

I would really like to buy seat #16 if anybody has it and would be willing to let it go.
I watched my son grow up on this ice and 16 was his # ,it would mean the world to me to have this to remember all the times we shared father and son at the rink!

2/13/2014 10:35:39 am

Contact me at scott29mackay@yahoo.ca if you can help.
Thank you.

Rick Knight

7/26/2014 09:26:37 pm

I still can't believe they tore it down, this old building was Georgetown. When I look at the pictures It brings back so many emotions and I can actually smell the place. There are no heritage buildings preserved in town and what better building to make a heritage site. If it was no longer viable as a usable arena they still could of left it standing and not put the ice in to save money. It could have been used for concerts and events or even just mothballed. I would give anything to be sitting in the center of the end balcony with my Dad and brother watching the Raiders on a Friday night one more time.

Ian Gosling

4/18/2017 01:38:31 pm

I hung out at Memorial Arena from 1961 to 1970. I worked there and played there. Mind you, I was lucky, my Dad was the manager. I can remember the dances in the Rose Room on Friday nights which sometimes got a little wild. I was too young to be attending in the early 1960's and by the time I was old enough they had stopped having them.
I also remember Georgetown Raider Intermediate hockey very well, always on Friday evening start time at 8:30 PM from the late '50's into the early 1960's and then in the mid '60's we had the Junior "C" Beavers who generally played on Sunday afternoons. Play-off games against Milton were something of legend. It was like the entire population of Georgetown and Milton stuffed into a Bell Telephone booth. People were literally hanging off the rafters. The fire department was not amused.
I played minor hockey too. I wanted to be good enough to play in the NHL but that wasn't happening. Some opposing players would sail by me so fast I'd get wind burn on my face but I still dreamed about drinking from the Stanley Cup someday. (It took my numb skull quite some time to realize I wasn't the next Frank Mahovlich.) But looking back, the important thing was not how good or bad I was, but that I did my best with what God gave me and I had a lot of fun doing it.
Public skating was 3 to 5 and 7 to 9 on Saturdays. I think we had skating during the week too. I just can't remember anymore. Roller skating was introduced in 1965 and by the following year it was a very hot item. We had live bands on Saturday nights and when they went for a break there was hit music playing over the PA system. I can still hear "California Sun" by The Rivieras.
Another thing we used to have was pro wrestling every summer. We had all the big names of the day too, like Sweet Daddy Siki, Whipper Watson, the Kalmikov Brothers (Ivan, Carol & Nikita), Dick "Bulldog" Brower etc. You name 'em, we had 'em.
At least two major renovations took place in the 1960's. In the summer of 1963, all the old green wooden bench seats, which had been there likely since the place was built, were replaced with new individual wooden chairs on a concrete base. Then in the summer of 1968 the entire lobby was gutted and redone. Also in mid 1967 we finally got a Zamboni which drastically reduced the number of rink rats needed. (Even then technology was eliminating jobs.)
Then when I wasn't looking, a funny thing happened. The years suddenly rolled by and eventually I was out to work and I stopped visiting Memorial. Life changes, you grow up, get married and have kids. But I'd give anything to live those years again. They were easily the best years of my life. I'll never forget the people I met there and the friends I made there.
Love to you all.

gene roshier

12/7/2018 11:50:52 am

just reading some of the comments floods my brain with memories of those great times. I loved growing up on Churchill Crescent where winter freezing rain would enable a huge road hockey game, and the artesian spring behind McFarlanes' turned into a stream that flowed under the main street. So fortunate. Thanks Georgetown.

The memorial

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