Arthur Howey Ross (January 13, 1885 – August 5, 1964) was a Canadian professional ice hockey player and executive from 1905 until 1954. Regarded as one of the best defenders of his era by his peers, he was one of the first to skate with the puck up the ice rather than pass it to a forward. He was on Stanley Cup championship teams twice in a playing career that lasted thirteen seasons; in January 1907 with the Kenora Thistles and 1908 with the Montreal Wanderers. Like other players of the time, Ross played for several different teams and leagues, and is noted for his time with the Wanderers while they were members of the National Hockey Association (NHA) and its successor, the National Hockey League (NHL). In 1911, he led one of the first organized player strikes over increased pay. When the Wanderers' home arena burned down in January 1918, the team ceased operations and Ross retired as a player.
After several years as an on-ice official, he was named head coach of the Hamilton Tigers for one season. When the Boston Bruins were formed in 1924, Ross was hired as the first coach and general manager of the team. He later coached the team on three occasions until 1945, and stayed as general manager until his retirement in 1954. Ross helped the Bruins finish first place in the league ten times and win the Stanley Cup three times; Ross personally coached the team to two of those victories. After being hired by the Bruins, Ross, along with his wife and two sons, moved to a suburb of Boston, and he became an American citizen in 1938. He died near Boston in 1964.
Outside of his association with the Bruins, Ross also helped to improve the game. He created a style of hockey puck still used today, and advocated an improved style of goal nets, a change that lasted forty years. In 1947, Ross donated the Art Ross Trophy, awarded to the leading scorer of the NHL regular season. Ross was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1949.
Early life Arthur Howey Ross was born on January 13, 1885, in Naughton, Ontario. His father, Thomas Barnston Ross, was of Scottish descent and originally from Chicoutimi, Quebec, while his mother was Marguerite (Margaret) McLeod. Ross's parents initially lived in Lake St. John, Quebec (now Lac Saint-Jean), where Thomas worked for the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC). The family had ten children: nine sons and one daughter. Around 1876, Thomas was transferred to a trading post in Northern Ontario close to the Whitefish Lake. Living in a remote outpost, the family would trek each way twice a year for supplies.
Ross spent his early years at the trading post and first learned to skate on the nearby lake. He grew up speaking English, and was taught French by his mother, and later in life claimed he knew Ojibwe and Montagnais. In 1892, the family moved back to Lake St. John, though Margaret left Thomas in 1895, and moved back to Ontario with her younger children. She married Peter McKenzie, who was the Chief Factor for HBC in the region (and thus Thomas's superior) in 1895. They moved again in 1896, settling in the affluent Westmount district of Montreal. Thomas also re-married, and by 1904 was living in Victoria, British Columbia, where he died in 1930.
In Montreal, Ross attended Westmount Academy, and became active in a variety of sports, though he was best at hockey and Canadian football (which was still very similar to rugby football at the time). He likely first played organized hockey in the 1900–01 season, joining the Westmount Amateur Athletic Association. With this club, he first met the brothers Lester and Frank Patrick, both of whom were later inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame. Ross and Lester had a financially successful ticket resale business at the Montreal Arena, buying tickets for thirty-five cents and selling them for up to a dollar.
Playing career 1905–09
The best hockey players on their high school team, Ross and the Patrick brothers were invited to play occasional games for local league teams in Montreal. Ross first played in a senior league in 1905, joining Montreal Westmount of the Canadian Amateur Hockey League (CAHL), the top amateur league in Canada. He scored ten goals in eight games during the season. His opponents regarded him as one of the best-rushing defencemen. Most defenders at the time either shot the puck down the ice or passed to a forward; in contrast, Ross skated up the ice, taking the puck into the offensive zone. Later that year, wishing to pursue a career in banking, he moved to Brandon, Manitoba, where he joined the Brandon Wheat City Hockey Club of the Manitoba Hockey League, the senior league in the province. In 1906, his first season, he scored six goals in seven games while he recorded six goals in ten games in 1907. Around this time, the Kenora Thistles, the Manitoba League champions, wanted to strengthen their team for the Stanley Cup challenge against the Montreal Wanderers in Montreal during January 1907. They paid Ross $1,000 to play both matches, a common practice at the time, and the Thistles won the Cup. While failing to score, Ross started many plays and proved an important part of the team. Although he played for the opposing team, he received a good reception from the Montreal crowd. Ross did not play for the Thistles when the two teams played for the Cup again in March, which the Wanderers won to take back the Cup.
The following year Ross moved back to Montreal. He joined the Wanderers, the team he had helped to defeat, who played in the Eastern Canada Amateur Hockey Association (ECAHA), the successor league to the CAHL as the premier league in the country. He scored eight goals in ten games over the two-month season that lasted from January to March. He helped the team to finish first in the ECAHA and retain the Cup in 1908 with challenges from Ottawa, Winnipeg and Toronto. The Wanderers were Cup champions throughout these challenges, so Ross became the second player to win the Cup with different teams in consecutive years, after Jack Marshall in 1901 and 1902. In January 1908, he participated in the first all-star game in sports history, a benefit for the family of former Wanderer defender Hod Stuart, who died the previous summer. Aside from his time with the Wanderers, Ross repeated his practice of playing for other teams who paid for his services in important matches. For the 1909 season Ross demanded a salary of $1,600. Although he settled for $1,200, the average salary of hockey players at the time was $600. Ross received a cash bonus of $400 to play in a Stanley Cup challenge against a team from Edmonton in December 1908, in which the Wanderers won the two-game, total-goal series 13–10. He finished the season with two goals in nine games.
1909–18
A new league, the Canadian Hockey Association (CHA), was formed in late November 1909. One of the teams, the All-Montreal Hockey Club, hired Ross as a playing manager, but the league only lasted until mid-January 1910 before disbanding. Ross, who scored four goals in four games in the CHA, then signed with the Haileybury Comets of the National Hockey Association (NHA), a league formed in December 1909, which proved to be the stronger replacement to the ECAHA as the highest level of hockey in Canada. He received $2,700 to play in the 1910 season, which lasted from January to March, playing twelve games for the team and finishing with six goals. Before the following season, the NHA imposed a salary cap of $5,000 per team. The players, including Ross, were unhappy as this would result in a pay decrease, and began looking to form their league without a cap. Ross wrote to the Montreal Herald, stating "all the players want is a fair deal ... The players are not trying to bulldoze the NHA, but we want to know where we get off at." The plans were abandoned when they realized all the suitable arenas would be unavailable as they were owned or leased by the NHA. Ross scored four goals in eleven games with the Wanderers, who finished fourth in the five-team league. During a match against the Quebec Bulldogs on February 25, 1911, Ross knocked out Eddie Oatman in a fight, provoking a massive brawl between the two teams, which the police had to break up. The fight helped to increase the reputation Ross had as a tough player unwilling to back down from any opponent. The following season Ross had eleven goals in nineteen games as the Wanderers improved to second in the league.
Before the 1913–14 NHA season, Ross refused to sign a contract for the Wanderers, requesting a salary increase. As one of the top players on the team, the Wanderers agreed to his demands of $1,500 for the forthcoming season, in which he finished with four goals and nine points in eighteen games. The next season Ross, again concerned with his salary, began negotiating with other players in the NHA to leave their teams and form a new league that would offer higher wages. These actions resulted in his suspension in November 1914 by Emmett Quinn, president of the NHA. Ross responded by declaring himself a free agent and claiming his contract with the Wanderers was no longer valid. Consequently, although having no technical power to do so, Quinn suspended Ross from all organized hockey. The proposed new league failed to materialize and Ross applied for reinstatement to the NHA, which was granted at a meeting of the team owners on December 18, 1914. The owners realized if they suspended Ross, they would also have to suspend all those he signed, hurting the league. However, Ross's actions led to his release by the Wanderers. At first he trained with the Montreal Canadiens, then joined the Ottawa Senators.
After the 1914–15 season, the Senators and Wanderers finished with identical records of fourteen wins and six losses. A two-game, total goal series was played to determine the NHA league champion who would contest the Stanley Cup with the Pacific Coast Hockey Association winner, the Vancouver Millionaires. Ross, who finished with three goals in sixteen games in the season, scored one goal in the first match against the Wanderers, a Senators 4–0 victory, and though Ottawa lost the second game 1–0, they won the series, 4–1. To help the Senators stop the Wanderers, who were known for their speed, Ross created a new system of defence. Termed "kitty bar the door", it required three defenders to align themselves across the ice 30 feet in front of the goaltender to stop offensive rushes. This style of defence would later be used in a modified version known as the neutral zone trap, later used widely to stop opposition offensive chances.
The following year Ross, who had eight goals and eight assists in twenty-one games, was the second highest-paid player on the team; his salary of $1,400 was $100 less than Frank Nighbor made. Even so, Ross left the team in 1916, returning to Montreal to look after his sporting goods store, and rejoining the Wanderers. He scored six goals and had two assists in sixteen games for the team.
The Wanderers, along with the Montreal Canadiens, Toronto Arenas, Quebec Bulldogs, and Ottawa Senators dissolved the NHA and founded the National Hockey League (NHL) in November 1917. Before the start of the season, Ross was named coach of the Wanderers, in addition to playing for the team. He played in the first game in NHL history on December 19, 1917, in which the Wanderers defeated the Toronto Arenas 10–9, in Montreal; Ross earned the league's first penalty during the game and also scored his first and only NHL goal. A fire on January 2, 1918, destroyed their home, the Montreal Arena, and forced them to fold after four games. However, the NHL insisted the team continue to play, and recorded two additional scheduled matches as defaulted losses for the Wanderers, even though the matches were not played. With the Wanderers disbanded, Ross retired as a player. His NHL career yielded one goal in three games played.
Managerial career 1918–36