30 November 2008

Getting my money's worth

Tim from the comments--and, I should add, from a website on the history of the old Eastern Hockey League--referred me to NewspaperArchive.com, a subscription site with a plethora of newspaper clippings for me to sift through. While I sadly cannot sift through the Herald-Dispatch or Advertiser in this site, I can sift through the Charleston Gazette and Daily Mail, and have found the fate of Charleston's ice hockey exploits: their rink, Ice Sports in Kanawha City, was converted to a roller rink in 1942 as a result of the outbreak of World War 2. The preceding season, Charleston's high schools launched an ice hockey championship, complete with a sponsored trophy--the Union Fuel Trophy.

Sadly the rechristened Barlow Roller Rink met a similar fate, burning down in February 1945, only a few months before Huntington's Iceland/Arena Gardens. Luckily, they were in a new rink by July, and continued operating as such through the 1950s.

28 November 2008

Thanks Mike!

Got your DVD of Blizzard-Admirals Game 3.

In related news, I might have some YouTube goodies from the WABAC machine soon (Inserting another friendly solicitation for video materials from you crazy kids out there...)...

24 November 2008

I reckon there's more where this came from...

Big thanks to Mike (commenting in the club team thread) who put this on YouTube. He actually recorded this from the stands--caught the whole game, put this bit on YouTube. There's a 10-minute limit on videos, which is annoying and means that the game would be chopped into bits to be put up... but this is not an impossible task, particularly for preservation's sake.

18 November 2008

TV--help me out guys!

Copying most of this from a comment about TV coverage--my guy Mike there says some Blizzard games were broadcast locally on the WB affiliate (Portsmouth?). I was wondering about the broadcast angle of things in Blizzardland--I hadn't delved into that corner of things, beyond the fact that both 'RVC and 'KEE-AM carried radio broadcasts at one point or another. I know TV games were kinda sporadic--a few here or there on cable--but hadn't seen much more (admittedly, I'd been spending a lot of time immersing myself in pre-war hockey shenanigans, when there was NO television).

So to that end, while I'm digging stuff out on the microfilms, help me out! Anyone have some videos, recordings, etc. of the Blizzard (or Marshall, or older (if at all possible!)) out there?

03 November 2008

New club team?

Got this in the comments from "marhalluhockey":

"I am in the process of organizing a club hockey team for Marshall. Seems like there is a good response for it but depends on some tuff issues. Bad part is, we all know the closest ice is in Charleston but I have talked to the rink manager and he is going to help with ice time. I did not know Marhsall used to have a club team, I wish it was still going and the Blizzard was still here. I would have loved to watch them, just to young and when I got here everything was gone. If anyone has old game footage or pictures of Marshall's team and even the Blizzard I would love to see them. Anyother information that may help me bring hockey back to Marshall let me know!!"