Reprinted with permission by author Jim Jones
The following is an in-depth recollection of the history of the Conquest Merchants senior hockey team, the local community rink, and the annual Shrimp Feed event; three things that have tied the people of the village of Conquest close for generations. Written by Jim Jones, a former native with many family ties to the community who today serves as the chief administrative officer of the City of Swift Current, what follows may stir up some memories in some of our readers, and perhaps open the eyes of others to a piece of cherished history in the local area.
My true boyhood ambition was to play for the Conquest Merchants. I grew up in a community that had a senior hockey and fastball team and those memories have shaped my life ever since.
Thursday, March 28, 2024, will be Fifty (50) years for the annual Conquest Fan Appreciation Night and Shrimp Feed in Conquest, Saskatchewan, a village of 150, sixty miles southwest of Saskatoon.
My childhood heroes were Cliff McMillan, Richie McIntosh, and Gordie Smarsh. When Cliff (our next door neighbour) returned home to play for a new team in town, as the primary tenant of the newly built arena in Conquest, I was there as a 10–12-year-old fighting the Larocque boys, and my brothers for our neighbors’ broken sticks, used equipment, pucks, and memories.
Richie was a goaltender, sporting a mask built by my local dentist Neil Munro who had moved away from home as a stopper for hire for some very good Ituna and Balcarres Bronco Senior hockey teams at a time when the paying of import players by senior hockey teams was becoming the norm. Richie became my summertime boss at Central Construction and made hard cement construction work fun. He later moved home and played with the Merchants and through a few tough years, backstopped them to championships in the Wheatbelt Hockey league.
Gordie was a friend of Cliff McMillan’s, a defenseman with a slapshot that parted the players net front in fear of the puck hitting them. A very large, gregarious looking man, whose brother Dalton was a running back for the U of A Golden Bears Football team and a Rider draft pick, joined the Merchants wearing #4. As a 12-year-old I was in the far end goal judge booth when Smarsh scored his first goal in Merchant silks.
He moved in from the left point towards the top of the circles, lifted his stick skyward and unleashed a shot that had the goalie cringing on release and impact. As he let go of the shot, his momentum caused his loss in balance, and he went skidding towards the net like a bowling ball heading for the kingpin. As the goalie made the save much to his surprise, Smarsh collided with the netkeeper pushing him into the net and I had to turn the light on.
I had to! The puck was over the line. Norman Joyes, the father of Gary, David, Terry, Neil, and Linda was one of the only referees around. He put his hand on his close to the block brush cut, wiping away the frost from his hairline and yelled up to me, “Jim, was that puck in the net?” I said, “Yes it was.” Gordie looked up at me, gave me the thumbs up and said, "Right on.” Linesman Dick Neve agreed, and the goal was allowed. Smarsh started a celebration that took him carrying three or four of his teammates towards the Merchant bench, culminating in a team hug at their bench. It was his first goal ever in Senior Hockey. On the shot, he broke his stick in half, midway up the shaft. All I could think about was getting down from the goal judge booth to get that stick.
Once a thriving community of close to three hundred (300) this small sporting community has continued with the event, as a fundraiser to help them operate the natural ice arena, even though neither the Conquest Merchants Senior Hockey team, nor any minor hockey team for that matter has called this arena home for some time, it has carried on the tradition in support of keeping the doors open.
The annual “Shrimp Feed” has been a staple for the community. A celebration of the Merchants team success, an at-home feast of shrimp, oysters, marinated deer steak, garlic toast and French fries served up with a band or taped music that traditionally played into the night and early morning.
While some events take off rapidly due to a combination of effective planning and promotion, others require more time to build momentum. The Fan Appreciation Night/Shrimp Feed has led the league in guest experience for half a decade.
This has been a not to miss date for many years and the 50th year celebration should be no different.
As indicated, the Conquest Merchants were a team organized in and around 1972 coinciding with the opening of a brand-new wood arch rib arena across the street and just south of the first Conquest arena. It was built in 1972 and attached itself to a two-sheet natural curling rink built as a 1967 Celebration in Saskatchewan.
The Merchants were a huge success. Named after the many business owners in the community with each jersey sponsored by a local Merchant. Sask. Wheat Pool, Sibbald Motors and Lynda’s Beauty Salon put their money up to ensure the team was a success and these hometown boys never disappointed.
The desire to come back home and play in a new rink, organized by local community volunteer folk with the desire to assist in fundraising in support of the team. The team had immediate success in the old Wheatbelt Hockey League that featured teams from Perdue, Rosetown, Zealandia and Harris.
This was a team that was every piece of the community. Players from outside the small village immediately became part of the community. Recognized in the Merchants Hotel, getting gas at J.B McRae’s or Sibbald Motors, buying tape, mix or chips at the Shop Rite, jumping out of their cars to play ten or fifteen minutes of road hockey with Merchant wannabee’s these players made the rink the place to be, and the kids dragged their parents to every home game and some on the road.
Over the years the Executive has included the likes of Fred Lemon, Stan McAdam, Russ Amy, Doug Ball, Ron Amy, Floyd Derdall, Adrienne Lockwood, Norma Larocque, and many others.
Originating players like Les and Randy Lemon, Arnie Wyatt, Gordie Smarsh, Doug Lemon, Glen Fry, Buck Blandford, Dwight Moerike, Terry McAdam, Grant Richards, Larry Grier, Sam Amy, Ken and Richie McIntosh, Elgin and Wendell Amy, Garth Ramsay, Brian and Morley Sinclair, Pat McAdam, Lloyd Tyler and later Terry Joyes, Darrell Starling, and Jim Kilmister.
Conquest punched above its weight class always. After several successful years in the Wheatbelt Hockey league they moved to the Coteau Hills League and then to the Saskatchewan Valley Hockey League.
The popularity of the team did not allow for youth at the time and many younger players in their teens headed to Delisle to play Jr. B hockey with the Bruins.
Three Jones boys, Doug, Jim and Bob, Jeff McAdam, Neil, David and Terry Joyes, Lindsay Ogilvie, Mitch McAdam, Alden Friesen, and Dwaine Moerike. They would all come back to play for the Merchants, first in the playoffs and later as they aged out of the junior ranks.
Hometown heroes winning championships, actually getting their sticks paid for, painting all their helmets flat black, curving their sticks, building their own team dressing room, working the phone lines in the summer talking to past acquaintances from Jr. teams gone by, getting in better shape than was normally expected, refusing to lose, and celebrating annually at the Shrimp Feed in front of the best fans in all of Saskatchewan.
The history of this long-standing event can not be complete without the tragic day in January of 1980, when the wood arch Conquest Arena burnt to the ground. The Merchants history could have stopped right there. But it didn’t – Community kept it alive.
ARENA BURNS TO THE GROUND
The fire call came in at about 11:20 am and by 12:00 noon the rafters were burning from end to end. By 12:15 the rafters were down and only part of the north wall was standing.
Sitting at my kitchen table in Humboldt, Saskatchewan, home from lunch from my job at Revelstoke lumber, I answered our phone to hear my Mom on the other end of the line. She said, “the rink is burning to the ground.” I was playing my 20-year-old season with the Humboldt Broncos and the news from home made me sick to my stomach.
The speed of the fire and the swiftness of its destruction was incredible.
All that remained after one hour were cement foundations of the wooden structure and fragments of the 32 granite curling rocks which exploded in the fire, twisted remnants of kitchen appliances, and an array of evenly spaced mercury vapor lamps which fell from the arena ceiling.
Reeve of the RM of Fertile Valley Fred Lemon was the first to notice the blaze. He arrived at the rink to check the hockey schedule and noticed what he thought was the smell of burning cardboard. He asked Dan Kennedy and Terry Fletcher who had been skating if they could smell smoke. All of them thought that maybe the arena caretaker Dennis Larocque, was just burning garbage.
Larocque was working in the curling rink, so the explanation made sense. A fairly strong wind was blowing from the northeast, but the smell got stronger.
Then Lemon noticed flames coming out under the exit lights at the west end of the arena basement – right under the room that the electrical panels were situated.
The lights went out in the building, Kennedy, and Fletcher who were taking off their skates thought someone was playing a joke on them. Lemon yelled down to them that they better get the hell out of the basement, and fast. The fire spread so quickly that they both abandoned their coats and shoes, worked their way to the ice surface and out through a hole in the arena wall that housed large fans that were used in the spring to keep the ice. Kennedy had one skate on and one off.
Larocque went out the curling rink door after the lights went out. Lemon headed out through the arena’s main entrance and raced to the Merchants Hotel to call the volunteer fire department. By that time, the whole arena was on fire. Outlook Fire Department was dispatched but by the time they showed up both departments had to stand down and just ensure that the fire did not jump to other buildings across the street and into Ken Lockwood’s field or the Elks Sportsgrounds.
It appeared that the fire broke out in the Electrical room as a short in the main lead line into the building. The wind sucked the fire through the rest of the building in a matter of minutes.
About forty (40) school children were scheduled to skate in the arena less than an hour after the fire was first spotted.
A temporary outdoor rink was built to allow the local kids a skating opportunity and many of the surrounding communities offered up ice time for the Conquest teams for the remainder of that year.
A meeting was called for January 27th, 1980, for the purpose of deciding whether or not to organize the community in a fundraising campaign to build another arena.
Over one hundred and thirty-five (135) people showed up for the meeting. Mayor Lorne Porter was nominated as the chairman of the newly proposed Conquest Community Centre – aptly named the ABC Centre – Ardath, Bounty and Conquest.
Insurance coverage for the burned facility came in at $72,000 and the Arena had about $16,000 on hand for operations.
A Culture and Youth grant was also available at $30 per capital and if approved by the Village and the RM, it would equate to about $20,000.
A finance and Building committee were set up to begin discussion on the plans for a new hockey and curling facility.
The finance committee was set as follows: Dan Kennedy, Shirley Fletcher, Neil Munro, Bill Jones, Doug Turner, Fred Clarke, Earl Ogilvie, Shirley Porter, Clarence Rafoss, and Fred Harrison.
The Building and Planning Committee included Bob Fletcher, Ken McIntosh, Terry Fletcher, Cec McAdam, Blair Sinclair, Doug Sibbald, Herman Hendricks, Don McRae, Lorne Porter, Bea Dallas, Carmen Kennedy, and Joan Munro.
Preliminary Costs for the new facility were estimated at approximately $350,000.
Exactly one year from the date of the fire that ripped through the community, the Merchants had its first game in the new arena. The ice surface was there, parts of the waiting room and building were not, but it allowed the Senior Team to play out of their own arena, one more time.
The first games played in the new Conquest Arena were eventful. A sense of terrific pride by all that had worked so hard to fundraise, build and plan for the new facility were replaced with horrific fear once again when fuses for the Arena blew flooding smoke in the not finished hockey dressing rooms in the basement of the new building. This forced a panicked evacuation that brought back simmering memories of a year previous.
A few rums and ryes were downed that night as many closed their eyes in fear of starting all over once again.
THE BUILD
Dan Kennedy and Bob Fletcher became local area farmers that led the build. They coordinated the work load every day based on who showed up. The new rink build was the place to be.
Local area farmers would do their chores in the morning, then head to the rink and work there until five pm. From there they would head to the Merchants Hotel, and each would throw ten dollars into the pot in the center of the table, and they would have a drink on the day then leave for whatever they needed to do at home, with their families or in the community.
Local Merchants Hotel bar owners Keith and Louise Skutchings kept the money from the tables that was left over at the end of the night, put it in a jar and when the Rink opened for operation, they provided a free night that included a meal and free drinks for anyone that helped in any way, rebuild the rink and the community.
What a celebration that was.
THE SHRIMP FEED
The shrimp feed flourished in the community from that point forward. The annual celebration of more than just a hockey team, but the community. Everyone came. Surrounding fans, local folk, cavalcades of cars from Saskatoon. The Shrimp feed never disappointed.
Today it still carries on. Far less people to celebrate, no Merchant awards night as part of the event just a community get together that helps keeps the lights on in the community (rink). With no teams playing regularly in the facility, there is no revenue generated to operate the facility. Steak Nights, hamburger, and fries’ night, Superbowl parties, and weddings are now part of the mettle of the facility, but it stands forty-four years proud, a million-dollar facility built by the community.
I have been proud to attend the weddings of my niece Megan and her husband Ryan and my son Jordy and his wife Kennedy, in that Rink. Billy and Lynne Jones and their son’s Darren, Mark and Brent, a huge part of the history of the Merchants have been there for it all. Cooking meals, tending bar, taking tickets, coordinating steak nights, purchasing a used Zamboni from community connections, and just carrying on.
Jordy, Kennedy, Darren, and Darren’s wife Tracey still sit on the Rink Committee. Kevin Lockwood, Lindsay Kokesh, Bob Silverthorn, Jeff McAdam, Lloyd Tyler, and others have formed part of an executive that over the years fundraised for capital improvements for the Arena and have kept the lights on. Stan McAdam always concerned with the power bill would turn down the furnace every time he entered the rink. Stan was a hard man to say no to and if he tapped any one of us that were his hockey disciples over a seventeen-year span as our coach, we were expected to help out.
When I had a six-year sabbatical on the farm at Ardath, I was proud to head up a group of local area volunteers that took turns to run the building once every four weeks. Les Lemon, Ken Lockwood, Wayne Spence, Neil McCutcheon, and others formed our crew and it always started with a deep clean from the past week, coordinated efforts during the day, finding a Zamboni driver, or someone that could fix something that had become broken.
Anyone that knows me would know that I am the coordinator and not the fixer. We had fun. It had to be, or people would not show up. It culminated in a rum or a rye in the Zamboni room for those who stuck around each night. Building Team and not even knowing it. I do not think I ever thanked those people on my crew who never said no when I called.
In the early nineties, my son Cory learned to skate there. Always a willing participant, he would accompany me to the rink in the afternoon as I cleaned up, and he would head out onto the ice by himself with a broken silver Easton hockey stick that was cut off when defenceman Terry Neith of the Merchants broke it in a game and threw it over the boards.
Coming full circle, Cory always bragged as a 5-year-old that he had Terry Neith’s broken stick. He was no Cliff McMillan but just the same, it was an aluminum stick, cut in half just his size, and completing the circle started by his Dad many years earlier.
If the rink had burned down three years later, the re-construction may never have happened.
The Shrimp Feed is a signature event for not only the community but for all in the area. The onetime fierce rivalry between the Conquest Merchants and the Outlook Comets, that by many wives and girlfriends alike would tell you, was safer on the ice than in the stands, has dissipated.
Fueled by the Outlook Ice Hawks comradery heading to the Senior B Provincial Championships now in the rear-view mirror, the rivalry which was at one time akin to the Battle of Alberta, and all out hate between the Edmonton Oilers and the Calgary Flames, the Shrimp Feed becomes less of an end of the year banquet and more of Celebration of Life for those players and community members that have experienced it before.
The Larry Grier Memorial Trophy that I was fortunate enough to win two times and presented by Margaret and Hank Grier and carried on by their daughter Diane and her husband Myles for many years, sits empty of names for some time now.
The Community made every rush up the ice with Cliff McMillan, Brian Sinclair, Neil Joyes and Gordie Cannon, they where the flex in the stick of every shot by Jim Jones, Doug Jones, Garth Ramsey, Arliss Preus and Jeff McAdam, they made every save with Ken McIntosh, Richie McIntosh, Kevin Lockwood, Colin Larocque and Kim Decorby, they were involved with every goal mouth scramble with Terry Joyes, Robbie Clark, Duane Morerike and Tim Climenhaga and they helped throw every punch by Alden Friesen, Maury Decorby, and Kenny Ross.
I am missing so many others and it makes it so difficult to talk about. They were my friends and teammates, my brother Bob, and Doug’s teammates, they were players that made Conquest their home like the Wytrykusz’s, Mike, Steve, and Danny. There were lifers…. Barry Barton, Chris Kennedy, Connor Ogilvie, Rory Jones, Ellison Krismer, Clay Ogilvie, Kirk McCutcheon, Kevin and Barry Derdall, Terry McAdam, Arnie Wyatt, and Lloyd Tyler.
Make the time if you can be there. There may not be many more.
Experience the fun that half a lifetime can bring. Head back home, because if you played there for a year or more, it is home. There may be a few more grey hairs, some added weight, limps, aches and pains, hearing aids and glasses but the rum and rye will never taste better.
I hope to see you there. And I hope that we can do our best to send you home, remembering the great people, and place that make the community.
With any luck, someone may break their stick and it will add another twenty years of celebrating Fan Appreciation Night and the Conquest Shrimp Feed.
Thursday, March 28th
Conquest Rink
Tickets $30 in advance - etransfer - [email protected]
Happy Hour - 5:30 - 6:30 pm
Hot Stove League Discussion of those that lived it.
Live Band at 9:00 pm - Seven Mile Sun
Tickets from any Rink Board member
Please pass on to every former Conquest Merchant, Executive, Coach, Manager, spectator, and referee. We would love to see you. Advance Tickets only from Rink Board Executive. Bring your skates, memories and appetite. Come support the Community and Rink.
Ask Shnerd about the weather, figure out how many times Russ Wyatt had to duck out of the way from a slap shot in the goal judge booth, how old was Terry Joyes underwear, what number was Pat McAdam, and who was Smog?
Once a Merchant, always a Merchant - Player, Executive or Fan.
