Blackhawk on a horse at Diversey and the Lake Shore Path
In 1892, Lord Frederick Arthur Stanley, 16th Earl of Derby and then Governor General of Canada gave a gift of a championship trophy to annually be awarded to the top amateur team in Canada. The generously sized bowl shaped trophy would eventually become known as the Stanley Cup, and the rest is history.
What Lord Stanley didn’t envision is that his present in 1892 would become the most fiercely coveted and ostensibly charming trophy in the entire world of sports. This does not mean to diminish the significance of the years of sacrifice that go into earning an Olympic Gold Medal or the perfect ensemble of talent and character needed to win a championship in any major sport. Whether it’s being kissed, hoisted above one’s head, or simply held by it’s golden-mopped caretaker Phil Pritchard he Stanley Cup is just the most aesthetically gifted of them all.
The Stanley Cup
It’s the beauty of the Cup that drives the desire to earn the right to hold it. Players endure broken bones,, lost teeth, pulled groins, and personal hardships for months during the regular and post-season long to battle for that one special privelage. The Cup itself has a mystique of an ancient relic, or precious work of art. But it resides in no museum, it gets passed around to the grizzled men who fought seven months for the opportunity to raise that marvelous symbol above your head and scream at the top of your tired lungs in front of 20,000 people and millions through the television nation wide.
Fans are no different. The fans want to see the Cup hoisted by a hometown sweater as badly the men trying to earn it on the ice do. Why? Because the Cup travels. Everyone has an opportunity to see and perhaps even touch the Cup. After the players and management get their time with the Cup, it stops everywhere from hotels to supermarkets to festivals to VFW halls. A picture with the Cup is something you never, ever pass up on, even if you have to borrow a strangers camera.
This is why this three foot tall, thirty-five pound silver and nickel trophy is so special. It needs just four simple words to describe it’s importance. Because it’s the Cup.
Jake Berent 
Leave a comment