They grow hockey players in Warroad, Minn.

Community pride just comes with the territory in Warroad, Minn. People who grew up there are fiercely loyal to their hometown. 

Jess Myers is one. He’s made it his business to tell people: “There is only one Hockeytown USA, and it’s not Detroit.” 

“‘Hockeytown USA” was bestowed upon Warroad in the 1950s, when boys from our town first began winning Olympic hockey medals,” said Myers, who is a sportswriter by trade.

Warroad folks celebrated an Olympic silver medal won in 1952 during the Winter Games in Oslo, Norway. A key player on that U.S. hockey team was local hero Rube Bjorkman. 

During the 1956 Winter Olympics in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, the U.S. team repeated as silver medalists. Warroad’s Gordon Gene “Ginny” Christian and Dan McKinnon were members of that squad.

Gordon Christian of Warroad won an Olympics silver medal.

Then, all 1,800 or so Warroad residents about burst with joy in 1960, when two more Christian boys – brothers Roger and Bill – helped lead the U.S. hockey team to a gold medal at the Winter Olympics staged in Squaw Valley, Calif.

 

Bill scored the tying and winning goals as the U.S. team beat the Soviet Union, 3-2, in the semifinals. The American skaters went on to win the gold medal defeating Czechoslovakia in the championship game.

 

That was the beginning of the Warroad dynasty, Myers said: “This tiny hamlet by the Lake of the Woods (at the very tip-top of Minnesota) was and remains the cradle of American hockey.” 

“The game is in your blood from birth,” he said. “You grow up dreaming of playing in the NHL (National Hockey League), to be sure, but your first goal is to wear…a Warroad sweater.” 

“And the first time you pull that black and gold jersey of the Warroad High School Warriors over your head…it sticks with you,” Myers wrote.

 

“As I kid in the early 1980s, I played goalie…beneath the massive sign below the scoreboard that read ‘Welcome to Hockeytown USA’ in bright red letters. Nobody questioned those credentials. There was never a reason to do so. Warroad was the capital of American hockey, with the numbers and banners to back it up.” 

“While some rinks hosted birthday parties and figure skating competitions,” Myers said, “ours held a ‘welcome home ceremony’ in 1980 for Dave Christian where he could show off the gold medal he won in Lake Placid, N.Y.,” as a member of the U.S. Olympic hockey team.

 

This was the incredible “Miracle on Ice” team that outlasted the thugs from the Soviet Union in the semifinals, winning 4-3. The Americans defeated Finland to win the gold. Dave Christian (Bill’s son) was a pivotal contributor to the success of the American team during the entire tournament.

 

Dave Christian (23) is the first to bear hug U.S. goaltender Roger Craig.

Warroad folks were justifiably distressed in 1996 when the Detroit Red Wings NHL team decided to promote the City of Detroit as “Hockeytown.” Detroit’s owners had registered Hockeytown as a trademark, something the Warroad town leaders had never got around to doing. 

“I always thought that when someone made something, it was his or her ‘invention,’ so to say,” Myers said. “Warroad was using the moniker four decades prior to the Red Wings’ use of the name Hockeytown.” 

“If anyone from Detroit comes to Warroad and insists that the ‘Welcome to Hockeytown USA’ signs at the town entrance come down,” a big-time hockey fight would likely ensue, and “the brawl would get messy,” Myers warned. 

That scenario is remote…because Warroad is remote. Warroad is almost in Canada’s Manitoba province – more than 950 miles from Detroit. 

Yet, we need to visit Warroad.