The last surviving PCHA player

The Pacific Coast Hockey Association existed from 1912 until 1924, whereupon it merged with with the Western Canada Hockey League. Who was the league’s last surviving player?

He was Norman James Boswell (Hec) Fowler, a goaltender from Saskatoon who turned pro with the Spokane Canaries in 1917. When the team disbanded after a single season, he joined the Seattle Metropolitans, who were coming off a Stanley Cup championship. Fowler then enlisted for the First World War and didn’t return to hockey until 1920 with the Victoria Cougars. The highlight of his career, perhaps, came on Dec. 12, 1921, in a game against the Vancouver Millionaires where he stopped three penalty shots.

Hec Fowler, from the Victoria Daily Times, Dec. 13, 1921

Fowler continued to play for Victoria until he was sold to Boston of the NHL in 1924 and became the first goaltender in the team’s history. Things didn’t go well there. In his seventh and final game, he let in nine goals in 49 minutes before being replaced. He later admitted that he had deliberately let them slip by to embarrass the team into acquiring better players. He was suspended, fined, and released.

Fowler later played for Edmonton in the WCHL and Prairie Hockey League, and for Oakland of the California Hockey League before retiring in 1931. He coached the Saskatoon Quakers to the Allan Cup final in 1933 and was inducted into the Saskatchewan Sports Hall of Fame in 1985. Off the ice, Fowler worked in Saskatoon for his father’s printing business, F.W. Fowler and Sons.

Hec Fowler died in Saskatoon on July 30, 1987, age 94. He is acknowledged on his Wikipedia page as the last surviving member of the Spokane Canaries, but he was in fact the last surviving member of the entire PCHA. He outlasted Stanley Skinner, who had played a lone game for Seattle in 1918-19. Skinner died in 1985, age 91. At least one other player lived into that decade: Syd Desireau, who skated for Vancouver from 1920-22, died in 1982, age 83.