♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Stan Fischier: But once the big crash came and there was the depression, you know, a lot of people were out of work, so you associated with the Americans if you're on the poor side.

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Joannne Dwyer: You know, it's such a happy memory, the Amerks, and I just enjoy it from the perspective of how much happiness it brings to other people.

Herb Cohen: And then I also rooted for the Brooklyn Amerks.

I think I rooted for them for one year.

Before that, I think they were the New York Americans.

Louis Monaco: I can name every one of those Sweeney Simon and Buzz Baal and Bush's Jackson, every one of those players.

♪♪♪ Larry King: There was a time when Brooklyn was the center of the world.

Manhattan had class and money, but Brooklyn had heart and grit.

We had a can-do attitude that would help win the Second World War.

We were the laborers who fueled New York and America and the world.

We were manufacturing, and shipping, and innovation.

And oh, we were sports, baseball and stickball and sandlot football and roller hockey.

We had them all.

We even had the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Then, as if by divine right, we became the Brooklyn Americans, and they became us.

These star-spangled Amerks were ours to cheer for.

They were a team of equal parts, fantasy, heart, desperation, grit, and guts.

Stolen from Hamilton, Ontario to fill the new Madison Square Garden and birth with a bootlegger's dough, they were fated to be perennial also-rans.

The Americans team was to hockey what Bernard Malamud's fictionous New York knights were to baseball.

And like all great fairy tales, there was a hero.

Our hero Red Dutton.

Dutton was an immigrant to our borough, but we were all immigrants.

He understood us and he understood that the Amerks belonged to Brooklyn.

And so, we moved them, moved them in name and moved them in spirit, but never quite moved them in the flesh.

And then the fantasy met the facts, and the facts were joyless and bitter.

Just like that, the Amerks were gone.

The Amerks, the original seventh in a league claiming a history of the original six, gone.

And with their death, so began the slide.

The Dodgers were next, off to LA.

Businesses moved and so did families.

And what Brooklyn became was a punchline.

But miracle of miracles, Brooklyn is back.

The NHL is back too, where Dutton had wanted them all along, a time to celebrate and a time to remember, to remember the team that was here first, and remember Red, the man who brought the Amerks through the desert, but was not allowed to enter the promised land.

Red Dutton: One thing is definitely true in Canada, and that is the average youngster cannot separate in his memory when he learned to skate and when he learned to play hockey.

Both run together.

They do become acquainted with the flat blade on the end of the crooked bat long before the children south of the border, but this is only because we have ice considerably longer than the states and consequently just about every game a boy or girl plays in the Dominion is done on skates.

Red Dutton.

Stan Fischier: Hockey began in New York City in the metropolitan area because we had cold winters, Prospect Park Lake would freeze, Central Park Lake would freeze, people would go out skating.

There are many, many pictures and of course, there would be some hockey sticks, primitive hockey sticks around.

Plus, in the 1890s, a few significant rinks, indoor rinks--artificial ice actually was developed in the States before it was in Canada, Pittsburgh, for example.

So, we had a rink in Brooklyn in Clinton Hill near Clinton Avenue near Myrtle Avenue, not far from actually where I grew up.

J. Andrew Ross: American hockey of that era tended to be played by college players, so it started in places like Harvard and Yale.

And after graduation, they took their joy in the sport and took it to where they were working, maybe on Wall Street and going to New York and they gathered in small clubs like the Nicholas Street Arena and started up and put artificial ice in there and created small clubs there, but it really didn't have the kind of popular appeal that it had in Canada.

So, when hockey, NHL hockey comes to the United States, it really has to work very hard to appeal to people beyond the small group of elite people that had liked it before.

Stan Fischier: Hockey began to be played here in the late 19th century, and there were teams--a couple of collegiate teams, you know, began to play and Canadian teams came down early 1900s.

Some of the best players in Canada would come down in Manhattan.

The rink was the Saint Nicholas Arena that lasted well past World War II, by the way, and it featured college teams.

Princeton with the great Hobey Baker, he was considered one of the greatest American players of all time.

Unfortunately, he died right at the end of World War I in a plane accident.

He took up a repaired plane and it wasn't repaired and it crashed and that was the end of Hobey Baker.

But that was the kind of early hockey we had.

[gun firing] Larry King: In the fall of 1917, the great war raged across Europe.

On November 26, during a meeting at the Windsor Hotel in Montreal, executives from the NHA voted to disband.

They reformed as a new entity, the National Hockey League.

Under the leadership of former schoolmaster, Frank Calder, the league was a last-ditch effort by other owners to rid themselves of the much hated Eddie Livingston.

Livingston's Toronto Blue shirts won the Stanley Cup in 1914, but the NHA had grown increasingly frustrated with his business practices.

The new NHL effectively kicked him out, forming a new Toronto club.

Other teams included Ottawa, represented by Tommy Gorman, the Montreal Wanderers, represented by Tommy Dugan, the Montreal Canadiens and the Quebec Bulldogs.

The Bulldogs were troubled financially.

They would fold almost instantly, ultimately becoming the Hamilton Tigers.

Sam Wesley: It's hard to understand this now perhaps, but it was believed at the time that having--securing a team in Hamilton would actually possibly save the NHL.

At that time, the league was under threat from kind of rival leagues that were forming around the same time and in the same area.

And NHL owners and the NHL president worried that if another organization established a team in Hamilton that that could really undermine the NHL and the NHL might not survive that.

So, at that time, Hamilton was seen as absolutely integral to the future of the National Hockey League.

♪♪♪ Larry King: With the arrival of the Volstead Act came the roaring twenties, and with its bootleg booze, jazz, flappers, and surprisingly enough, the rise of popular and professional sport.

With cash to spend, the thirsty America spent on everything from baseball to football to tennis, making stars of its players.

The timing seemed perfect for hockey.

J. Andrew Ross: In the United States, 1919 is a very important event because it really changes the culture of entertainment in the United States.

People can't get their booze anymore, but there's a lot of money and a lot of wealth in the 1920s in the United States, and people want to spend it.

So, we see a lot of development of sports, baseball becomes very popular, the NFL gets created in 1920.

There's a lot of tennis--excitement about tennis and other celebrity athletes, college football heroes like Red Grange, tennis players like Bill Tilden, they're very important.

And prohibition is in that era as well.

It's kind of people searching to spend their money.

Larry King: Into the world of prohibition stepped an opportunistic Irishman, Big Bill Dwyer, William Vincent Dwyer, born in 1883, raised in Hell's Kitchen neighborhood in Manhattan, he was working on the docks of New York as a stevedore when prohibition came into being.

By 1920, Dwyer broke away from Dock's boss, George Shevlin.

Big Bill was a tall red-faced quiet man who created a lucrative rum running operation.

Through a network of garages as fronts combined with a fleet of trucks and ocean-going speed boats, he smuggled in booze from Canada and Europe.

He quickly earned the name King Of The Rum Runners.

J. Andrew Ross: We think of the era of Al Capone.

Bill Dwyer was bigger than Al Capone, and he had a lot of money.

And one of the problems with money is that you have nowhere to spend it.

And one of the problems with being a criminal is that people don't respect you very much.

But he was a sportsman, and the opportunity that sports gives you is to spend your money and to gain social legitimacy, right?

Just spend it, gain some profile in the community.

So, I think Bill was interested in that.

Stan Fischier: Big Bill Dwyer was actually the eastern version of Al Capone.

And his buddy, Owen Madden, you know, could have been one of the big shot gangsters along with Capone in Chicago.

So, you had Big Bill Dwyer who wanted to do something respectable.

He had money to burn.

Larry King: From the fledgling NHL, the 1920s weren't going well.

The league was struggling on and off the ice.

There was concern of rival leagues forming, including a league in the United States.

Entered Tommy Duggan with his plan to expand to the US.

Stan Fischier: He would be like what they call today--they have this wonderful expression or word that guarantees a lot of money right away.

He was a consultant before anybody knew what the hell a consultant was.

J. Andrew Ross: What the NHL has done is in 1923, is they had had Tom Duggan come to their board of governors meeting and say, "Hey, I think it's a good idea that we go to the United States."

And at that time, the league was very concerned that Eddie Livingstone, remember him, was going to start up a rival league maybe in the United States and maybe supplant the NHL in Canada in places like Hamilton or Boston or in the United States.

They're very much interested in expanding.

So, when Tom came to them and said, "I'm going to go and sell some franchises," they let him do that.

I don't think they realized at the time that he was not very well healed, he didn't have a lot of money, and that he would wind up being essentially in the thrall of Bill Dwyer as someone who would have to--he would need to finance his operation.

Eric Zweig: Boston and New York were names that always came up.

Boston seemed interested though Boston was such an amateur hockey hotbed that the amateur hockey people didn't seem interested.

Charles Adams who had a share in one of the Boston teams or in the Boston arena, I believe, was interested in a professional team.

Larry King: Smarting from his ill-fated attempt to put NHL hockey in Boston, Tommy Duggan turned his attention to another untapped market for the professional game, New York City.

Waiting for Duggan was Tex Rickard, a boxing promoter with a flair for the bold.

Born George Lewis Rickard on January 2, 1870 in Kansas City, Missouri, Tex was a cigar smoking, cane twirling marketing genius.

He was a man ahead of his time.

J. Andrew Ross: Tex Rickard was one of these fascinating characters where he had done all manner of things before he finally winds up as the boss of Madison Square Garden in the early '20s.

He'd been up to the Yukon, I think he ran a tavern during the gold rush, he'd been to South America, he had a giant beef raising operation down there at one point, but he really made his mark in the Western United States staging prize fights, boxing matches.

Stan Fischier: To call Tex Rickard a promoter would be like the understatement of the half century.

I mean, this guy was a super impresario, and he was connected with the Madison Square Garden and he was one of the guys behind the decision to knock down the MSG 2 which was on 26th Street.

And Madison, which was designed by Stanford White which was a terrific building for its time.

And of course they knocked it down and built a New York life insurance skyscraper there and build the Garden at 49th and 50th and 8th Avenue.

Larry King: It would fall to Bill Dwyer's quest for legitimacy in a troubled Canadian hockey franchise to help Rickard fill Madison Square Garden.

In the spring of 1925, the hockey gods appeared to finally be smiling on the long-suffering fans of Hamilton, Ontario.

After faithfully standing behind the woefully inept hometown Tigers of the National Hockey League, fans were rewarded with a magical run toward the playoffs.

Sam Wesley: Finally, by this last season in Hamilton, these players really be able to--established a good rapport in terms of being able to work together.

They were clicking on the ice, everything was going, they were getting good coaching, and I think that's really what led them to the top of the standings, and they were just consistently--played high level hockey.

So, the 1924 and '25 season was really unlike any other previous NHL season.

Firstly, the league expanded south of the border for the first time.

Boston joined the NHL.

Also, a second team from Montreal joined.

So, now we went from four teams to six teams.

Therefore, they had to expand the number of games they played from 24 to 30.

So, now they're playing six more games.

The season is extended, the preseason is extended, the playoffs are extended.

So, this is a big change for the players.

So, you have to remember this, heading into this final scene where the team is heading back on the train from Montreal.

So, the team, they gather on the train on the way back from Montreal and they get talking.

They're not happy.

They're not happy with management, tempers start to boil over.

Larry King: In what was the first player strike in the National Hockey League, Hamilton's Tigers demanded more money for playing a longer season.

Sam Wesley: When the players presented their ultimatum to the Hamilton Tigers management that they get $200 each or they won't play in the finals, Tigers management say, "Forget this, we're referring this straight to the NHL president."

So, it goes right to Frank Halter, who's the president of the NHL, and he's not an individual that's gonna be swayed by players or that's gonna be, you know, taken by these demands.

Frank Halter says, "Oh no, not at all.

Not only are you not gonna play in the finals regardless, and we're gonna allow the Montreal Canadiens who won the NHL semi-finals to come and play in the finals.

Not only that, but the players are banned from the league.

They're suspended indefinitely."

Stan Fischier: I mean, there's no question that the equation is prohibition equals birth of the Americans because of this remarkable coincidence.

First of all, you got a team in Hamilton, Ontario, best team in the National Hockey League, and they look like the favorites to win the Stanley Cup in 1920--you know, '24-'25 season, and they go on strike.

They want more dough for the playoffs and the league says, "Thanks, but no thanks.

You're disqualified."

So, Hamilton, which couldn't make too much money on the team to begin with because they didn't have a big rink, they decide to sell the team.

So, you had the Big Bill Dwyer who wanted to do something respectable.

He had money to burn.

And with the inspiration of a couple of hockey writers like Bill Macbeth, who was a Canadian, and Tom Duggan was involved, they persuaded Dwyer, "Why don't you buy this team?"

Meanwhile, coincidentally, the Garden needed a tenant, a regular tenant.

There was no pro basketball at that time, and hockey was perfect.

Larry King: Dwyer didn't seem to realize that Duggan had made a terrible deal with Rickard.

The deal Dwyer signed was a sucker's deal.

Not only did Dwyer's Americans rent Madison Square Garden for at least 15 games a season, it guaranteed Rickard and the Garden 15% of the gross receipts from the gate.

Plus, the contract guaranteed a cut of their away money as well.

J. Andrew Ross: And Rickard immediately sees the opportunity of not having one, but two teams play in his arena, so he makes a deal with the Americans with Duggan and Dwyer, saying, "You will support me if I want another team."

Joannne Dwyer: The Amerks were, you know, the beginning, and it's sad as a lawyer myself that he did not have a good lawyer to draft the contract and it was missing that "No compete" clause.

♪♪♪ Larry King: On December 15, 1925, the New York Americans made their home ice debut with Star-spangled uniforms in front of a capacity crowd in the newly constructed Madison Square Garden.

The opening game with pomp and blitz and members of high society in attendance, including Mrs.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, as well as members of the Adler and Astor families, "The New York Sun" wax poetic.

male: "Never has a more glittering spectacle surrounded the sporting event in the city.

The New Garden, already a thing of beauty, was decked out in its finest.

Flags from Canada and the States vied with each other from the boxes and the tiers.

But as ornate as was the arena, the crowd actually added color to the scene.

Society was out in force, and the gorgeous gowns of the women blended a picture at which even an artist would have marveled.

The white line of men in evening dress around the edge of the rink served to create an impression of snow which is banked around the sides of outdoor rinks in Canada, so even the players were treated to an Eiffel."

"The New York Sun."

Stan Fischier: What are you kidding?

It was one of the most significant sporting events in the rich history of New York City.

I mean, you had a band come down from Canada, a famous military band.

The West Point band was there representing America.

They--and it was like opening night at the opera.

People were wearing tuxedos and top hats.

It was huge and of course I--it was the proceeds I think went to a philanthropy.

There were major, major parties afterwards and they were after parties for the after parties.

I mean, it was just a hell of an event and a pretty good hockey game was played.

The Montreal Canadiens skated to an easy three to one win.

Maybe it wasn't such an easy win considering how distracting some visiting players found the home side's star-spangled uniforms that evening.

Aurèle Joliat, the diminutive Montreal Canadien winger, was quick to mock the hockey sweaters.

Aurèle Joliat: "Jeez, what a surprise to see New York in that game.

Those bright sweaters.

They looked like they had come right out of Barnum and Bailey Circus.

We didn't know whether to play hockey against them or ask them to dance."

Aurèle Joliat, Montreal-- Larry King: Noticeably absent from the opening night's festivities was Bill Dwyer.

On December 4, Dwyer had the misfortune of being front page news.

Biggest liquor ring smashed by arrests of 20.

Here William Dwyer seized as head of international groupwide bribery charge, "Operations Random Millions."

That read the headlines on page one of "The New York Times."

Emry Butner, the famed US attorney of New York, had finally caught his man.

Bill Dwyer: You know, while you were speaking, I thought to myself, "I really should be convicted," Bill Dwyer.

Larry King: Dwyer had built his empire on the back of bribery.

This one time, attempting to bribe the Coast Guard had been his undoing.

And with that misadventure, the Americans publicly became Tex Rickard's Americans.

Stan Fischier: His getting jailed was sort of like the same mistake he had made, you know, with the claws that he didn't see.

But, hey, you know, it happened.

Larry King: Tommy Duggan was listed as the club's chairman, Tommy Gorman, the former Ottawa Senator executive hired away by Dwyer to serve as the team's manager and coach.

It would take until 1927 for Dwyer to see the inside of a jail cell.

Convicted and sent to federal penitentiary in Atlanta for two-year sentence, he managed to only serve a year.

Stan Fischier: Well, they were in a position to call the shots.

You have to understand something that Dwyer was not focused just on his hockey club.

This was like a toy.

He had race tracks, he was all over the place.

And he, you know, he had to maintain his position as the king of the New York bootleggers.

He had to take care of people like Mayor Jimmy Walker.

They wanted to go to the 21 Club, which was then a speakeasy.

He was doing a lot of other stuff.

Plus he had a gang.

Plus the gang lived in a hotel at the Forest Hotel, right near the Garden.

I mean--so, you know, he was--he had a lot of little things to take care of in his big cartel.

So, it would, you know, I mean, it would be perfectly natural for Rickard be--to be running a lot of the things that you might think that Dwyer was, but he had the dough and he had the team and the team was here.

It was a fait accompli.

That's all that mattered.

Larry King: As the 1925-'26 season continued, the Americans were woefully inept on the ice.

Even though the Amerks boasted most of the roster from the successful Hamilton Tigers, including Billy Birch who was touted in New York City as the Babe Ruth of hockey, Manhattan proved too much.

If the '20s roared, then the '20s in New York roared loudest.

Soon enough, this group of Canadian hockey players discovered they were a long way from sleepy Hamilton, Ontario.

Sam Wesley: Well, I think Bill Dwyer is the answer to all that.

I think if you look at the circumstances under which that team was playing in New York, they were a lot different than the circumstances in Hamilton.

Now, I mean, don't get me wrong, the players in Hamilton were used to playing and mingling with mobsters and were used to gambling and distractions.

There's no question about that.

It was not--at that time, Prohibition Hamilton was not a squeaky clean place to play, but New York City was on a whole other level.

These guys were small town Ontario boys for the most part, who'd played in Hamilton, maybe in Toronto, who'd played amateur hockey in small northern towns.

They weren't used to what was coming to New York City.

Larry King: Bill Dwyer was flushed with cash in and his generosity knew no bounds.

One of the ways he showed this was by paying players well above the going rate of the day.

Jake Forbes and Billy Birch, ringleaders of the players' revolt in Hamilton, each inked three-year, $20,000 contracts.

The Green brothers, Shorty and Red, were both similarly compensated.

Dwyer operated his bootlegging empire from the top floors of the Forest Hotel, a couple of blocks away from Madison Square Garden, populated by gangsters, various henchmen, and curvaceous women.

And of course, there was a free-flowing booze, and Dwyer made sure of that.

Jacky Forbes was quick to notice how different this new world was.

Jacky Forbes: "The first thing I did when I saw the bright lights of Broadway was I noticed the lovely underwear.

Mine was long in the sleeves and legs and woolen, and I got into them short silk ones straight away," Jacky Forbes.

Larry King: The Forest Hotel appeared like a scene from "Guys and Dolls."

This was fitting since famed New York columnist Damon Runyon, who wrote the short stories for which "Guys and Dolls" was in part based upon, lived at the Forest at the time.

He had more than a passing disdain for Dwyer's hockey players who called the Forest Hotel home too.

Many of them took great joy mocking Runyon and his little dog as they walked through the lobby of the hotel.

Stan Fischier: Hollywood couldn't--screenwriter couldn't make up the Forest Hotel.

First of all, this was Big Bill Dwyer's headquarters.

So, you had all his gangsters there, all his hit men, the whole prohibition machinery was there at the Forest Hotel.

Plus, you had one of the most famous of all New York writers, Damon Runyon lived at the Forest Hotel.

Larry King: The carousing and the constant access to liquor took a toll on the team, and they had very little on-ice success as a result.

But the fans, they didn't seem to mind.

Stan Fischier: They had tremendous success at partying.

They--that's a very important part of New York life in the early '20s.

I mean, here they're working for a bootlegger, right, who has all the booze he wants at his disposal.

When he's--even when he's in jail, he's throwing parties galore for the team.

They, you know, they discovered nightlife.

Let's face it, the Garden was only one block from Times Square.

Larry King: Making things worse for the team on the ice was Gorman's decision to hire the firebrand Newsy Lalonde as player coach.

Lalonde, the former Montreal Canadien forward, had tormented many of the American players when they suited up for the defunct Tigers.

The bad blood was still present when he took over coaching the boys in the star-spangled jerseys.

Lalonde was ill-tempered, had little patience for the drinking and carousing ways of his players.

One night in a fit of rage after a loss, Newsy put a beating on a drunk Alex McKinnon.

McKinnon was knocked unconscious with both eyes swollen shut.

He was unable to play for a week.

Remembering his days in New York, Lalonde put all the blame on the players.

Newsy Lalonde: "Those years in New York took years off my life.

You never saw such a bunch.

Billy Birch and Lionel Conquer were the ringleaders and caused a lot of problems.

You couldn't keep them in line.

I damn near had a nervous breakdown that first year over their antics.

The train trips were the worst.

It was a living hell with those ruffians."

Stan Fischier: There wasn't the same kind of feeling that they had if say, Connie Smythe was running the team and Martin Ed or even Lester Patrick.

And, you know, it was--it might have been around the time that Cole Porter wrote the classic tune which could have been the anthem of the Americans.

And to Big Bill Dwyer, anything goes and anything went.

Larry King: Making matters worse for the hungover Amerks players, ice conditions at the Garden was slowly deteriorating during the season.

Tex Rickard, who struck upon ingenious ideas such as painting the ice surface white to make the arena brighter and the puck easier to follow, had one of the less brilliant schemes.

He decided to increase the temperature of the building to make watching hockey more comfortable for ladies.

J. Andrew Ross: The arena was about 20 degrees Celsius when people were playing there, about 70 degrees Fahrenheit.

That was not what the teams were used to.

Canadian teams were used to playing for about 4 or 5 degrees Celsius, so 40 degrees Fahrenheit, very cold.

Larry King: Temperatures rose while the Amerks sank in the standings.

As a result, blood pressure and tempers boiled for both Dwyer and team general manager Tommy Gorman.

J. Andrew Ross: He was running the team, a real hockey man, and he knew what was good for players.

And so, he's the really one who actually leads a lawsuit that Dwyer supported against Rickard that's threatened to take him to court to essentially raise the temperature in the arena.

And what Gorman pointed out is that, you know, we're losing, the Americans that is, are losing all these games they would ordinarily would win because they're so dehydrated at the end of every game, right?

So, the rest of the NHL teams will come in and they could take it for a game, but the Americans having to play their week in, week out at home, it was really sucking the life out of them.

Larry King: With the threat of the lawsuit hitting the papers, Tex Rickard back down and cooler temperatures prevailed in the Garden.

The Americans still skated to a disappointing 12 wins and 20 losses in their first season.

The Americans were a box office hit, convincing Tex Rickard to put a second Garden-owned team, the New York Rangers.

The National Hockey League reached 10 teams.

Two divisions were formed, and the Amerks found themselves the odd team out.

Eric Zweig: Apparently, Charles Adams tells "The Boston Globe", shortly after all this has happened, that Boston was originally going to be the team that moved into the Canadian division perhaps because they were already a more established team and they had played against these teams.

It's unclear why, but he suggested it would make more sense from a, you know, it would look like there was no fix in if the New York teams were split up.

So, he suggested the Rangers be placed in the Canadian division.

The decision was eventually made to make the Americans the team, the American team that would play in the Canadian division.

Stan Fischier: It's going totally against the grain in every way.

The Americans belong in the American division.

And that should have been the end of it.

Larry King: A rivalry quickly developed between the tenants and Texas Rangers.

The fan base was divided, and Rickard had turned his focus to the Rangers.

First, he hired Conn Smythe to manage the team.

Smythe began building the Rangers only to be fired before the team's first season in favor of a name brand manager in Lester Patrick.

A bitter Smythe would return to his hometown Toronto and save the struggling Saint Patrick's Hockey Club, turning them into the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Patrick, a strict disciplinarian, picked up from Smythe, creating a range of team in stark contrast to the Amerks.

Stan Fischier: The hatching of the Americans Rangers rivalry was almost a natural thing.

Why was it natural?

Because we had that same kind of thing in our national pastime in baseball.

You had the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants in the National League.

Louis Monaco: But the Rangers somehow had a bigger fan base, you know.

And so, you would get these fans who had to yell at the Americans just like the Dodgers and the Giants used to be or whatever, you know.

We always had arch rivalry there.

Larry King: The Amerks took a hit at the gate and a group of rough and tumble, lovable losers were now thought of as hapless also-rans.

Adding to their woes, the New York Rangers, a button-down team run by taskmaster Lester Patrick, won their first Stanley Cup in 1928 and added a second in 1933.

Larry King: If the Americans were suffering at the box office, that didn't impact the parting ways of the players.

The team became infamous league-wide for their wild ways.

The Amerks even had their own slogan, "Join the Americans and laugh yourself to death."

Stan Fischier: That was coined by their goalie, Roy Waters.

Roy Waters mentioned that he was trying to lure one of his former teammates from--who had played with him in Pittsburgh to come and join the Americans.

And of course, the fact that they had done so much partying and it had a negative effect on their performance on ice, which was one of the tragic aspects of the team.

Larry King: Big Train Conacher was an example of how the Americans' love affair with booze could have a ruinous effect.

Conacher came to the Americans via a trade with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Before this, he was an outstanding lacrosse player and a star in the Canadian Football League battling for the Grey Cup.

By the 1929-'30 season when he was named player coach of the Americans, Conacher was a functioning alcoholic.

Exposure to New York City and Bill Dwyer's Americans all but ruined Conacher's career, and it was slowly destroying his life.

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Larry King: In January 1929, at the age of 59, Tex Rickard died in Florida from a burst gangrenous appendix.

He was known for his fear of going under the knife, and he rarely had his medical issues properly treated.

Rickard's body was returned to Manhattan, where he lay in state at Madison Square Garden for thousands of fans to file past and pay homage.

In his will, he made grand gestures of generosity.

The papers described a different reality.

J. Andrew Ross: Rickard was a promoter, right?

And it was all about he's kind of the Donald Trump of his day in the sports sense where a guy--where the amount of money he had wasn't as important as his brand.

Larry King: On the blackest of Tuesdays in October 1929, the stock market crashed, ending a decade of roaring parties and easy money.

The Great Depression brought widespread financial hardships, chronic homelessness, poverty, and hunger.

It wasn't long before the new reality hit professional sports.

Stan Fischier: Never mind the repeal of prohibition, but it was the depression and it was tough for the average Joe to come to a game.

Not everybody had enough money to buy tickets, even though tickets were low.

So, it led to, particularly for the Americans, difficult times.

Larry King: Before the 1930-'31 season, the Americans in Montreal Maroons pulled over trade that had a lasting impact on both the Amerks and the players involved.

Headed to the Maroons was Lionel Conacher.

Drowning in booze, Conacher would turn his back on the bottle as soon as he became a member of the Maroons and resurrect his career.

He would become an all-star, win two Stanley Cups.

Lionel Conacher was the stuff of sporting legend in Canada.

Sadly, his life was cut short when as a member of parliament, he collapsed and died at third base after stretching a single into a triple during the annual Parliament Press Gallery softball game on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, May 26, 1954.

Coming to the Americans was a red-headed defenseman with a fiery temper to match, Red Dutton.

That Dutton had lived long enough to play hockey, let alone play hockey for the Amerks, was nothing short of a miracle.

[gun firing] Larry King: Like most Canadians, Red Dutton rushed to sign up and serve in the First World War.

In the spring of 1917, the battle for Vimy Ridge took place during the early days of April.

Dutton, who had lied about his age to join the Princess Patricius's regiment in 1915, was one of nearly 12,000 Canadians injured during three days of fierce fighting.

Red Dutton: "I was the 22nd Canadian to enlist and was afraid the war would be over before I got overseas.

It wasn't.

I was a stretcher bearer the night the Germans were throwing them over at the ridge.

One of the shells got me from behind and the other hit me in the leg, kind of like a hockey sandwich, wasn't it?

Well, there were a good many sandwiches that night.

W. R.

(Bill) Dutton: His mother didn't want him to go.

We still have the odd couple of letters.

And then he was wounded and laid out in the battlefield at Vimy Ridge for two or three days.

And when they did rescue him, the first thing they wanted to do was cut off his leg because it was so much sharp in it and he said, "No, no, no, you're not gonna cut my leg off because I'm going home to play hockey."

Steven M. Cohen: The doctors had wanted to amputate the leg, but he insisted that the leg be left intact largely because he didn't know what he would do.

Red Dutton: "I pleaded hard with one of the doctors, an Australian, and managed to talk him out of the idea of amputation.

I was in hospital 18 months, but I didn't mind that so much.

You see, I'd be able to play hockey again when I returned home.

Steven M. Cohen: His intention was to go home and play hockey and that's what he did.

Red Dutton: I was full of ambition in those days, playing six days a week with four different teams.

Sometimes, we'd play a matinee and evening performance.

I couldn't get enough hockey.

Larry King: Red Dutton returned to Western Canada, resurrected his hockey career.

He played his way through a number of amateur leagues, joining the professional ranks.

Before heading east, Dutton helped lead the Calgary Tigers to the Stanley Cup, losing to the Montreal Canadiens.

Noticed by the Montreal Maroons, he signed with that club, leading them to the Stanley Cup final, losing again before being traded to the Americans to start the 1930- '31 season.

Steven M. Cohen: Dutton arrives in 1930.

I think it takes him a while to adjust to being in New York.

It's a different experience than obviously playing in Calgary and even in Montreal.

And the Americans at the time were known in the league not so much for their winning ways, but for their partying ways.

And Dutton was a serious hockey man.

He had a fiery temper, he was a large dominating figure.

He played defense and he played defense with a kind of tenacity that makes a difference on a team, but Red Dutton was not a guy who believed in screwing around.

Stan Fischier: Big Bill Dwyer wanted to pick a player that was suited his personality more than anything.

It was Red Dutton.

And I believe that there was a paternal relationship that Dwyer looked at Dutton as maybe his oldest son who was a hockey player and that Dutton looked at Dwyer as maybe in an avuncular way or whatever, maybe his father figure, whatever it was.

The point is, they were made for each other.

Larry King: Dutton had a mischievous side, and he wasn't entirely immune to Dwyer's booze.

In the spring of 1931, the Americans were poised to make the playoffs after finally catching their nemesis, the Montreal Maroons in the standings.

A smug and overly confident Big Bill ordered a party for his boys at his New Jersey horse ranch.

Horses and hockey players seldom mix.

Horses, hockey players, and booze never mix.

Dutton challenged some of his teammates to race with Bill Dwyer's horses.

According to Amerks goalie Roy Waters, the race went terribly wrong for the team's rugged winger, George Patterson.

When his horse went left into the first turn, Patterson went right.

The result, a season-ending broken collarbone for the forward.

The New York Sun reported Patterson as the victim of a freak accident in practice.

1933 was a terrible year for Bill Dwyer.

His other sports interests were failing or had failed.

Dwyer was the thinly veiled money man behind the Pittsburgh NHL team, which folded and was sold off in 1930.

Dwyer was also forced to dump his national football franchise.

He sold it to two former players for more than he originally paid for the Brooklyn team.

Dwyer's habit of overpaying his football players similar to his hockey players, meant he took a hefty loss.

Then came the repeal of the Volstead Act, ending prohibition and most to Big Bill's empire at the same time.

Making matters worse, the feds were hunting him on tax fraud.

It's little wonder Bill Dwyer turned more and more to his trusted defenseman, Red Dutton.

Steven M. Cohen: The stories are that Dutton and Dwyer became very close.

They weren't just a coach and a player.

By the time Dutton shows up in New York, Dwyer has been through the wringer.

He's been in and out of jail, he's gone through some financially rough times, he is certainly, you know, no favorite of the governing body of the NHL.

And Dutton in many ways is just the opposite.

He's a mature guy who's been to war, survived what would have been for many a life threatening and certainly a career ending injury, had appeared in two Stanley Cup finals and was a serious man, but he was also a businessman.

Stan Fischier: As luck would have it, when Dwyer's fortune was becoming dissipated, Dutton's family had dough, construction, and of course the Western Canada was burgeoning at that time.

So, eventually, Dutton had dough that he could lend to Dwyer, maybe not with great enthusiasm, but Dwyer needed dough and he would turn to Red.

Steven M. Cohen: Dwyer was a lavish generous man when he had a lot of disposable cash.

And that was certainly the case in the '20s when he was making a lot of money from bootlegging and other illegal activities.

By the time Dutton is on the team, much of that income has begun to dwindle for all sorts of reasons.

Prohibition is over, the mainstay of his financial success, Dwyer's, has been taken away from him.

He's now being chased by the IRS.

Larry King: Big Bill never wanted to drink, fell victim to the demons of gambling time and time again.

Steven M. Cohen: The story goes that $20,000 that Red Dutton loaned to Bill Dwyer created for Dwyer an opportunity to turn it into more money, which he was going to do by playing craps.

It didn't work out so well, and the $20,000 ends up being lost.

Again, for Dutton, it's not just about the loss of the money, it's about the loss of the payroll for the players who stand shoulder to shoulder with Dutton on the bench.

And that's why the relationship begins to sour.

Larry King: As financial problems continued to mount for Dwyer and the Americans, the team's on ice fortunes improved.

During the 1935-'36 season, the team made the playoffs for just the second time in its history.

Dwyer's days as an NHL owner were nearing an end.

He made a desperate attempt to merge with the struggling Ottawa Senators, but was turned down by the league's governors.

Then he tried to sell the team, but couldn't find a buyer.

By the start of the 1936-'37 season, Dwyer was tossed by the National Hockey League owners.

They took control of the Amerks and put Dutton in charge.

Bill Dwyer: "I wish I'd never seen a case of whiskey.

I spent years in daily fear of my life, always expecting to be arrested, always dealing with crooks and double crossers, and now look at me.

My wife is heartbroken and I'm worse than broke."

Bill Dwyer.

Larry King: In December 1946, Big Bill Dwyer died at his home in Bell Harbor, Queens.

Since losing control of the Americans, Dwyer had been hounded by the US government, lost his empire and his fortune.

He died a broken man with little more than the roof over his head, surrounded by his wife and children.

Under Dutton's stewardship, the Americans began to realize their potential.

During the '37-'38 season, the Amerks finished second in the Canadian division and met the New York Rangers in the playoffs.

Stan Fischier: And, you know, I loved everything about them and of course in 1938 when they beat the Rangers in the best of three series that was a major, major event in my life because these big shot guys who had already won two cups, we knocked them off in one of the longest and greatest games in history at the Garden.

You know the people who were at that game when the Rangers were leading and looked like they were gonna win, guys left, went to Johnnie Walker's bar on the corner of 49th and 8th, started drinking and somebody came into the bar about an hour or two later, and the guys who had left said, "What the hell--what was the final score?"

He said, "What do you mean final score?

They're still playing."

He came--they ran out of food, so this guy came down to get some food.

So, they all went back in to watch the great American's victory.

Larry King: The 3-2 playoff victory on March 27 would be the Americans' crowning achievement.

Lorne Carr scored the winner for the Amerks in a game that ran 120 minutes and 40 seconds, making it the longest in the history of the Garden.

A heartbreaking series loss to Chicago followed.

♪♪♪ [audience applauding] male: On behalf of the hockey fans of New York State-- ♪♪♪ Larry King: Everything was going downhill for Red Dutton and the Amerks.

commentator: He tried it again to center out and Campman spears it, makes up with Philan who takes the forward side, goes over the American line, the pass in front, and Campman goes sailing into the boards with Hooli Smith, half-centered ones that went wide and Campman is lying on the ice with Hooli Smith as their skates were caught.

They're up now.

Charlie Conacher shooting the cut back of his own, that's the Carr.

Carr of the Americans taking his time-- Larry King: Heading into the 1938-'39 season, Dutton was saddled with a team of players past their prime.

By 1940, Dutton was losing players and money.

War had broken out in Europe in 1939 and by '40, Canadian hockey players were being pressed into action as part of the Royal Canadian Armed Forces.

The 1940-'41 season was a disaster.

The Amerks won only eight games and Red Dutton had had enough.

J. Andrew Ross: Well, Dutton is running the team for a long time, and he aspires to own the team.

He has the money, he has the dedication, he's been a player and the manager for a long time, but he realizes there's no future as long as they're playing in Madison Square Garden.

The only option is to move it to another arena.

So, he starts developing plans to establish it perhaps in Brooklyn, somewhere close where they can retain--maintain their fan base.

Brooklyn Eagle: "Professional hockey has come to Brooklyn.

Mervyn Red Dutton, now the owner, on auction anyway, made the announcement officially at a luncheon and given the hockey writers at Toots Shor yesterday.

The Duttoneers, after some 15 seasons of traveling the hockey circuit as the New York Americans, already have begun the changeover.

First came the assumption of the grand and winning name Brooklyn.

Then the Duttoneers began practicing here on the ice palace on mornings and allowing the youngsters in to watch.

They've been getting the inside track on the road to Brooklyn Hearts.

The next step will be setting up an office in Brooklyn that'll be followed by father and son nights, mother and daughter nights.

The limit of this, no man knows."

"The Brooklyn Eagle", November 13, 1941.

Stan Fischier: The league was was eyeing Brooklyn as a site to put a team.

So, this was not a brand new idea, you see?

So--but it was a great idea for Dutton.

He was gonna build the arena downtown Brooklyn right near where Barclays is now at the intersection of Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues called The Hub.

And basically would say, "To hell with the Garden.

I got my own building."

Steven M. Cohen: Brooklyn at the time for many people was the center of the world.

It was the heyday of the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Brooklyn had a kind of attitude that matched that of the Americans.

It was a gruff but lovable kind of place where people prided themselves on maybe not being the most articulate and not being the classiest, but they had heart and they knew how to get things done.

And Dutton looked and realized the team belonged in Brooklyn.

And for that reason, Red Dutton decided.

Moved the team to Brooklyn and play as the Brooklyn Americans.

And that's what he did.

Larry King: A brash Red Dutton pursued his plan to move the team.

He struggled to keep players in the lineup since Canada had been drawn into the Second World War in Europe.

For Dutton, the move to Brooklyn was an opportunity to embrace the community and hopefully be embraced in return.

Steven M. Cohen: So, what Dutton does is he encourages the players to move to Brooklyn.

He himself moves to Brooklyn.

The idea is you got to be part of the community.

And that, you know, teams at the time, much more so than today, were community based.

And so, he wants the players in Brooklyn.

He begins practicing at the Brooklyn Ice Palace.

He invites kids in to watch those practices.

He changes jerseys so that they're now actually skating in a jersey that says Brooklyn.

It's Brooklyn Americans, but the name is Brooklyn and it is proudly displayed in the front of that sweater.

And so, Dutton does everything he can do short of actually playing games in Brooklyn.

And if he could have built an arena, he would have built an arena.

There just wasn't time.

Louis Monaco: I was in a high school not too far from the this Brooklyn Ice Palace where the Americans used to practice.

So, I used to rush back from school because they had practice like pre-game practice 5 o'clock in the evening before a 7 o'clock game, and I used to finish school at 3 o'clock and it was about an 8 block walk from my high school to the Brooklyn Palace.

So, I used to get in there and watch them practice and used to players used to wait for me.

They didn't do too much talking because they had to worry about their practicing, but I made sure I was there for every practice game.

And then at 5 o'clock in the evening, they would open up the skating rink for the public.

[laughs] So, here was the Americans and a hockey team was using a public facility for an ice skating rink.

And then, I watched a few games, few practices, and then like I said, I went to the Garden in the evening, take a subway to get to New York.

I used to live in Brooklyn at that time, and I used to go to any American game.

Paid 75 cents to sit in the end balcony other than the games that they gave me tickets to come in the Perkins, but I was a real fan of the hockey and stuff.

I mean, it was my business.

Herb Cohen: We loved to watch hockey and we would go into Madison Square Garden as we used to say in those days and probably still do, we go to the city, we didn't believe we lived in the city, we lived in Brooklyn.

And we take the subway in and the old Madison Square Garden was at--between 47th and 48th Street on 8th Avenue, and they had a Nedick's.

We always got a Nedick's hot dog.

And these were like orange hot dogs that more people didn't expire as a result of eating that was miraculous.

And then we watched the games.

We watched the Brooklyn Torpedoes and then we'd watched the Rovers play.

Then there was a break because the NHL was on.

And what we do is we go to the bathrooms and we stand on the toilet seats.

And they come around they look underneath, they didn't see us.

And so, we could see the evening game.

male: "These Brooklyn Americans, the hockey team, you know, getting positively dramatic.

On Monday, they changed their allegiance from New York to Brooklyn, and Zoe, they're off on a winning streak.

In less time than it takes for Red Dutton to tell off an umpire, they're up from the depths and in front of the Rangers for the first time in ages."

"The Brooklyn Eagle", November 17, 1941.

Larry King: Dutton's Americans showed so much promise when they beat their in-house rival, the New York Rangers near the start of the season.

That promise faded as the season continued along with Dutton's dream of building a permanent home for the Amerks in Brooklyn.

As America entered the war after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, steel was needed for projects more important than hockey rinks.

male: "You got to admit it, those Brooklyn Americans do lose some fancy.

On the record, the Amerks lost to the Rangers last night, 3-2 in an overtime session.

As a matter of fact, they lost by about 6 inches.

In the last period, Matt Colville let go of one of those long heaves from the blue.

It was a harmless thing on the face of it, but the puck hitting against Chuck Rayner's pads curbed a dozen feet off the hard leather cap on his knee, and Grant Warwick, who was offside look equally harmless, was right there to flip the rebound past the goalie for the tying score.

If that puck had been 2 inches higher or lower, it would have dropped kaplunk right at Raynard's feet.

And without a doubt, he would have cleared it as he did 20 much tougher ones."

"Brooklyn Eagle", December 17, 1941.

Larry King: Red Dutton lacked talent and time.

During his season in Brooklyn, the Americans performed terribly on the ice.

Goaltender Chuck Rayner, who would go on to have an MVP career with the dreaded New York Rangers, was one of the only bright spots for the Amerks.

male: "Chuck Rayner, the dark-eyed Brooklyn American goalie, put on a display of goaltending for a three-minute stretch against the Detroit Red Wings last night.

That was really one of the wonders of the age.

There he stood, not even a goal stick in his hands.

He'd lost it in a melee, and those Red Wings hammered away.

Chuck was up and down like a rubber man.

He dropped to his knees to stop a drive by Mud Bruneteau.

He was up to stop one off Sid Howsick.

He was up.

He was down.

Shot after shot was fired, but not a puck went into the net.

An amazing show, that job of Rayner's, It came when the Amerks had two men off in the penalty coupe.

That meant that the wings at times had five men up there hammering away.

They could not pass Rayner, not for those two precious minutes.

But for all that, the Amerks still lost.

The score 3-2 and the 14th one goal loss of the season."

"Brooklyn Eagle", February 25, 1942.

Larry King: For the Americans, the season in Brooklyn was a disaster on ice.

They spent much of the year trying to claw their way out of the NHL cellar.

A ten-game losing streak sealed their fate.

The pressure of running the team and fighting to find an arena location combined with coaching took its toll on Red Dutton.

Finally, after sleepless nights and meltdowns behind the bench, Dutton stepped down as coach.

By the final day of the NHL season, the Amerks pulled within striking distance of the Montreal Canadiens for the final playoff spot, needing a win in Boston to clinch a berth in the playoffs.

Instead, the Americans collapsed and lost 8 to 3 to the Bruins.

It was a sad but fitting end considering Boston was one of the teams that didn't want the Americans to exist.

Steven M. Cohen: The problem is there's not enough time.

The war is on in Europe and the Canadians are fighting in the war, and Dutton is losing players, and there's no way to replace them.

And so, the NHL comes and says, "You've just got to suspend play.

You don't have a sufficient bench to be competitive," and that's what happens.

J. Andrew Ross: In 1942, the Americans essentially realized in the fall they won't have enough players to put on the ice, so Dutton says, "Okay, let's suspend the team."

He also knows that Madison Square Garden basically does not want the team back.

So, the only real option is for him is to build a new arena.

Now, in 1942, no one knows how long the war is going to last.

Larry King: On January 25, 1943, Frank Calder, the founding president of the NHL, suffered a major heart attack and collapsed during a board of governors meeting.

He died on February 4 at the age of 65.

The league, desperate for leadership, turned to the one man at the table without a team, Red Dutton.

W. R.

(Bill) Dutton: And of course they asked Uncle Ber because he was without a hockey team, basically didn't coach and manage it.

And they asked him to take over presidency of the NHL, which he did do.

Steven M. Cohen: His team has been suspended and so he's the natural person to step into the breach and he does.

Now, whether he was promised that he could have the Brooklyn Americans back or not, I don't think anybody will know and I don't believe there was a quid pro quo, but I believe that Dutton had been led to believe he had been told all along, "Suspend the team, and when the war is over, you can have the team back in Brooklyn."

And he believed that when he took on the presidency of the NHL.

W.R.

(Bill) Dutton: He made money while he was president.

It was the first time the league had ever kind of melded together and been profitable.

Red Dutton: "Don't let this job fool you.

Please tell the people of Brooklyn that I've taken it only for the duration.

or until I can get the green light to go ahead with our plans for a sports arena and a hockey team in Brooklyn.

Nothing will sever me from that ambition."

Larry King: Tragedy struck the Dutton family during the war.

Eldest son, Joseph was killed June 1942 at the age of 23.

Dutton's second eldest son, Alex, was also killed less than a year later.

Both were wireless gunners in the Royal Canadian Air Force.

At the end of the war, Red Dutton would suffer another loss.

This time, his beloved Brooklyn Americans.

W.R.

(Bill) Dutton: Then when the war was over, he had had some interest in buying the property where Barclays Center is apparently.

And he said, "Well, now that the war is over, I'd like to start the New York Americans again."

And I don't really think the rest of the NHL had that much to say about it like the other teams because they weren't really so concerned, but New York said, "No, that's in our franchise area, we don't want it."

And so, they left it disbanded from '42 to '46 and then finally I think they took it off the books in 1946 and he said, "All right--" Supposedly he said, "All right."

And this quoted by some of the sports writers at that time.

"You--I know where I stand.

I'm leaving the meeting," and he picked up his stuff and walked out and he says, "But I'll tell you that the New York Rangers will never win the Stanley Cup again as long as I'm alive," and they never did.

Steven M. Cohen: He's told that there are members of the league who are opposed.

I think Conn Smythe delivers the message to him.

I suspect he delivers it somewhat gleefully.

And the sense is that the Rangers just weren't going to have it.

And Dutton is told there will be no revival of the Brooklyn Americans and there will be no other NHL team that will be playing out of Brooklyn.

And Dutton, who did have a temper, in fact, he used to say that it's not so much that he had a temper, but rather he had enthusiasm.

With enthusiasm, he said there was an understanding, there was a deal when he suspended the team.

It was understood that the team would be revived.

And they said, "Well, you know, we're sorry, Red.

It's just not going to be."

And Dutton purportedly said at that moment, "Well you can take your franchise and stick it up your a--," and he left that meeting and never really returned for years did not return to the NHL.

Larry King: Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1958, Red Dutton, the rest of his life in Western Canada, avoiding the National Hockey League and amassing a small fortune in the construction industry.

Dutton was coaxed back into the NHL rink to drop the puck in a ceremonial face-off for the inaugural home opener of the Calgary Flames on October 9, 1980.

He died in 1987.

Larry King: In 1957, Brooklyn was dealt a blow and Major League Baseball voted to move the borough's beloved Dodgers to Los Angeles.

Herb Cohen: People in Brooklyn still, you know, remember the loss of the Dodgers, you know, in 1957.

In fact, there's a joke, you probably know this joke that people tell.

Okay, you walk into an elevator, you have a pistol in your pocket, you have two bullets.

In the elevator is Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Walter O'Malley, who moved the Dodgers from Brooklyn to Los Angeles.

Okay, who do you shoot?

And the answer is you shoot O'Malley twice, you know.

Larry King: Brooklyn then went from being a place to be to being a place to leave, a place to be stuck in.

Steven M. Cohen: You know, you look at cultural history if you watch movies.

The pre-war movies always presented Brooklyn as this feisty, aggressive, savvy, smart kind of place, and it was reflected in the Brooklyn character.

By the time you get to the '70s, what is Brooklyn?

Brooklyn is the place in "Saturday Night Fever" that Tony Manero wants to leave.

You know, he watches the bridge, and it's not the Brooklyn Bridge, it's the Veranzano Narrows Bridge.

It's an exit.

"Welcome Back, Kotter," a popular TV show.

You know, what is the theme of the show that this guy who finally got out of Brooklyn is now stuck back in Brooklyn?

You could argue that this different vision of Brooklyn, not as the center of the world begins when the Americans are deprived of the opportunity to play.

Bruce Ratner: So, Brooklyn in the '60s and '70s began to have a lot of the same kind of problems as so many American cities had, which is loss of population, crime, loss of jobs, and deterioration.

Larry King: In 1972, the National Hockey League awarded an expansion team to Long Island to keep the upstart World Hockey Association from putting a team in the newly built Nassau Coliseum.

Team ownership wanted to call the new franchise the New York Americans.

National Hockey League said no.

The New York Islanders were born.

Bruce Ratner's plan to create a sporting venue was the first step in the Islanders coming to Brooklyn.

Bruce Ratner: So, for me as a sort of--as a non-native citizen of Brooklyn, I looked at it as something that was very important to the psychology of Brooklyn and psychology of people living here.

Giving young people an opportunity to see sports as something very, very important in their lives and to see Brooklyn as having a sports team as bringing Brooklyn back to where it was in the '40s and the '50s.

Larry King: A bidding war for the NBA's New Jersey Nets and resulting friendship with the then Islanders owner Charles Wang help put the pieces in place for the Islanders' eventual move to Brooklyn.

Bruce Ratner: So, in a period of three or four months, we sat and we negotiate an agreement.

And being friends, it was not difficult to negotiate an agreement to move the Islanders to Brooklyn, and it was done very quietly.

And then one day in September, we just stood up and announced the Islanders are coming to Brooklyn.

So, that negotiation was one of the best negotiations I've ever had.

It was two friends really negotiating something.

Larry King: As the Islanders commemorated their first season in Brooklyn, the greater community celebrated too.

At the Brooklyn Historical Society, an exhibit was mounted to celebrate the return of professional hockey and explore the broken promise of the Brooklyn Americans.

Steven M. Cohen: The return of professional sports to Brooklyn symbolizes that the borough is really back, that the era of leaving Brooklyn is over.

In Brooklyn, you know, it is now oddly enough, bizarrely for people who have lived here for years, Brooklyn is now a place to come.

It's hip, it sells.

And to be relevant, to be an international location, in this country at least, you need professional sports.

It says something.

And so, the return started with the Nets, but with the Islanders, it really does become a kind of crowning glory that Brooklyn is back and it's back in a way that matters, that's relevant, that's exciting, and it's the fulfillment of a legacy.

Larry King: In the fall of 2015, the New York Islanders completed their move to Brooklyn and Long Island mourned the loss of their team.

Brooklynites welcomed the Islanders to a basketball stadium turned hockey rink.

Barclays Center sits near where Red Dutton dreamed of building his arena and walking distance from the former ice palace.

The Brooklyn Ice Palace is long gone, replaced by a parking lot.

So, giddy was the atmosphere in the borough known most recently for hipsters, craft beer, and artisanal food, professional hockey was home.

In a doomed experiment, a fiery Canadian hockey player and coach from the Wheatbelt, Red Dutton, moved the dying New York Americans to Brooklyn 73 years before the Islanders came to Barclays.

Well, Brooklyn had their team again, the name was different, but the love was the same.

In the years since Dutton's hockey team came crashing down, the Islanders were the new lords of Flatbush, and the ghost of Red Dutton could still be felt.

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪