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J. D. (Jack) Ruttan

NHL, the National Hockey League is a premier professional North American Sports League played in indoor stadiums. It’s divided into two conferences, each comprising of three divisions of ice hockey teams. The league was established in 1917 in Montreal, Quebec and it is composed of 30 teams out of which 24 teams based in U.S. and 6 in Canada. They have a regular season and playoffs leading to the Stanley Cup, which is the NHL Championship final.

J. D. Ruttan was born on 5 April 1889 in Winnipeg, Manitoba and died on 7 January 1973. His playing career began with the Armstrong's Point hockey team that won the juvenile championship of Winnipeg in the 1905-06 season. He switched to the Rustler club the following season and it in turn also won the city juvenile championship. By 1907-08, Ruttan was playing for the St. John's College team, which won the Manitoba University Hockey League championship that season.

In 1909, he moved up to senior hockey and played for the Manitoba Varsity hockey team as they won the championship of the Winnipeg Senior Hockey League in the 1909-10 season. Ruttan stayed with the Varsity team through two more seasons before moving on to play for the Winnipeg Hockey Club in 1912-13. The Winnipeggers won everything in sight that season, starting with the Winnipeg League championship and ending with the Allan Cup as senior hockey champions of Canada.

Ruttan recalled later that the Allan Cup win, symbolic of amateur hockey superiority, was the greatest thrill of his hockey career. He remained in hockey for many years after his playing days had ended. He coached the Winnipeg senior hockey team during the 1919-20 season and officiated in the Winnipeg Senior League from 1920 to 1922 and then coached the University of Manitoba team for a year in 1923-24. J.D. Ruttan was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1962.

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