Carnegie finally gets due, named to Hockey Hall of Fame Class of 2022

Bernice Carnegie was crying tears of joy over the phone, thrilled and surprised by the day she thought would never come.

Herb Carnegie, her late father who several hockey historians regard as the best Black player never to play the NHL and a pioneer on and off the ice, was finally elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame in the Builder category.

The announcement Monday capped years of petitions drives, editorial campaigns and advocacy by current and former NHL players for Carnegie to be recognized by the Hall of Fame.

"This is so amazing," Bernice Carnegie said Monday. "For a long time, I just kind of put it out of my mind. There were so many people that worked so hard to try to bring it to their (the Hall's) attention, but it just didn't want to seem to happen. Every year when the announcement came out, news articles would come out and say, 'Herb's been forgotten, Herb's been forgotten.'"

Not anymore.

Not that he ever was by those who know his story, including his contributions as a player, an innovator and philanthropist, and what he endured to play the sport he loved.

"He paved the way for a lot of players from Tony McKegney to Val James to Mike Marson to Anson Carter to Wayne Simmonds and myself," said Anthony Stewart, a "Hockey Night in Canada" analyst who played 262 NHL games as a forward for the Florida Panthers, Atlanta Thrashers and Carolina Hurricanes from 2005-12.

"Players our age [who] go through issues of racism really appreciate what he had to go through, and it actually helped us in getting through that," Stewart said. "What we went through is nothing compared to what he went through."

Filmmaker Damon Kwame Mason conducted the last interview with Carnegie before he died on March 9, 2012, for "Soul on Ice: Past, Present & Future," an award-winning documentary on Black hockey history.

Mason said Carnegie's Hall entry "is the most important induction when it comes to Black history in hockey" because it finally honors one of the sport's earliest pioneers in the drive for diversity, equity and inclusion and recognizes the pain of his unfulfilled NHL dream.

Carnegie will join Grant Fuhr (2003), Angela James (2010), Willie O'Ree (2018) and Jarome Iginla (2020) as the Hall's only Black members.

"All he wanted to do was play hockey," Mason said. "He just wanted to play in the NHL. He just wanted to be recognized for what he could do."

Carnegie, the son of Jamaican immigrants to Canada, was a dazzling center who played in the Quebec Provincial Hockey League, the Quebec Senior Hockey League and the Ontario Hockey Association Senior A League from 1944-54. He played for Quebec of the QSHL from 1949-53, where he was a teammate with a hockey prodigy named Jean Beliveau.

Carnegie was part of the Black Aces, professional hockey's first all-Black line that also featured his brother, Ossie, and Manny McIntyre.

He won two scoring titles and three Most Valuable Player awards in the QPHL from 1944-48. He competed on four Allan Cup teams in the 1940s and led Quebec to the Alexander Cup as Canadian semi-pro champions in 1952.

Carnegie received a letter in 1948 from New York Rangers general manager Frank Boucher inviting him to try out for the team.

He attended the camp in September 1948 and turned down three contract offers because they paid less than he was making in Quebec. The final offer would have required him to play the season at the Rangers' top minor league affiliate in New Haven, Connecticut, about two hours from Madison Square Garden.

Bernice Carnegie said her father rejected the offers because he had a wife and growing family to support in Quebec and couldn't afford the pay cut.

Hockey historians have debated whether Carnegie erred by declining the Rangers offer that could have led to an NHL roster spot or whether race ultimately played a role in him never making it.

In his autobiography, "Jean Beliveau: My Life in Hockey," the late Montreal Canadiens center wrote that "It's my belief that Herbie was excluded from the NHL because of his colour."

It would be a decade before O'Ree became the NHL's first Black player, making his debut with the Boston Bruins against the Montreal Canadiens at the Montreal Forum on January 18, 1958.

O'Ree has said Carnegie should have been the League's first Black player.

"Herb Carnegie was an excellent hockey player, but more importantly, he was a beautiful human being," O'Ree said. "I am so pleased and excited that he finally gets the recognition that he deserves, it's a long time coming."

In in his 2018 Hockey Hall of Fame induction speech, O'Ree saluted Carnegie and the Black Aces line, saying, "They paved the way for me. They just never got the opportunity I did."

Carnegie's legacy extended beyond the ice. After he retired as a player in 1954, he started the Future Aces Hockey School, one of the first hockey academies in Canada.

In 1987, he co-founded the Herbert H. Carnegie Future Aces Foundation with his wife, Audrey, and daughter, Bernice, with a mission to inspire youth to be confident and pursue education excellence. Since its founding, the nonprofit organization has awarded $900,000 in scholarships to children across Canada.

Carnegie developed the Future Aces Creed, a 12-point philosophy to help mold youngsters into responsible citizens. He also became a successful financial adviser and a championship senior golfer.

"He put his money where his mouth was and brought it back to his community," said Rico Phillips, founder of the Flint (Michigan) Inner-City Youth Hockey Program and the 2019 recipient of the NHL's Willie O'Ree Community Hero Award. "His legacy is long and wide. And finally, it will be for everyone to cherish."