Obituary: NHL/WHA goalie Dave Dryden was ‘one of the nicest, kindest people’

Dave Dryden never set out to be an NHL goalie.

The Oakville resident, and older brother of that other NHL goalie, Ken Dryden, just didn't think he was cut out for it.

I knew I was a pretty good goaltender, and I knew on the good nights, I could be a really good goaltender, but I just didn't have an image of myself as a professional goalie," Dryden told The Spectator's Steve Buist in a 2009 profile.

But, cut out for it he was. Dryden - who died from surgical complications Oct. 4 at age 81 - landed with the Chicago Blackhawks in 1965 after impressing the coach at the Buffalo Bisons of the American Hockey League where he only played weekend games due to his full-time job as a teacher.

He went on to have a 15-year career in professional hockey, also playing for the Buffalo Sabres and the Edmonton Oilers. He played for the World Hockey Associations's Chicago Cougars - a team he ended up partly owning because of money problems - for one year before it folded in 1974.

Thw man who was named the WHA's Most Valuable Player in 1978-79 surrendered Wayne Gretzky's first pro goal when Dryden was with the Oilers and Gretzky was with the Indiannopolis Racers.

Dryden, who later went back into teaching and served as chair of the bed-providing children's charity, Sleeping Children Around the World, is also credited with creating the template for the now-ubiquitous mask-cage goalie mask.

Buist, who travelled with Dryden to India for a story on the charity and became a good friend, said he was honoured to have known him.

Dave was one of the nicest, kindest people I've ever met," he said. He never had a bad word to say. The most you'd get out of him was, Oh, jiggers.'"

Dryden's wife Sandra said her husband was kind of quiet" but was always busy and a tremendous family man" who talked to his brother, Ken, every day.

He wore many hats," she said. He took up speed skating. He was always learning. He was always trying new things."

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said Dryden was respected and well-liked and made contributions to the game beyond his years in the two professional leagues. The WHA merged with the NHL in 1979.

In the mid-1970s, he reimagined the goalie mask, designing the combination fibreglass helmet and birdcage front that greatly increased protection (and) transformed the way the position could be played," Bettman said. After retirement, he worked with the league on refinements to equipment."

Dryden was born in Hamilton on Sept. 5, 1941 to Murray and Margaret Dryden, who went on to found Sleeping Children Around the World in 1970. His parents owned and ran a building supplies business.

The family lived on Haddon Avenue North in Westdale. Dryden spent the majority of his early years in Etobicoke after the family moved there when he was about six.

By the time he was 20, he was teaching at a Toronto-area school, but he played goalie for the Galt Hornets in the Ontario Senior A league before he went to the Bisons.

Dryden had one game in the NHL before he arrived in Chicago. In 1962, he was called upon to fill in for New York Rangers' goalie, Gump Worsley, during a game in Toronto against the Maple Leafs. The Rangers lost.

Dryden settled in Oakville in 1980 and coached the Peterborough Petes for nearly two years. He went to work for the Peel District School Board and got his Masters in Education. He was principal at such schools as Tecumseh Public School and Thorn Lodge Public School, both in Mississauga.

He remained active with Sleeping Children Around the World until his death.

Dryden is survived by his wife Sandra, children Greg and Debbie, and six grandchildren. He is also survived by his brother, Ken, and sister, Judy.

Daniel Nolan can be reached at dannolanwrites@gmail.com