HILLTOPS BID ADIEU
Clubhouse demolished
A big claw ripped timbers and walls, reducing them to dusty rubble, on a cold winter day in Saskatoon.
The Saskatoon Hilltops’ clubhouse — built in 1950, with some of the labour provided by players and executives — met its demise Tuesday. Right beside it looms the big, gleaming, $3.2-million clubhouse which will usher the team into a new era.
“I well remember Keith Peberdy, a great football player, down on his hands and knees, pounding nails into the wood,” Lorne Richardson — who was on the team executive in 1950 — said Tuesday, a half-hour after watching the north wall collapse and a big piece of the roof disappear.
Richardson was the Hilltops’ president in 1953 when they paid off and burned the mortgage, thanks in part to proceeds from that season’s national junior championship, won by Saskatoon at Griffiths Stadium.
According to Ned Powers’ book The Hilltops, that initial building cost $6,751.64, with additions and renovations coming in later years. It gave the previously-homeless Hilltops — then just three years old — their first real sense of permanence.
Many of the timbers used in the 1950 clubhouse came from a building the Hilltops helped to demolish, thanks to an offer from contractor and Hilltops director Art Peberdy, who also headed up the building committee.
As those timbers merged, the team served notice that it was around for the long haul. They called the place “home” for the next 67 years, and used it as a springboard for 20 national championships, including seven of the last eight. But Richardson said he’s not sad to see it go.
“Not really,” he said, while standing in the brand-new clubhouse. “This is beautiful, and it’s needed.”
The new clubhouse is 10,000 square feet, up from 6,000 (over a few different levels) at the old building, and the space is designed for efficiency.
There are film rooms for both offence and defence, a directors room, an expanded trainers room, a weight room, a more practical coaches room with a touch of nostalgia (head coach Tom Sargeant insisted that his battered desk make the move from the old to the new clubhouse), and a bigger locker-room. When the old clubhouse is completely gone, they’ll put a patio there.
Current Hilltops receiver Jason Price, asked to name one thing he won’t miss from the old clubhouse, responded quickly.
“The lack of showers that worked,” he said. “There’s about 12 showers in there, and about six that worked really well. Things got a little interesting after games. It was a lot of sharing showers. Cold water, too — we ran out of hot water really fast in that locker-room.”
Meanwhile, Hilltops director and clubhouse project co-ordinator Al Gibb talked about toilets, and a need to do better.
“Two urinals and one toilet for 80-plus players. I don’t think you can say you’re a successful football club if that’s the case,” he told a large crowd gathered for the clubhouse’s official opening.
Later, he expanded on that thought.
“We had a situation we really needed to rectify,” Gibb said. “The building was going quickly downhill, and we carry more players than we used to. The building was designed for 50 players, and we’re up to 80. It just wasn’t proper to treat young players like that — the lack of washroom facilities, the trainers room and how hot it was and how small it was. The whole thing was not a proper situation.
“I enjoyed the old clubhouse,” he added. “But there was a situation, probably a couple of weeks ago, once we started doing a salvage of all the areas ... I just flipped right over and said it’s time to come down. There’s no attachment to it anymore.”
The Hilltops carry a deep connection to their past. Team history is recorded meticulously in scrapbooks. Photos, trophies and memorabilia adorn walls and glass cases.
Price, the receiver, noted how many jackets — bearing the familiar Hilltops ‘H’ — were on hand for Tuesday’s demolition and grand opening. Alumni leaped into the fundraising effort with great enthusiasm, and kept the money taps pouring as construction continued. Gibb estimates the team also received $400,000 in gifts in kind.
“I was waiting to see if a couple of mice scurried out of there or not,” Price joked when talking about the demolition.
“It’s also sad, because you know how much tradition has come through there. It’s a little sad to see all that tradition go away, but I know we’re going to bring it over to this building as much as we can — bring that winning tradition over, and try our best to keep up the Hilltop name.”
The building was going quickly downhill, and we carry more players than we used to. The building was designed for 50 players, and we’re up to 80.