A Look At Wally Hergesheimer (Part Three)
Winnipeg's Wally Hergesheimer was a 30-goal scorer with the New York Rangers in the early 1950s.
Here is the final part of a three-story series on Wally Hergesheimer:
“After his career ended we lived on Henderson Highway near Kelvin Community Centre where there was a storefront and some apartment units, and we owned it all,” recalled Dave. “Mom and dad bought it and rented all the store-front units and three suites upstairs, while we lived on the main floor. One of the people they rented out to went on to become a pretty prominent person in our province, the former Manitoba Premier Edward Schreyer. Our parents kept that until 1970 and then we moved to Sutton Avenue in 1971 where they built a brand-new home. They lived on Sutton until just after the millennium where they moved into an apartment on Valhalla Drive just past Henderson/Chief Peguis.”
Dave also recalls a post-hockey friendship between his dad and the great Bobby Hull, “When Dad went to Chicago, Bobby Hull was being brought up on the team as a rookie. My dad said he was a tough guy to play hockey against. Later on, there were a couple of times where my brother Wally Jr. was playing hockey for the River East Royals and his son played for another team at the River East Arena. My dad would sit way up in the corner at the opposite end and Bobby Hull would follow him up there and the two of them would sit and hide from everyone because they didn’t want anyone screaming at their kids, so they’d sit together. I can remember one time driving home and Bobby Hull was on CJOB because he was in town for something and he said, ‘By the way, Hergy, if you’re listening, call me, get in touch with me.’ So he did and I think they both wound up going to some function, autographs or whatever.”
You could definitely say that Wally really kept things low-key in his post-hockey career. He shied away from all attention about his hockey, not attending events that he was invited to by the Rangers or Cleveland Barons. He said no to most media requests because he just didn’t like talking about his accomplishments. It wasn’t who he was.
Although he didn’t have much to do with hockey after his career ended, he continued to curl at the Elmwood Curling Club and golf with the Elmwood boys at the Rossmere or Transcona Golf Clubs. “He golfed all his life,” Dave recalls.
Wally’s older brother Phil had built his own home with his bare hands in Kelowna after first moving out there to coach after his own playing career ended. Phil Hergesheimer passed away in Kelowna on March 6th, 2004 at the age of 89.
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