Sport Wife: Mrs. Gus Kyle
Mountie Got His Girl
and Made Her His Wife
By Bill Beck
Doris
Speer felt a little twinge of guilt as the broadchested Mountie waved her auto
to the side of the road.
Of
course, it was only constable Walter Lawrence Kyle pulling a surprise customs
check on his friends and neighbors in little Woodstock, New Brunswick. Doris, a
bit irritated, watched him walk toward her in his Smokey-the-Bear hat and
wondered where she should stash the carton of American cigarettes she had just
purchased in Holton, Me., 10 miles away.
If
you ask her now, she will say she had no difficulty in outwitting the big,
clumsy fellow, and preserving the contraband.
Or,
if you ask the constable, he will tell you Doris flew into a girlish panic and
pitched the cigarettes into a ditch; that he pretended not to notice, figuring
loss of the smokes was punishment enough for the inept little smuggler.
What
neither of them knew that day in 1943 was, they were on their way to Madison
Square Garden, New York, together.
Walter
Lawrence Kyle – called Gus because, as a baseball catcher, he reminded Canadian
fans of former Cardinal backstop Gus Mancuso - is now coach of the St. Louis
Hockey Braves. Doris is his wife, and this story is about Doris, although Gus
will intrude from time to time. At 231 pounds, he’s hard to keep out.
One
of two daughters of the village clerk, Doris had never seen a professional
sports contest or experienced the slightest desire to when she began to date
Gus in Woodstock. Nor did she know that Gus was an athlete.
All
she knew was that Kyle was assigned to customs and narcotics investigations
there at the border and that he would never talk about any of his cases.
She
certainly would never have urged Gus to change occupations if it had not been
for one particular regulation. No Mountie could wed until he had been with the
force seven years and could show bank deposits totaling $2500. How do you save
$2500 on a salary of $92.10 per month?
That
is when her sweetheart’s athletic background became important. You couldn’t
just quit the Mounties. You either had to serve out your enlistment or buy your
way out at the rate of $30 for each expired month.
When Doris told Gus, “yes,” he still had 42
months to go and coming up with $1300 was almost as tough as saving $2500.
The
upshot was, the New York Rangers of the National Hockey League bought Kyle from
the Canadian Mounted Police in 1947 for $1300, one of the strangest player
transactions on record. At least it was a switch on the way baseball got
Alabama Pitts from Sing Song.
That
began for Doris the strange, nomadic life of a sports wife and, except for the
time Gus quit to sell investments, it has continued for 17 years.
Kyle
played baseball in the summer and Doris cheered home runs. He had her cheering
hockey in the winter and would have her cheering football in the fall, but his
hockey contract forbade him to play the game.
“I
spent my honeymoon with a girl friend because Gus was busy cleaning up old
police cases. We moved five times in the first seven months we were married,”
Doris remembers. “That should have been the tip-off.”
All
the moves were not for change of seasons. Once, there were bedbugs and another
time, the newlyweds had to share one bathroom with six working girls and Gus
was getting trampled in the morning rush.
“The
most exciting time was in New York (1950) when the Rangers almost won the
Stanley Cup and Gus almost was rookie of the year,” said Doris. “Some rookie!
He was 29 years old.”
It
took Kyle two years to make the Rangers. Doris, who had seldom been outside her
home town of Woodstock, had to make the trip to the big town by herself. Gus,
in all his wisdom, had arranged quarters in a sleazy hotel across the street
from Madison Square Gardens.
Doris,
suspecting that most of her fellow lodgers were racketeers or worse, kept the
door chained until her husband could find a pleasant apartment in Long Island.
“Living
in a different apartment every year, you seldom come to know your neighbors.
But in Long Island, several players and their wives lived near us and we met a
musician across the street. They knew Kay Starr and she began to go to the
games with us. It was fun,” said Doris.
It
was also fun at the Garden where a supposedly hapless Ranger team fought its
way into the Stanley Cup playoff, eliminated Montreal and carried Detroit to
seven games before losing out in the final.
Gus
had himself a year. Playing left defence, he took over the roll (sic) of
“policeman” which meant that if anybody on the other team abused a Ranger, Gus
skated into the fray, ham-like fists swinging.
“I
got used to seeing Gus in fights,” said Doris. “I’d just stand there and watch
and hate the other guy. It never seemed to me to be Gus’s fault and he never
seemed to lose, or if he did, I’d call it a draw.”
Kyle
missed the rookie award by a vote or two. For a defenseman to win would be like
a defensive tackle grabbing football’s Heisman trophy. It has never happened.
“Gus’s
coach went to Boston and after a year, bought Gus’s contract. I didn’t like
Boston much. But in 1953, Gus quit and we went to Calgary. That was the best
time of all for me.”
Kyle
meant to quit hockey. He opened up a sporting goods store. But the Chicago
Black Hawk organization bought his contract and lured him back into the game in
Calgary on the promise he would one day be a coach.
“Hockey
was fun when Gus was a player. I even used to laugh when they booed him in
Edmonton. It all changed when he became a coach. The fun went out of it.”
In
all, the Kyles remained nine years in Calgary. They bought a home, kept the
store and one of Gus’s teams set a pro hockey record by going undefeated 16
straight games. Then the Black Hawks pressured Gus to take a bigger job and he quit
in favor of the investment business.
“He
seemed to like it and did well. I loved it. It meant no more moving. But I knew
he couldn’t stay away from hockey and he didn’t,” Doris related. Gus went back
in 1962, picking up a staggering club in Syracuse. That club became the St.
Louis Braves, moving here New Year’s Day of 1963.”
Doris
has learned she is apt to be alone on holidays and anniversaries because the team
seems to be always on the road. She has learned she must have salads and steaks
on the menu, because big Gus has a weight problem; that she should keep off the
subject of hockey unless he brings it up, and that she should never, never turn
around when the fan behind her begins to revile the coach.
But
she has never learned to stop missing her comfortable home in Calgary. It is
now rented to Eagle Day, former Ole Miss All-America quarterback. He
quarterbacks the Stampeders, Calgary’s professional football team.
And
there is one other problem: Doris doubts that there is a cure for telephone
fever of which her husband is a hopeless victim.
“About
the time most people go to bed, Gus gets on the telephone and calls long
distance all over the United States and Canada. He wants to make a deal or he
wants to check on some junior player. All I can do is go to sleep or talk to
Duke."
Duke
is a 9 – year old Weimaraner that is almost as big as Gus but who is a
sophisticated apartment dweller as you’ll come across.
As
Doris sees it, there have been no unhappy times in her 17 years with Gus,
although the one the Kyles are experiencing now is extremely trying.
The
Braves are in last place in the Central Hockey League. Gus can’t stand to be
last. Doris can’t cook him a meal or give him a pill that will make things any
better.
He
frets and makes telephone calls. He moans and sighs.
“If
it were only summer,” she said. For one thing, the hockey season would be over.
For another, she knows a sure-fire summer method of making Gus smile.
One
look at Doris’ somewhat unorthodox golf swing throws her husband into fits of
helpless laughter.
Next:
Mrs. Mike Shannon.
Recipe for Making
Police Reputation
Doris
Kyle knew her husband by reputation long before she actually met him.
As
all Woodstock, N.B., knew, Constable Walter Kyle was the man who made the
daring capture of the poor, demented lady who kept scandalizing the city by
dashing about like Lady Godiva –c clad in nothing.
“Not
so,” protests Kyle now. “The sheriff made the capture. All I did was help take
her to the mental hospital.”
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