Of the many enthusiams of Bell Islanders in the latter years of the mining operation, none was greater than their passion for hockey. The Bell Island Miners, with their bell and pick and shovel emblem, were lionized at home and feared abroad. The greatest of Bell Island's hockey rivalries was with St. John's. In their resistance to "townie" hockey supremacy Bell Islanders were, of course, participants in an age-old outharbour Newfoundland antipathy towards the local capital. But the aggressive hockey for which their town was known may have had other roots as well. Has the defiant brand of hockey for which mining towns across mid-Canada are famous and which has often found ready company subvention, provided an easy outlet for feelings of exploitation and despair? No definitive answer can be given to this question. But anyone who ever sat in the Msgr. Bartlett arena amidst the lusty roar of the submarine miners might be tempted to say that something more than athletic prowess was at stake there.
