My first ever hockey game was at the old London Gardens on Oct. 23, 1987 against the Guelph Platers. The game ended in a 3-3 tie. I was 5 years old.

I saw over 250 games at the London Gardens and I felt like I knew the place as well as my own home. It was raucous, loud, and had the atmosphere of a madhouse. The paint was peeling, the toilets were few and far between, the seats were uncomfortable and the lighting was terrible, but it was a fantastic place to watch a game, with an atmosphere that new buildings could never duplicate. You sat right on top of the action and the players could practically hear whispers coming from the crowd.

Longtime Knights' trainer Don Brankley made his home in the Gardens under the seats in a small apartment next to the Knights' dressing room.

The building was designed to resemble the old Boston Garden, and it succeeded in both the atmosphere and the craziness. Fans in London were among the best in the league, and the team drew well over 3000 fans a game even in 1995-96, when the Knights went 3-60-3 for the worst record in CHL history. Knights' fans were also adept hecklers, and were merciless on players that weren't liked.

The building's two proudest moments came in 1977 and 1999. In 1977, Dan Eastman scored in overtime against the St. Catharines Flyers to send the Knights into their first Robertson Cup final against the Ottawa 67's. They lost in 6 games. The second was in 1999 when the Knights beat Belleville in the sixth game of the Robertson Cup broadcast coast-to-coast on Sportsnet. Unfortunately, destiny was not on the Knights' side as they lost 9-2 in the seventh game in Belleville.

The Knights were never able to deliver a championship to the old Gardens, which is the building's one regret. Perhaps the Knights will finally make good on their status as the league's fourth oldest club and finally make it into the Memorial Cup.

Best Gardens quote:
"I love playing in London, it's where you can get two points and groceries at the same time." - Bert Templeton, referring to the fact that a grocery store used to be next door.

The Treasure Island Mall opened on the industrial southern fringes of London in 1961. The developers decided to include a 5000 seat hockey arena in the plans, and were in the process of buuilding one when the project went bankrupt and the half-finished arena, just a mass of girders, sat empty for four years.

In 1964 the project was finally finished and the Treasure Island Gardens opened. The arena was designed to be a one-level copy of the Boston Garden. It was home to a newly minted OHA franchise, the London Nationals, who were owned by the Toronto Maple Leafs as one of their junior clubs.

In 1968 the team was sold to Howard Darwin, who renamed the team "London Knights" and changed the colours to green and gold. The arena was also renamed the London Gardens after four years of pirate jokes had started to wear thin.

The arena was home to a lot of the city's history over the years. The Rolling Stones played the building on their first North American tour in 1964, and the cops shut down the concert after 15 minutes. Alice Cooper, Randy Travis, WWF and Bill Cosby are just some of the names who played the venue over the years. The Gardens' most famous concert moment, though, came in 1968 when Johnny Cash proposed onstage to June Carter, who would remain his wife right up to the present day.

One unfortunate characteristic of the Gardens, though, was that the building was never really maintained over the years. The dirt started to pile up and the building was allowed to deteriorate rapidly. Near the end, most visitors had a hard time believing that the building was only 40 years old, as it felt at least 60. In spite of this, or perhaps because of it, the fans who filled the rink week after week were raucous and loud, and crazy. The senile old building was a perfect match for the Knights' fans and their consistent frustrations at being the fourth oldest club in the league yet never having won an OHL championship.

In 1994 the Knights were bought by real estate mogul Doug Tarry Jr., who changed the Knights' colours to awful eggplant and teal, the logo to "Spiderknight" and renamed the building "The London Ice House." Tarry was going for a total image change, but the changes were silly at best. Now that the building is closed, I've reverted to calling it the Gardens again. It was a better name.

In 2000 the Brothers Hunter, ex-NHLers Mark and Dale, bought the Knights. In Feb. 2002 the colours were finally changed back to green and gold. The eggplant and teal period today seems like a bad dream, and no matter what the Hunters do to the team, they will always be the men who brought back the green and gold.

In 2002 the building finally closed as the Knights moved downtown. So far, it seems a little bit of the old schizophrenic character has moved with them. Most Knights fans will tell you that the building desperately needed replacing, but it was still a shame to lose her. She was a fantastic place to watch hockey and will not be forgotten as long as Tony the Fan still screams from behind the net, or the fans chant Robert Holsinger's name. And as long as the ghosts of Sittler, Maruk, Stajduhar, Allison, Ciccarelli, Bradley, Taylor, Green, Riggin, Nash, Erskine, Eastman, Chiarello, Ing, Shanahan, Marsh, Ramage, Fata, Kostopolous, Brathwaite or DeBrusk still roam along Wellington Road, the Gardens will always be a part of the fabric of the city of London.

The building is incredibly easy to find as it is visible from the 401. Simply exit at Exit 186 (Wellington Rd.) and go south over the overpass. Turn left at the first light which has a left-turn available; the building is on the right, set back from the road, with a large triangular spire on the front. It's in the same plaza as the McDonalds.

The building was purchased from the Knights in 2002 and turned into the "London Motoplex", which is North America's only permanent indoor motocross facility with stadium seating. Several hundred tons of dirt were dumped on the arena floor and today dirt bikes jump where the Knights once skated. Apparently the owners aren't planning to make money primarily from ticket sales but from other riders, who would jump at the chance to practise in a permanent facility. So far they're doing quite well, selling out every rider pass for the first practice session. The arena is completely unchanged with the exception of a few rows of seating in section 17, which were removed to allow the dump trucks full of dirt easier access. (Including my old season ticket seat, the bastards.)

I got one of the old seats. It's currently in my basement.