THE VANCOUVER AMAZONS
A West End Story

by Fred Hume
(click images to enlarge)

Women’s hockey in B.C. it is said, has existed since the 1870’s but began to thrive during the first 15 years of the 1900’s particularly in the West Kootenay region. The team from Rossland was B.C.’s best during these years (1900-1916) with 1911 a highlight year as the Rossland ladies were proclaimed “World Champs.”

**1921-22** **VANCOUVER AMAZONS.** (*VANCOUVER ARCHIVES PHOTO*)

They have since been inducted into the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame.

In 1914, teams were formed in New Westminster and Victoria, and to provide opposition and feed the rivalry, the Patrick family, owners of the Vancouver Millionaires and the team’s new 10,500-seat Denman Arena, set out in February 1914 to create a Vancouver City team.

Now included in this new three team inter-city league, Vancouver was not the only local women’s team as U.B.C., beginning in 1915 and coached by student Sherwood Lett, also competed. Concluding this 1915 season Vancouver defeated New Westminster to win the league championship and O.B. Allan Cup.

The Patrick Family of hockey fame, particularly Millionaires player Frank Patrick, was key with regard to this new Vancouver team as the family had a residence in the city’s West End with young Walter Patrick attending King George Secondary School. It was also KG which in 1917 provided the Ladies’ junior team the “Swastikas,” with seventeen year old goalie Amelia Voitkevic and sixteen year old left-winger Nan Griffith.

**AMAZONS IN BANFF**. (*PHOTO CREDIT WHYTE MUSEUM OF THE CANADIAN ROCKIES*)

As the sports pages of the Vancouver papers reported, it was later in February 1918 that a “bunch of school girls” from the West End and attending King George, issued a challenge to the Vancouver Ladies team for the Lower Mainland championship. The West End girls with the Denman Arena on Georgia and Denman at their disposal, skating on Friday nights and on weekends watching the Millionaires, had formed a team in January 1918 calling themselves the Amazons. “How dare they!” was the exclamation which spouted from the lips of the Vancouver Ladies team secretary upon reading that these “girls” were challenging the Vancouvers “to come and get defeated at hockey by the Amazons Girl’s Club” to quote the Feb.3, 1918, Vancouver Sun. After being stunned by the high schoolers' audacity, the challenge was accepted by the City champions.

Meanwhile, the young Amazons were “not tickled, no, not A-tall” at the Ladies’ reaction to their challenge. Emulating the rough and tumble style of their role models the Millionaires, the Amazons scored 1-0, 2-1, 0-0 and in the championship match 1-0 victories, winning the challenge and wresting from the senior Ladies the city and Lower Mainland titles. “Amazons Are Now Real Hockey Champs, B’Gosh” stated the March 28, 1918 Vancouver Sun. “That bunch of school girls” who made up the Amazons this season included KG students Nan Griffith, Phebe Senkler, Mabel White and Greta Maddison.

Although still a bit of a novelty, the Amazons, Vancouver Ladies and Fernie Swastikas were amazing the fans at Denman Arena with their “speed, daring, ability to handle the stick and sheer abandon…(the fans) fell for the ladies half a minute after they took to the ice.” Prominent in this experience was the “plucky play” of Nan Griffith who despite being cut and crashed into the boards, “refused to quit and no sooner was down she was on her blades again urging her teammates on with eager shouts.”

**FRANK PATRICK’S WIFE WITH CHILDREN** (*THE PROVINCE 1923*)

The following year, March 1919, the highly regarded Alberta champion Calgary Regents travelled to Vancouver in search of competition and to accommodate the Regents, a team of the best of the Amazons/Vancouver squads was formed, six of the eight players being Amazons. The fortified Amazons lost a close contest with Calgary, parents of the Amazons’ Senkler sisters. This whole experience was designed to create an awareness of the scope of women’s hockey in Western Canada and its commercial prospects. Spurred on by the Patricks, interest was ignited which together with the Amazons’ connection to this already legendary hockey family, created a definite “buzz” with hockeyists in B.C. and Alberta.

The Amazons gained traction in early 1921 as did their compatriots the Millionaires, who this year won the Pacific Coast championship and came within one game of winning a second Stanley Cup. The Amazons with nine players and natty new red, black and white uniforms with the letters ‘VA’ on the front practiced under the watchful eye of Frank Patrick. Six of the players were from Vancouver’s West End: Nan Griffith, Phebe and Norah Senkler, Kathleen Carson, Amelia Voitkevic and Greta Maddison were 1917 KG grads, Griffiths a 1920 grad, while the Senkler sisters also attended King George with Norah playing on the school’s basketball team in 1920. According to Wayne Norton’s book, “Women on Ice” the distinguished Senkler family who lived in their grand house at 1889 Haro Street helped with contributions toward “...at least a portion of the financial requirements of the Amazons team…”

**DENMAN ARENA 1929** (*VANCOUVER ARCHIVES PHOTO*)

On February 1, 1921, the Amazons left for the Banff Winter Carnival as the first team to represent the coast at the annual Western Canadian women’s hockey championship. Hockey was now becoming the most exciting and featured event at this Carnival. Reaching the Tournament semi-final the Amazons faced defending champion Calgary Regents led by forward Pansy Pue, but lost 4-1 to the team who would win it all again this year. Less than three weeks after returning to Vancouver, the Amazons, or more specifically Frank Patrick, launched a West Coast tournament with the Amazons hosting teams from Victoria and Seattle. The two new teams did not offer much competition as the Amazons with six of the nine players King George girls, outscored them by an aggregate 13-0 over four games thereby claiming the West Coast title.

A confident Amazons team returned to Banff for the February 1922 Carnival Tournament although unlike the other teams had not been recently tested as no competition could be found on the coast. But the team was still led by the King George girls; goalie Voitkevic, Griffith, Carson and the Senkler sisters and under the guidance of Guy Patrick, was in search of their first western championship and coveted Alpine Cup. Despite being relaxed and confident the Amazons lost an exhibition game 1-0 to the upstart but potent Calgary Byngs. However for political reasons in Calgary, the Byngs were disqualified and the Amazons would therefore meet the Calgary Regents (who had political clout) for the championship. In a further twist, the Amazons, short two players due to injuries, were allowed to replace one of them from the disqualified Byngs – there being no love lost between the Byngs and the Regents. In that final game on the open-air rink in thirty below weather, the Amazons prevailed, a 2-1-overtime victory over the defending champions on two goals by Kathleen Carson. It was for the fan favorite Amazons a circuitous route to becoming 1922 “Lady Champions of Western Canada”. To quote Wayne Norton, “It had been a year to remember for the Vancouver Amazons despite the curiosities of their games against the Byngs and Regents. Captain Phebe Senkler had presided at Carnival events as queen and had led the team to a championship at Banff – women’s hockey’s most acknowledged prize in Western Canada.” And as it happened the ’22 Amazons proved to be one of only two teams from B.C. to win the championship during the 19 years of this, Canada’s major women's hockey tournament. Also interesting was that star and K.G. grad Kathleen Carson was contemplating a career change as she prepared to marry into the most famous hockey family in the country: the Patricks.

It is worth noting that the Amazons were pioneers in the sense that they were the first women’s team from B.C. to travel extensively – that is, the first team from the west coast to undertake the expense and time to travel to compete at Banff, a relatively long distance at the time. It wasn’t until 1926 that a team from as far away as Vancouver – in this case the University of Manitoba – attended the Banff Winter Carnival. Among the west coast teams and even Alberta teams, the Amazons set themselves apart not just in their appeal but also in their willingness to travel a significant distance to compete.

**KG ALUMNI AND AMAZONS STARS SENKLER SISTERS .**

According to Norton’s “Women on Ice”, from the perspective of women’s hockey in B.C. there was no greater prize available than the one awarded with victory at Banff and the Amazons in ’23 were eager to relive those moments of glory. However heading to Banff there were changes to the Amazons’ lineup. The Senkler sisters were now at college in Montreal, Kathleen Carson was now Mrs. Guy Patrick yet still playing, while the team added renowned B.C. all-round athlete, Doris Parkes. At age 16 Doris had moved from North Vancouver settling in the West End living on West Hastings then on to Gilford Street. But this year’s team had slipped a little as the Fernie Swastikas (a symbol of good fortune) led by “fast travelling brunette Dahlia Schagel”, easily wrested the Alpine Cup from the West Coasters then held off the Calgary Regents to become the new champions of Western Canada.

The always-successful Amazons annual fundraising dances drew Vancouver’s social elite together with players and members of the Patrick family. Attending in 1924 was the Baker family (friends of the Senklers) who would shortly after be witness to the legal services of prominent Vancouver barrister John Senkler, father of the sisters, as he would defend the Chinese houseboy accused of murdering the Baker’s nursemaid Janet Smith. It remains to this day the most mysterious murder in Vancouver history.

The trip to Banff in ’24 was again a disappointment. Even with Voitkevic, Griffith, Phebe Senkler and Kathleen Carson Patrick still on the roster the Amazons lost in overtime to the Calgary Hollies who would ultimately become 1924 Alpine Cup winners and western champions.

The next year it was the same story. Despite an outstanding performance by goalie Voitkevic the “B.C. fair ones” lost to the “far superior” Calgary Hollies, the “local fair ones”, who went on to defeat the Patricians and Coleman to again win the Alpine Cup.

The 1926 Amazons now featured three Senkler sisters (who’s home on Haro Street would be no more than three short blocks from the Denman Arena) plus returning for her fourth year, the ever-athletic Doris Parkes. Not only a hockey standout, Parkes was a champion speed skater and known both in B.C. and Alberta as an outstanding all-around athlete. Meanwhile at the Tournament, the Amazons opened with a 2-0 victory over a team from Banff but then lost by the same score to the ultimate winners, University of Manitoba.

By 1927 a pattern had emerged as far as the Amazons were concerned. Despite five of the members of the 1922 champion team still on the roster (all five West Enders), the Amazons were just not good enough at the “classic” Banff event, being outclassed mostly by Alberta teams. It had now been close to ten years those West Enders/King George grads had served as the core, the backbone of the Amazons team.

Following the 1927 season it appeared to be the end of the line as the team had all but disbanded. A 7-1 victory over Revelstoke on Feb. 15, 1927 was their last recorded game. However after a three year hiatus the Amazons reorganized led by Doris Parkes, Norah and Phebe Senkler along with six players new to the team. Parkes in particular worked hard to bring the Amazons back to life and back to the Banff Carnival for the 1931 tournament. They defeated Banff 5-0 but then were defeated 3-0 by Edmonton who was en route to the Tournament championship. Parkes performed well playing impressive hockey, doing very well in the speed skating events and acquitting herself well as the 1931 Carnival queen.

By 1932 team captain Parkes was such a familiar sports personality newspapers were referring to the women’s team as “Doris Parkes and her pals”. She did win the 1932 Carnival speed skating gold but the Amazons with a completely new roster outside of Parkes, which included the West End’s Corlett sisters, were once again eliminated by Edmonton who would win its fourth straight Tournament title.

The team did not return for the 1933 tournament, however, as the Amazons had decided to call it a day. Women’s hockey in general was in decline, with men’s professional hockey commanding more resources. In fact, the demise of the Amazons effectively marked the end of women’s hockey in southwest British Columbia. It would be more than three years later that the Denman Arena—the only ice surface in Vancouver and home to generations of young players, from West Enders and King George students to the Millionaires and the Vancouver Amazons—burned to the ground.

Yet the Amazons had enjoyed considerable success over the years. They may not have matched the dominance of some Alberta teams, but that has to be understood in context: unlike most other parts of the country, Vancouver had almost no natural ice, the Denman Arena was the only available rink, and the Amazons faced very little local competition. Despite those limitations, their determination gave them remarkable staying power, along with the energy and optimism of their dedicated players and supporters.

Ann Clark wrote in The Province in 1934, “It will be remembered how in past years the old Amazon team used to cover themselves in glory at this (Banff) great affair. Ice hockey has long been a favourite with Vancouver girls and they have usually been able to more than hold their own with any team they have ever met up with.”

CREDITS & THANKS

This article was originally written in 2019 and gifted to the King George Archives. Fred Hume is a BC athletics historian and entered the UBC Sports Hall of Fame in 2011.