GEORGE WILLIAM FEENEY
(December 28, 1895 – August 21, 1975)
New Westminster Salmonbellies (1920-1924)
George Feeney, younger brother of the outstanding Salmonbellies speedster James ‘Pat’ Feeney, was a versatile athlete whose lacrosse career spanned an awkward and transitional era of the game – bridging the twilight years of the professional game, the doldrum years of the amateur field game in the late 1920s and early 1930s, into the nascent days of the indoor box game. Feeney also successfully navigated the contentious divide between professionalism and amateurism in Canadian sports, and the obstacles he faced exposed some of the first cracks of double-standards and hypocrisy in the amateurism debate which dominated all sports in Canada in the early 20th Century.
Born in New Westminster in 1895, he started out in lacrosse as a goaltender with the West End intermediate team in 1911. He played between the posts for two seasons until he found his true talent at the opposite end of the playing field as an attacking midfielder.
Still in his teens, George Feeney moved up to the senior amateur ranks in 1914 when he joined the New Westminster Salmonbellies in the Pacific Coast Amateur Lacrosse Association.
1915 prove to be a very busy year for him, as he helped New Westminster Salmonbellies win their first-ever Mann Cup when the formidable Vancouver Athletic Club dynasty was dethroned after four years’ dominance.
He played baseball in the local church league that year as a shortstop, helping the Electrics team win the championship – in the process being heralded as the team’s ‘star player’ in their title game. He also played soccer in 1915 with Westminster United at inside right wing. Along with lacrosse, baseball, and soccer, he was well-regarded as a bowler, on the athletic track, and in trap-shooting.
However, “one of the most versatile athletics in the Pacific Northwest” ran into problems with the British Columbia Amateur Athletic Union in 1916. Feeney was banned from playing soccer, after the local New Westminster amateur baseball league was disrupted by the war and he was then induced to suit up for few games for a team in a league deemed ‘outlaw’ and semi-pro by the amateur authorities.
In October 1916 he applied for reinstatement – or “whitewashing”, as it was disparagingly referred to in the parlance of the day. The issue was plagued by poor and murky communication when it ended up going to the national authorities and his case was used by some newspapers as glaring evidence of the inconsistent state of amateur sports at the time in regards to fringe or questionable ‘professionals’ inadvertently caught up in the bureaucracy that was chronic between different athletic endeavours.
Although never explicitly saying outright, it was clear in the minds of some in sporting circles and the press that their thinking was ‘who cares if a pro athlete in one sport partakes as an amateur in a completely different athletic activity?’ This thinking was compounded by the war years, when double-standards arose when those professionals who were serving military personnel, were given a free-pass exemption from the ban on playing against amateurs due to a belief about helping the war effort.
After six months spent on the sidelines, he was finally reinstated by the BCAAU on April 9, 1917, and a month later he resumed his sporting activity when he signed with the National Biscuit team in the local Commercial baseball League. He also signed on with the Vancouver Hearts soccer team. Despite the six months of inactivity, Feeney had not lost any of his form.
George Feeney suited up for some of the Patriotic lacrosse matches held in 1917. These were a series of exhibition matches which saw professionals and amateurs mixed together on the playing field to help raise money in support of the war relief effort.
In November 1917, Feeney enlisted with the Royal Flying Corps but did not leave for overseas until the last week of February 1918.
He arrived in England around April 13, 1918 and was quartered at Seaford Camp, located near the town of Eastbourne on the Sussex coast. During the trip there, he witnessed firsthand the excitement and dangers of a submarine hunt when his transport narrowly missed being torpedoed by a German submarine, by about twenty feet, before it was then sunk by some convoy destroyers.
Stationed in England, he managed to find time to play baseball with the local Seaford team versus convalescing hospital soldiers. While George Fenney had his heart set on becoming a flyer, he did not pass the medical qualifications. He was assigned to the reserves at Seaford and the only wartime action he would experience – apart his journey across the Atlantic – were those battles fought on the playing field, with lacrosse, baseball, and soccer teams in the south of England while wearing the colours of the First British Columbia Reserve Depot.
He returned home from England on July 25, 1919. Within weeks of his return, he was back out playing lacrosse with the senior Salmonbellies.
In April 1920, he was poached from the amateurs to sign with the professional New Westminster Salmonbellies.
George Feeney would play 5 seasons in the professional game, scoring 36 goals in 64 games. He was generally found in the second home position on the midfield wings, although he did play half a season as the centreman in 1920. His 1923 campaign saw him filling mostly a substitute role – although with the tabulation of assists introduced that year, his numbers showed him to be an adept player maker and set-up man. During those two seasons (or 19 games) where assists were officially recorded, George Feeney led with 15 career assists to give him a total 51 career points. He finished tied in 15th for career goals and 11th for career points – impressive numbers for such as short career as his, as well as for being a midfielder.
After professional lacrosse died suddenly in June 1924, George Feeney once again applied for reinstatement to the amateur ranks. He ran into problems in 1925 whilst playing soccer for Westminster United and was once again suspended. He was reinstated, for a second time, as an amateur sometime in December 1926.
Feeney travelled with the New Westminster Salmonbellies team to participate in the lacrosse demonstration at the 1928 Amsterdam Summer Olympics, but was disqualified from playing due to strict Olympic regulations thanks to his former professional status. He ended up watching and assisting the team from the sidelines along with his also-banned teammates Harold ‘Haddie’ Stoddart and the Patchell brothers.
George Feeney’s best years as a lacrosse player probably occurred during the mid-1920s and early 1930s when the field game was dying its slow and inevitable death from disorganisation and spectator indifference.
He was at the top of his game during the 1930 season. Paired up with Harold ‘Haddie’ Stoddart, they made for a deadly scoring duo against their hapless Vancouver opponents in provincial play. He fractured a rib during the Western Canada finals against the Edmonton Native Sons and missed the Dominion semi-finals that followed versus Winnipeg Argonauts, but healed enough to return and help lead New Westminster in their losing effort against the Brampton Excelsiors in the Mann Cup finals.
His final season of field lacrosse followed in 1931, when he participated in very the last Mann Cup series played under field rules. The series was memorialised by a 360° spherical panoramic photograph taken of the players of both teams positioned on the playing field (some who devilishly moved about to appear multiple times in the same image) and crowd at Queens Park. The Salmonbellies once again fell to the Excelsiors in three games.
George Feeney travelled to Los Angeles as a spectator at the 1932 Olympic Games and ended up as the judge of play for all three lacrosse demonstration matches played.
He made a comeback in 1933, this time in the box game and scored 8 goals for the Salmonbellies at the age of 38. He broke his wrist (some reports say his arm) playing in the playoffs after being checked into the boards. He returned for the final Mann Cup game in October 1933. He started in the game in bandages (and pain) before leaving and watching the final half of the game in civvies.
There were rumours of him jumping for the rival New Westminster Adanacs in 1934 but he never played any games in the purple and gold; he later became manager of the team. He refereed in the women’s league in 1937. In June 1938 he played in an oldtimers game versus a junior squad.
In 1938, when some of the former 1908 New Westminster Salmonbellies players were upset and “raised beef” about the re-classification of the Minto Cup, George was one those who voiced his support in favour of the kids getting their hands on the silverware.
In 1952, he attended the first reunion of the 1928 Salmonbellies team, held at the Elks Club in New Westminster.
George Feeney was inducted into the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1969, in the field player category.
There is not much information regarding his employment, although a newspaper article from 1915 mentions he worked at New Westminster City Hall in the engineering department, until he was then transferred to the treasurer’s office at reduced wages to replace a resigned staff member. Eleven days after his transfer, Feeney quit his job at city hall and was hired by the Dominion Bank.
He was a life-member of the B.P.O. Elks Lodge in New Westminster.
His only daughter Norma Phillips passed away suddenly on April 10, 1971. George Feeney passed away on August 21, 1975 and was survived by his wife Verna, 2 grand-daughters and 9 great-grandchildren. His funeral took place just two days later and he was interred at St. Peter’s Cemetery in New Westminster. His last place of residence listed was at the Edgewater apartments located at 707 Seventh Avenue in New Westminster.
(PHOTO SOURCES: CLHOF X994.98b; Vancouver Daily Province February 3, 1917; CLHOF X994.16 (excerpt); Vancouver Sun September 5, 1931)
Old School Lacrosse 