Our Town, Our Teams: Hockey in Elmira

 by Kevin Earley, Alfred University intern

Hockey in Elmira has a storied history to it that most people wouldn’t really think about. From going to the domes in Pine Valley to watch the Elmira College teams play to weekend nights down at First Arena cheering on the professionals, there have been some memorable times for the sport in our neck of the woods.

Elmira College introduced the sport to its athletic program starting in the 1973-1974 season, and it was a very successful program in those early days. In six of their first 16 seasons, they made NCAA Tournament appearances and reached the finals twice, which is no small feat for any college program. In the entire history of the men’s ice hockey program, however, they have never been crowned National Champions despite having multiple years of success. In the 2001-2002 season, the women’s ice hockey program came into existence, and they started their history by winning back-to-back NCAA Division III National Championships in the first two years of the program. They have only missed the NCAA Tournament in 3 out of their 21 years, and they have been one of the most dominant powerhouses in Division III throughout their entire history.

Professional hockey officially came to Elmira in 2000, when the United Hockey League (UHL) awarded a franchise to the city that would be known as the Elmira Jackals. The brand new First Arena, then known as Coach USA Center, had just been completed with the Jackals beginning play in the 2000-2001 season. After an early exit in that year’s playoffs, the Jackals earned a spot in the Colonial Cup Finals in two of the next four seasons, losing both times. Eddy Lowe was a leading player on most of those playoff teams, and eventually got his number 26 retired by the Jackals in 2007, an honor that has not been given to any other professional player for any Elmira team. For their final few years in the UHL, the Jackals missed the playoffs, and never reached a championship series again.

The UHL began to struggle in the mid-2000s, and in April of 2007 the Jackals joined the ECHL, which is the league two levels down from the National Hockey League and is the NHL’s Double-A affiliate league. The Jackals enjoyed some early success in the ECHL, making the playoffs for their first six years in the league while serving as the primary AA affiliate of teams like the Columbus Blue Jackets, Anaheim Ducks, and Ottawa Senators of the NHL. There was a lot of instability, however, due to ownership changes and financial struggles for the team come 2013. In 2014, things seemed to be looking up when the Jackals became the ECHL affiliate of the Buffalo Sabres of the NHL, but those good vibes did not last long as most of Elmira’s talent didn’t really stick around long enough to create a solid team that could compete for a championship, let alone a playoff spot at all. Come 2017, they were owned by the Chemung County Industrial Development Agency (IDA), and as a result of low attendance and arena issues the Jackals folded after playing their final game on April 8th, 2017.

First Arena was pretty much closed throughout the 2017-2018 hockey season, with the exception of the youth hockey programs playing on the recreational rink. In the summer of 2018, it was announced that a new team would come in and play in a league called the Federal Prospects Hockey League, which is a level below the ECHL. The team, owned by Elmira Pioneers baseball team owner Robbie Nichols, became known as the Elmira Enforcers out of tribute to law enforcement. The 2018-2019 season was very good for the new team, but they failed to capture the league championship as they lost in the finals that year. 2019-2020 seemed to be going decently for the Enforcers until the COVID-19 Pandemic hit the United States, causing all sports leagues to shut down and ending the Enforcers’ quest for redemption. The following season was shortened because of the pandemic, and the Enforcers once again did not get the job done as they did not win the title. After the 2020-2021 season, it was announced that the Enforcers would not play in the upcoming season due to Nichols and the Chemung County IDA failing to come to an agreement on a new lease for the arena. The Elmira Enforcers effectively ceased to exist.

Once again, the future of hockey in Elmira was in a cloud of uncertainty. With an arena that had not been properly maintained and with a lack of consistent management, it looked as if professional hockey was done here. However, the arena was leased out and taken over by Steve Donner. It re-opened in December of 2021 under his management for public skating and recreational hockey and it was announced in April of this year that a new FPHL team, the Elmira Mammoth, will be beginning play this coming fall.

Elmira’s hockey history has had many great moments as well as moments that were not so great, and it’s very interesting to look at how much hockey has impacted Chemung County as a whole. It has given the community a lot of exciting memories from the thrilling fights and goals to simply being able to take the family out to the hockey game on a Friday or Saturday night. It’ll be very interesting to see what the future holds for the sport in Elmira.

 

Big Flats and the 1972 Flood

 by Rachel Dworkin, Archivist

1972 was going to be Big Flats’ year! It was the 150^th anniversary of the town’s founding and they had big plans. There were events scheduled throughout the year including a historic fashion show, town reunion, baking contest, art show, canoe race, antique show, and massive birthday party. The highlight of the whole thing was to be the Big Flats Diamond Jubilee three-day extravaganza from June 22^nd through the 24^th. The first night, Thursday the 22^nd, would start with an evening carnival at the Community Park. The next day would feature a firematics event, plus concerts and square dancing. Saturday was to be a massive parade featuring floats from every community organization in the town. Too bad Hurricane Agnes had to come and ruin everything.

Big Flats Jubilee button, 1972

 

The rain from Hurricane Agnes started late in the night on June 21^st and it just kept coming. By the 23^rd, the entire hamlet of Big Flats, plus large swaths of the more rural portions of the town along the Chemung River were under water. Nearly 3,000 residents were forced out of their homes into shelters at schools in neighboring Horseheads. To make matters, two ruptured oil tanks in the hamlet of Big Flats spilled a half-million gallons of gasoline into the flood waters. As the waters receded, crews from Sun Oil, Arco, and Gulf attempted to remove the fuel, but it wasn’t until June 28^th that the fire department declared that the threat of explosions had passed and allowed residents back in. Hundreds of homes were damaged. James A. Markell’s home on Olcott Road was entirely swept off it’s foundation. An additional five homes had to be razed by the town due to structural damage.  

Canal Street in the Hamlet of Big Flats, June 23, 1972

 Big Flats farmers were hit hard. Bill Smith, a State Senator with a dairy farm on Rt. 352, lost 18 of his 75 animals, plus 200 acres of corn, 20 tons of hay, and 10 tons of cow feed. The family had managed to move most of their furniture to the second floor Thursday night and had to be rescued by boat out of a third floor window Friday morning. All told, Chemung County farmers lost $3.5 million in crops and livestock. Thanks to that oil spill, some 4,016 acres of land in Big Flats, Southport, Ashland, and Chemung all showed signs of contamination, rendering them unusable for planting for years to come. Even without the spill, the flood washed away between 6 inches and, in some places near the river, three feet of once-fertile top soil, meaning even uncontaminated farms would struggle come spring. 

Smith farm in Big Flats from the air, June 23, 1972

Big Flats from the air, June 23, 1972

 The oil also polluted people’s drinking wells. In a recent interview with Big Flats resident Gloria Dick, she recalled that her family had been lucky enough to have a well fed by a spring which came down off a hill behind their house. As one of the few homes with safe drinking water, they kept their neighbors supplied. They weren’t the only ones helping. Teens from YES (Youth Emergency Services) under the auspices of Corning Glass Works cleaned flood mud from homes throughout Big Flats. 

As for Big Flats Diamond Jubilee? It was postponed until September, but folks still had a pretty good time. The real tragedy was the town’s planned history book, 150 Years: Big Flats, New York by Mrs. Samuel Farr. The first run of 2,000 copies had finished printing at 4pm on June 22^nd and was ready for sale at the Jubilee, only for the flood to destroy all but 700 copies. To make matters worse, the original manuscript, plus all the original photos, maps, and drawings used in the book were lost, meaning there could be no second edition. 

Town leaders had hoped to make 1972 a year to remember. It was. Just not the way they hoped.