Barney Holden Scored First Professional Goal

Barney Holden was well known in Winnipeg as an amateur baseball player before he started playing semi-pro hockey in his hometown.

Holden left Manitoba for Portage Lake, Michigan where he turned professional in the infamously rough International Hockey League. He helped Portage Lake win three consecutive championships.

It was hockey's first professional league, and Holden is the answer to an interesting trivia question: he scored the first goal, in the first game, of the very first professional hockey league on December 9, 1904 in Pittsburgh's Duquesne Gardens.

Read all about Barney Holden. You can also order the book Cross Check!, written by Holden's grandson, Dan.