They didn’t come much tougher than Murph Chamberlain. He played 12 NHL seasons with four different clubs and was one of the hardest hitters in the league, no matter what team he suited up for.

Born in Shawville, Quebec, in 1915 Chamberlain headed north to the mining districts of Ontario where he could both play hockey and find work extracting minerals from the Canadian Shield. As it was everywhere else in small-town Canada of the 1930s, hockey was the main live attraction. Miners worked hard and played hard. They liked their hockey players cut from the same cloth.

Chamberlain did not disappoint. Stretching 165 pounds over a 5-foot-11 frame, his ferocious competitive drive made him a feared adversary in bush league rinks from Sudbury to South Porcupine. Skilled offensively, the young forward could skate, shoot and carry the puck. He could also handle the heavy going, be it legally or outside the rules.

After three years of rumours and scouting reports from the hinterland, Chamberlain was summoned to Toronto, where he joined Conn Smythe’s Maple Leafs in time for the 1937-38 season. Playing under coach Dick Irvin’s orders, he picked up 4 goals and a dozen assists in his rookie campaign. More important than his offensive numbers was his robust play, a style that played as well at Maple Leaf Gardens as it had at community rinks named for mining companies. When the schedule came to an end, the rangy

Increasing his offensive numbers the following year to 10 goals and 16 assists, Chamberlain helped the Leafs to the finals in the spring of 1939, where they fell to the Bruins.

In 1940-41 Dick Irvin left Toronto and took over the reins of a lacklustre Montreal Canadiens team. His broom swept through the roster, leaving room for a half-dozen rookies, including future Hall of Famer Elmer Lach. To provide toughness and add some scoring punch he requested that GM Tommy Gorman get him one of his favorite Maple Leafs.

Chamberlain spent 40-41 and half of the next season in Montreal being sent out of town, although not traded, to the New York Americans. In the years before the 6-team league, NHL squads often loaned players back and forth, filling holes without necessarily owning the corks that plugged them.

The Habs loaned the tough left-winger to the Boston Bruins for the 1942-43 season and repatriated him to start the next campaign. Catching the elevator to the top, Chamberlain had the offensive year of his career with 15 goals and 32 assists. His energetic approach to play made him the third-most penalized player in the league.

Paced by the Punch Line, Montreal finished light years ahead of the second place Red wings and won the Stanley Cup for the first time in over a decade, taking only one more than the 8 games needed to do the job. Chamberlain proved that he was a money player in that year’s postseason, potting goals, third-best on the team.

Chamberlain’s best years were spent with the Habs. So were his most enjoyable. Always popular the brash and outspoken “Hardrock” was usually at the thick of things. On the ice he maintained his reputation as one of the NHL’s best brawlers. Off the ice he was one of the hubs of the Habs social life. From time to time he took a raw recruit under his wing, initiating him to delights of Montreal’s nightlife.

When 17-year-old Gerry McNeil reported for his first training camp and found his assigned room at the Queens Hotel, the veteran took his young roommate out on the town, showing him a time that he remembered for the rest of his life. When McNeil arrived at the Forum for the first time the next morning he certainly didn’t look or feel his very best.

Other newcomers weren’t welcomed quite so hospitably. Dick Irvin’s oral history, The Habs, contains an anecdote from Elmer Lach, who relates the fate that befell a prospective new center in the days when Lach’s position was not as solidified as it was to become.

Chamberlain took his buddy aside before the newcomer’s first scrimmage with the Canadiens and told him not to worry. He then went out and administered a beating that sent the prospect back to the Quebec Senior Hockey league for the rest of his career.

Playing a solid second-line role, Chamberlain had his name engraved on the Stanley Cup for a second time in 1946, another year that saw him play a clutch postseason role. He missed a major portion of 1947-48 recovering from a broken leg and retired after the net season’s schedule.

He tried coaching in several towns across Canada in the 15 years following his retirement but Chamberlain’s fiery temperament, while a valued asset in a player, didn’t do him any good behind the bench and many of his coaching jobs ended before the springtime came around.

After leaving hockey Chamberlain found success in the business world and operated a prosperous cattle operation. He passed away in 1986 at the age of 71.

In 510 NHL regular season games Chamberlain scored 100 goals and assisted on 175 others. He was also a successful playoff performer with 14 goal and 17 helpers in 66 postseason games. Perhaps the best measure of the Chamberlain’s contributions to team successes is that only once in his 12 NHL years did his team’s season end with the conclusion of regular season play.