Born in what is now Kitchener, Ontario, in 1893, Frank Selke must have laced skates on at some point in his youth but he realized early on that his path lay away from the ice and began coaching at the age of 14. In 1919, he directed the University of Toronto to the first Memorial Cup and repeated ten years later with the Toronto Marlboros before Conn Smythe hired him as his assistant with the Maple Leafs.

Over his 15 years with the Leafs, Selke did everything there was to do except suit up for the team. He persuaded Smythe that the Maple Leafs only hope for improvement lay in new blood, specifically, the youngsters who played under Selke with the Marlies. In 1931, paced by the Kid Line of Joe Primeau, Harvey “Busher” Jackson and Charlie Conacher, the Leafs took the first Stanley Cup in their history.

The next season, the Maple Leaf Gardens opened, home to the Leafs for the next 68 seasons, a building that would not have been erected were it not for Selke’s ability to convince tradesmen to take a portion of their wages in stock.

With the outbreak of World War II, Smythe, a veteran of the last great conflict, World War I , re-enlisted in the Canadian Army and went overseas, leaving Selke in charge of both the team and the building . Selke made a lot of the right moves, guiding the team to Stanley Cup victories in both 1942 and 1945. He also turned the Gardens into a major profit center by booking a variety of entertainments on the nights that the house was dark. By tripling the number of evenings that MLG was open, he drove profits skyward.

One decision the interim GM made didn’t sit well with his overseas employer even though it paid great dividends for the team. Selke traded the rights to Frank Eddolls to Montreal, the team Smythe had obtained them from previously. He got Ted Kennedy in return, who was instrumental in the 1945 Cup victory and a star for many years wearing blue and white.

When the militaristic Major Smythe returned to Canada, having won the war, there was friction between the two men and Selke moved on after the 1944-45 season, landing in Montreal. Running the Canadiens and their building, he revitalized both. As he had done in Toronto, he brought everything from symphonies to circuses through town, filling the Forum regularly with both touring attractions and local stars, widening the array of sporting events presented, installing both wrestling and boxing as weekly fixtures on the Montreal sporting calendar.

He also signed virtually every promising player in the province to a c-form, binding a generation of youngsters to the Habs, who picked the best among each year’s crop and assigned them to one of the many teams they sponsored or had minor league agreements with, creating hockey’s first farm system, a hierarchy of feeder clubs based on the model that benefited major league baseball for many decades. It guaranteed depth, continuity and an almost endless supply of new recruits, both for the Habs and for the other NHL teams, who didn’t recruit as extensively, since the Habs distributed many of their prospects among their competitors.

This recruiting technique was both cheap and easy work. The $100, which was the standard bonus for signing the c-form was more than most of the kids had ever seen and more than many of their dads made in a month. To be courted by the Canadiens was the greatest honor that could befall a young Quebec “puckster” and to refuse their offer was considered both impolite and very foolish.

There were a few parents who resisted. One father had a third grade education and worked for a power company. He politely refused to indenture his son to the Canadiens, saying that his kid’s future was worth more than a hundred bucks, money that would have certainly come in handy in the late 1940s. His son remained a free agent although the Habs, unable to sign him, put him on their negotiation list, ensuring that when and if the big center turned pro, it would be with Montreal.

In the fall of 1953, the now 21-year-old walked into Frank Selke’s office and walked out with a guaranteed, four-year, $100,000 contract, a first for the NHL, let alone for an unproven rookie. It seems Arthur Beliveau was right. Asked how he managed to finally sign the cornerstone of the franchise for the next 18 years, Selke said that it was quite simple actually, “I just opened the safe and told Jean to help himself.”

The Habs won the Stanley Cup in 1946, Selke’s first year in the GM’s seat, and once the kids in the pipeline started arriving in the NHL, deposed Detroit as the league’s most successful club, winning it all in 1953 and capturing five straight Stanley Cups to close out the 1950s.

Selke’s time with Montreal ended when he turned the reins over to Sam Pollock following the 1963-64 schedule but his imprint remained as teams made of up largely of men he developed won four more titles in the 1960s. Elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame as a builder in 1960, Selke is also enshrined in the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame. While he died in 1985, Frank Selke’s name is still bandied about the NHL when it comes time to choose the NHL’s top defensive forward.